The Daily Background

Remember that nasty propaganda business a while back? In case you don’t, you could either click on the previous link- or read th next sentence. Good choice; the story was that the Pentagon was using our tax money (tens of millions of dollars, or more) to pay private right wing groups to pay off the Iraqi press in order to plant their own propaganda stories.

The polls are in. And I’m frankly not surprised in the least bit. USA TODAY, CNN and Gallup:

Almost three-quarters of Americans think it was wrong for the Pentagon to pay Iraqi newspapers to publish news about U.S. efforts in Iraq, a new USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll shows.

USA TODAY reported earlier this month that the Pentagon plans to expand beyond Iraq an anti-terrorism public relations campaign that has included secret payments to Iraqi journalists and publications who printed stories favorable to the USA. In some cases, the stories will be prepared by U.S. military personnel, as they have been in Iraq.

[…]
Word of the payments to Iraqi journalists followed stories earlier this year about work awarded by the federal government to a few newspaper columnists in the USA who support Bush administration policies. The payments included $240,000 to commentator Armstrong Williams.

Some critics of the administration see a pattern.

“These are all parts of an effort by the administration to manipulate information,” says David Brock, president of the liberal watchdog group Media Matters for America.

Full Article here.

Filed under: Tax Money, Pentagon Propaganda, Z-TDB Blog