from:alt.conspiracy
As, always, Caveat Lector
Om
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Click Here: The Sold-Out Media<
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Subject: The Sold-Out Media
From: Freedom Project mailto:Use-Author-Address-Header@[127.1]">Use-A
uthor-Address-Header@[127.1]
Date: Tue, May 23, 2000 11:36 AM
Message-id: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
posted by: "Tom Keske" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> When we published the Pentagon Papers and exposed Water Gate and Deep
> Throat - we gave the American people the truth. When we publish pieces
> like the above we make ourselves stronger as a reputable newspaper and
> accurate source of information. The monetary value of that type of
> reputation is almost beyond calculation. The dissidents shouldn't think
> for one blessed moment that if there was any legitimacy to their arguments
> we wouldn't publish them. There are to many hungry young reporters who
> would gladly ferret it out and love to be in the position of making their
> careers for life ala Woodward and Bernstein. Not to mention the
> accompanying Pulitzer Prizes, Movie rights, book deals, etc.
I imagine that this might even be a sincere and well-intended view, but
I think that it is almost total baloney.I say this not particularly
in support of the Duesberg camp of dissidents, but on behalf
of unorthodox views in general.
It is part of the problem- these are precisely the kind of terms that
most people think in: big money, movie rights, book deals.
We are a nation of couch potatoes who want to be millionaires
and celebrities. That is precisely why most journalists will *not*
touch the story of AIDS origin. It violates too many sacred cows-
America's supposed decency, the basic legitimacy of our most
powerful political institutions.
What if the truth isn't good for a book deal? What if you spend
much of your life writing a major book, intelligently and
meticulously documented, then run around to every major publisher
on the planet and find not a single one willing to touch it? I converse
with AIDS authors- brilliant and knowledgable people- who have
precisely such stories.
What if it is worse than that? Who has the rights to the
"Danny Casolaro Story"?Who made money from the
miniseries? Who has the movie rights to the "Ted Strecker
Story"?
What if the chasing of political corruption is good for being
a victim of political murder, covered up and called suicide?
What if it is good for a ruined career? What if it is good
for nothing but becoming a ridiculed pariah?
I've had direct experience with the Washington Post- it must
have been more than 10 years ago that I paid about $5000 to
get a short political message printed in the paper. I had to
fight with them for the right to do it, threatening a sit-in at their
lobby and a public hunger strike.
This was a different issue, long before I even became interested
in AIDS origin. They told me that their lawyers had approved
my ad, but they just wanted documentation concerning one
specific statement. I quoted to them a direct passage from
a book that the Washington Post itself had given a stellar
review, directly backing the statement.
The message was a generic wording about the need to be on guard
against CIA abuses. I was concerned about certain technological
abilities that they had allegedly developed, that were an open
ticket to further abuse.What I was describing was not really
new information, simply very-little known and not put into
context.
The Post then did an about-face, refusing to publish and
refusing to give an explanation why they would not publish.
I had to delete the politically sensitive references, before
I could get the remainder into print.
As for Bob Woodward, I think that he is an establishment
sell-out who pretends to write "expose", but it really just
playing at the role, avoiding anything truly serious or
hard-hitting.After all, if he seriously challenged major
political powers, his access would be totally cut off, and
he would no longer be able to get his little tid-bits of
gossip to write his pretend-exposes.
We are not only a nation of couch potatoes and sheep,
but a nation of phonies and ever-present myth.
> In addition there is a very viable counter weight to the major papers.
The
> minority press - The Washington Blade, The Advocate, POZ, the various City
> Papers etc. have every incentive economic and otherwise to explore the
> issue of HIV and its origins. In addition the are several organizations
> within the newspaper / media industry who have incentive to investigate -
> among them are the National Lesbian Gay Journalists Association, Hispanic
> Journalists Association, Black Journalists, Native American Journalists -
> these groups also have committees that work together to monitor the
> portrayal of minorities in the mainstream press.
>
There is no real "leftist" or "alternative" press left- it has been tamed,
watered-down, compromised, infiltrated, destroyed. The few brave
souls who really probed political scandal and AID
