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Catherina

(35,568 posts)
Tue Apr 22, 2014, 10:45 PM Apr 2014

Robert Parry: "Prepping for a Ukrainian Massacre"

Prepping for a Ukrainian Massacre
April 22, 2014

Exclusive: As the rhetoric rages out of control, worsening violence in Ukraine grows more likely. Official Washington is readying the American people to view the slaughter of eastern Ukrainians as justified because they are “terrorists” and linked to the hated Russians, Robert Parry reports.

By Robert Parry

Between the anti-Russian propaganda pouring forth from the Obama administration and the deeply biased coverage from the U.S. news media, the American people are being prepared to accept and perhaps even cheer a massacre of eastern Ukrainians who have risen up against the coup regime in Kiev.

The protesters who have seized government buildings in ten towns in eastern Ukraine are being casually dubbed “terrorists” by both the Kiev regime and some American journalists. Meanwhile, it’s become conventional wisdom in Official Washington to assume that the protesters are led by Russian special forces because of some dubious photographs of armed men, accepted as “proof” with few questions asked by the mainstream U.S. news media.

While the U.S. news media is treating these blurry photos as the slam-dunk evidence of direct Russian control of the eastern Ukrainian protests – despite denials by the Russian government and the protesters – the BBC was among the few news agencies that provided a more objective assessment, noting that the photos are open to a variety of interpretations.

(body snipped, read at link)

Yet, rather than assess these events objectively, the U.S. government and the mainstream U.S. news media have slid into a neo-Cold War madness, which may be sated only by the blood of the eastern Ukrainian “terrorists.” That, however, could force Putin’s hand again and take this unnecessary crisis to a whole new level.

http://consortiumnews.com/2014/04/22/prepping-for-a-ukrainian-massacre/




Quote of the year:


"Indeed, in my four-plus decades in journalism, I have never seen a more thoroughly biased and misleading performance by the major U.S. news media. Even during the days of Ronald Reagan – when much of the government’s modern propaganda structure was created – there was more independence in major news outlets. There were media stampedes off the reality cliff during George H.W. Bush’s Persian Gulf War and George W. Bush’s Iraq War, both of which were marked by demonstrably false claims that were readily swallowed by the big U.S. news outlets.

But there is something utterly Orwellian in the current coverage of the Ukraine crisis, including accusing others of “propaganda” when their accounts – though surely not perfect – are much more honest and more accurate than what the U.S. press corps has been producing.

There’s also the added risk that this latest failure by the U.S. press corps is occurring on the border of Russia, a nuclear-armed state that – along with the United States – could exterminate all life on the planet. The biased U.S. news coverage is now feeding into political demands to send U.S. military aid to Ukraine’s coup regime.

The casualness of this propaganda – as it spreads across the U.S. media spectrum from Fox News to MSNBC, from the Washington Post to the New York Times – is not just wretched journalism but it is reckless malfeasance jeopardizing the lives of many Ukrainians and the future of the planet."


Robert Parry, Ukraine, Through the US Looking Glass, April 16, 2014

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/04/16-6

13 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
 

bobthedrummer

(26,083 posts)
11. I, for one, disagree with you Duckhunter935. Did you read the article, did it expand your knowledge
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 04:54 PM
Apr 2014

why don't you expound a bit on that if you're up to it.

 

ballyhoo

(2,060 posts)
2. Catherina, the media may well get what they want
Tue Apr 22, 2014, 10:54 PM
Apr 2014

with their lies and deceptions. Putin will not back down, I don't believe and those Fencers will not be making Buzz runs when the situation explodes. And the world will learn another lesson. I just hope that lesson doesn't involve mushroom-shaped clouds. You know this situation is getting really out of hand, even on this board. It's all getting strange and a little scary.

Catherina

(35,568 posts)
5. Just wait a few years. Then everyone will pretend they were against it or were misunderstood
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 12:35 AM
Apr 2014

Meanwhile in other news today, the Right Sektor in Lviv, neonazi HQs of Ukraine, told the OSCE they're forming a political party

The Lviv team met with the Head of the Right Sector in the city. He declared that all activities of the Right Sector were aimed at supporting the efforts to enhance the defense of the country (including. registering volunteers, providing them with basic physical training without weapons) and that they were co-ordinated with the National Security Council of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Armed Forces. He also asserted that the Right Sector had dissolved its militant wing. It was transforming into a political party and did not consider itself to be a part of the "armed groups" mentioned in the Geneva Statement.

4/21/2014

http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/117912


This part is really cute "He also asserted that the Right Sector had dissolved its militant wing." because just a few days ago the same people told the OSCE that they sent 100 Right Sektor paramilitaries into Donetsk.

The Lviv Team was told by Right Sector activists that they had begun recruiting for their paramilitary structure on 14 April. They said that approximately 100 paramilitaries had already been deployed to Donetsk region and were being trained in the eastern part of the country. One of the paramilitaries seen in Lviv was wearing a new military uniform, including a flak jacket, but carried no weapons.

4/15/2014

http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/117787

Igel

(35,268 posts)
13. Making both reports true requires little effort.
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 08:23 PM
Apr 2014

Too much, apparently.

There are "activists" that are Democratic on DU with a variety of views. Some of these views are firmly contrary to prominent Democrats. In some cases, the activists are proud of their views and of acting independently.

For RS activists to do one thing even as the officials in charge of the organization do something else shouldn't be surprising. The ranks grew markedly in recent times; we can consider them "fellow-travellers" in many cases. It's not an uncommon change: Svoboda did the same kind of mutation in the last 10 years, so if you want really unambiguously scurrilous quotes by svobodchiky you really need to go back a ways.

In fact, in Ukraine we see a lot of people making the same argument: Russian activists are doing one thing, while the Russian leaders are doing something else. Or we have RP folk doing one thing while RP activists do something else. The problem is thinking of groups of people not as groups of people but as blocks devoid of individuality and freedom to act independently in the name of a cause. In other words, the problem is not thinking.


In other news, it's been reported that obtaining "camo" and quasi-military garb is a slam-dunk in some areas. That was reporting in defense of russkoiazynye protesters being independent from Russian military. This reporting works also as defense of RP folk.

Judi Lynn

(160,408 posts)
3. Thank you for highlighting the quote from the last part of Robert Parry's article.
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 12:12 AM
Apr 2014

He's bee writing a long time, he knows whereof he speaks, clearly.

I was glad he focused on the NY Times' latest Judith Miller model, David M. Herszenhorn:

[center][/center]
How could any human being want to involve his only, unique human energy in something as twisted, as empty of integrity as what he does every day? Unbelievable.

No amount of money could every compensate his fall into shabbiness. He has sold himself. Maybe it's something beyond that, maybe they are holding his family, threatening to murderize them if he doesn't prostitute himself, and sell out the human race, and his own moral directive to live as an honorable man.

Catherina

(35,568 posts)
4. Parry's been a consistent voice of sanity for 40 years
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 12:29 AM
Apr 2014

I was happy to see this latest article too.

Meanwhile the same people who've been wrong about everything, are screaming for more war blood at the top of their lungs.

Do they every apologize to Iraq? Afghanistan? Libya? Syria? Vietnam? Guatemala?

No, they just move from country to country, massacring people without ever an apology.

 

ballyhoo

(2,060 posts)
8. Hi Judi Lynn.....
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 01:00 AM
Apr 2014

...now that you and Catherina have mentioned him I'm going to DD him tomorrow. What good would any bonus be if it's too radioactive everywhere to spend it. These lies are so transparent. Like reading Pravda.

 
7. We need to get the word out that the media is manipulating the public
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 12:59 AM
Apr 2014

The media is manipulating the public about Ukraine. Here are two videos for the background context of what is going on right now: VIDEO: "Subversive Ukraine Coup Threat Pushed Russia & Crimea Referendum"



And VIDEO: "Call Exposes U.S. Scheming on Ukraine & Hypocrisy about Ukrainian Democracy"
 

ballyhoo

(2,060 posts)
9. Thanks for those videos. They
Wed Apr 23, 2014, 01:16 AM
Apr 2014

were excellent. The Neocons are driving hard again and playing a dangerous game. Thanks again.

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