Who’s the Propagandist: US or RT

[Judi Lynn]

Who’s the Propagandist: US or RT?

May 1, 2014

Exclusive: After Secretary of State Kerry lashed out at Russia’s RT network over its reporting on Ukraine, a senior aide assembled a list of particulars, which have backfired by showing how weak Kerry’s case is and how hypocritical Kerry’s State Department has been, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

The U.S. State Department, which has been caught promoting a series of false or dubious stories about Ukraine, is trying to give some substance to Secretary of State John Kerry’s counter-complaint that Russia’s RT network is a “propaganda bullhorn” promoting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “fantasy.”

In a “Dipnote” of April 29, Richard Stengel, under secretary of state for public diplomacy, made some broad-brush criticisms of RT’s content – accusing the network of painting “a dangerous and false picture of Ukraine’s legitimate government” by citing examples of fascism, anti-Semitism and terrorism surrounding the Kiev regime.

Stengel claims he knows the difference between news and propaganda because he spent seven years as managing editor of Time. He defines propaganda as “the deliberate dissemination of information that you know to be false or misleading in order to influence an audience” and asserts: “RT is a distortion machine, not a news organization.”

But Stengel offers no specific citations of the supposedly propagandistic stories done by RT, making it impossible to ascertain the precise wording or context of the RT content that he is criticizing. One basic rule of journalism is “show, don’t tell,” but Stengel apparently didn’t learn that during his seven years in the top echelon of Time magazine.

More:
http://consortiumnews.com/2014/05/01/whos-the-propagandist-us-or-rt/

[MADem]

1. Answer: RT....and "Consortium News." nt

[EmilyAnne]

2. You nailed it. nt

[Hissyspit]

3. Did s/he?

There's no actual counter-argument there.

[EmilyAnne]

13. He nailed the fact that RT and Consortium are propagandist.

And that's all she wrote.

[Hissyspit]

30. So is the U.S. government.

[Judi Lynn]

4. Why attack the author, Robert Parry?

What does he say you find unacceptable?

What writer would you suggest his readers start looking for after they rush to forget Robert Parry, after seeing your valuable assessment? Show them the way.

His Wikipedia:

Robert Parry is an American investigative journalist best known for his role in covering the Iran-Contra affair for the Associated Press and Newsweek, including breaking the Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare (CIA manual provided to the Nicaraguan contras) and the CIA and Contras cocaine trafficking in the US scandal in 1985. He was awarded the George Polk Award for National Reporting in 1984. He has been the editor of ConsortiumNews.com since 1995.

Career[edit]

Parry joined the Associated Press in 1974, moving to its Washington bureau in 1977. After the 1980 presidential election he was assigned to its Special Assignment (investigative reporting) unit, where he began working on Central America.[1] In 1982 Parry noted the treatment received by the New York Times' Raymond Bonner, who was vilified and pushed out after reporting on the El Mozote massacre, an incident deeply unhelpful to the US government's effort to support the El Salvador government.[1]

Parry was awarded the George Polk Award for National Reporting in 1984 for his work with the Associated Press on Iran-Contra, where he broke the story that the Central Intelligence Agency had provided an assassination manual to the Nicaraguan Contras (Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare).[2][3] In mid-1985 he wrote the first article on Oliver North's involvement in the affair, and, together with Brian Barger, in late 1985 he broke the CIA and Contras cocaine trafficking in the US scandal,[4] helping to spark Senator John Kerry's interest in investigating Iran-Contra.[5] The Associated Press had refused to publish the drug trafficking story, and only relented when its Spanish-language newswire service accidentally published a translation.[3] Barger and Parry continued to press their investigation of North even as most of the media declined to follow it up, eventually publishing a story in mid-1986, based on 24 sources, which led to a Congressional committee asking questions of North. After North denied the allegations, Barger was pushed out of Associated Press, and Parry was unable to publish any further follow-ups to the story until after Eugene Hasenfus' plane (Corporate Air Services HPF821) was shot down in Nicaragua in October 1986.[1] After finding out that his boss had been "conferring with [Oliver] North on a regular basis", Parry left AP in 1987 to join Newsweek.[3] At Newsweek an early story concerned United States National Security Council staff being ordered by the White House to cover up aspects of the Iran-Contra affair, which Newsweek, under great political and media pressure, asked Parry to retract, despite his source holding firm. Parry refused, and he eventually left in Newsweek in 1990.[6]

In August 1990 PBS' Frontline asked Parry to work on the October Surprise conspiracy theory,[1] leading to Parry making several documentaries for the program,[6][7][8] broadcast in 1991 and 1992. He continued to pursue it after a Congressional investigation had concluded the story was untrue, turning his Frontline research into a book published in 1993,[9] and in 1994 he unearthed "a treasure-trove of government documents" supporting the theory,[6] "showing that the [Congressional] task force suppressed incriminating CIA testimony and excluded evidence of big-money links between wealthy Republicans and Carter's Iranian intermediary, Cyrus Hashemi".[3] In 1996 Salon.com wrote about his work on the theory, saying that "his continuing quest to unearth the facts of the alleged October Surprise has made him persona non grata among those who worship at the altar of conventional wisdom."[6]

Consortium News[edit]

In November 1995, Parry established Consortium News as an online ezine dedicated to investigative journalism, describing it in 2004 as "a home for important, well-reported stories that weren't welcome in the O.J. Simpson-obsessed, conventional-wisdom-driven national news media of that time". From 2000 to 2004, he also worked for the financial wire service Bloomberg.[10]

Subjects of Parry's articles and reports on Consortium News include the presidency of George W. Bush,[11] the career of Army general and Bush Secretary of State Colin Powell (with Norman Solomon),[12] the October Surprise controversy of the 1980 election,[13] the Nicaraguan contra-cocaine investigation,[14] the efforts to impeach President Clinton,[15] right-wing terrorism in Latin America,[16] the political influence of Sun Myung Moon,[17] mainstream American media imbalance,[18] United States Secretary of Defense Robert Gates,[19] the presidency of Barack Obama,[20] the influence of Sarah Palin,[21] efforts to rewrite history[22] as well as international stories.[23]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Parry_(journalist)

[polly7]

6. Truth hurts, I guess ......

(Propaganda Watch) NYT Retracts Russian-Photo Scoop - by Robert Parry

NYT Retracts Russian-Photo Scoop
April 23, 2014

http://www.democraticunderground.com/101691385




Robert Parry: Ukrainians Get IMF's Bitter Medicine

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/22922-focus-ukrainians-get-imfs-bitter-medicine

Ukraine, Through the US Looking Glass
by Robert Parry

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/04/16-6#.U08-A2AojKI.facebook

Robert Parry: Why Neocons Seek to Destabilize Russia

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/23376-focus-why-neocons-seek-to-destabilize-russia


He's been right all along. I have no idea why some support brutal austerity and suffering for yet another country, but as long as Russia can be seen as the cause of it, I guess no harm no foul ...

[newfie11]

9. +1

[Judi Lynn]

34. Not to miss Parry links. He has earned my respect. Thank you, Polly. n/t

[Bluenorthwest]

12. He's promoting a wildly anti gay propaganda machine for his own profit and self promotion

which is a morally vacant action. I understand that straights have limited empathetic skills, but surely you can see that citing a racist outlet would be at least questionable, right? Well, the bigotry of RT toward gay people is exactly the same thing. It is good to criticize our own mediocre media, but that is not reason to pump up the KKK newsletter as some source of righteous truth. Folks who promote homophobic bigots are in general homophobic bigots.
Also, anyone who presents a binary 'who is good guy, who is bad guy' choice among two great imperialistic powers is offering a choice so false that the person should never be trusted in any area.
The answer is that all media is a propaganda. Anyone who seeks to frame their own media as 'fair and balanced' is a liar.

[newthinking]

24. In which case you will then admit the Stances of the current Leaders of Ukraine?

Folks here completely ignore the fact that these parties, even the fatherland collation, are heavily right wing parties. The Party of Regions was actually the more liberal of the major parties. So it is somewhat inconsistent (or uninformed) act like there is a large gap in these areas between Russia and Ukraine's current parties in power.

New Ukraine President
In August 2007, Turchynov replied to the accusation that his stance on same-sex marriage is typically conservative, "I do not agree. If a man has normal views, then you label him a conservative, but those who use drugs or promote sodomy, you label them a progressive person. All of these are perversions".http://web.archive.org/web/20080820220202/http://www.lgf.org.uk/news/research-2/overview-of-lesbian-and-gay-rights-in-eastern-europe/

Oleksandr Turchynov is an elder in a conservative Evangelical Church. We know how Evangelical Churches view gays.

Ukrainian PM
Ukraine Opposition Surprises Supporters by Denouncing Gay Marriage (Fatherland leader and now Prime Minister)
http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/ukraine-opposition-surprises-supporters-by-denouncing-gay-marriage-198940821.html

Svoboda is heavily anti-gay

Member of parliament Ihor Miroshnychenko asked the head of the Kiev City State Administration Oleksandr Popov on 7 March 2013 to ban an LGBT march that was held the next day because he believed it would "contribute to promoting sexual orientation" and he further stated in his request "homosexuality provokes sexually transmitted diseases and AIDS".[98] The 8 March rally was in fact not an LGBT march but organized by feminist organizations.[99]

Need we even mention the further right parties?

[MADem]

17. Where did I "attack the author" or even mention his name? Don't do that. I will point it out.

Consortium News is a load of horseshit. It doesn't matter WHAT subjects they cover, it matters how they cover them--and they do it poorly and with bias.

Read with jaundiced eye.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

46. I'll for one go on record in saying Parry has mortgaged away whatever credibility he had left.

Yes, back in the day the man may have been a respectable investigative journalist, but if you look at any of his recent articles on the Ukrainian crisis, it is nothing but RT Russian propaganda spin and blatant pandering to the western conspiracy crowd.

Parry's essentially the Cuba Gooding Jr. of journalists--at one time award-winning and someone who showed a lot of depth and promise. And then somewhere along the line he got knocked off track, and you look at him and he's doing the journalistic equivalent of "Boat Trip", "Daddy Day Camp" or some straight to DVD hot mess.

For example, in one of his most recent pieces concerning the recent deadly riots, instead of noting the fact that the violence was two-sided, and that the ultimate deadly blaze at the trade union building was in part provoked by Pro-Russian gunmen apparently shooting at Pro-Ukrainian demonstrators, he instead choose the cheap way out and reported as if the Pro-Ukrainian mob had marched over to the building without any sort of provocation whatsoever. And then he compares it to World War II atrocities in which any similarity is surface deep. In other words, complete and utter parroting of the Pro-Russian line. Real investigative journalists don't do blatant and in your face propaganda pieces like that. They don't distort or misrepresent the truth like that.

I honestly don't know who's worse--Parry, who years ago had journalistic scruples but now is nothing more than a sensationalist shill for a repressive, imperialistic government; or RT's Man in Havan--err, I mean Slovyansk, Graham Phillips, who's essentially a glorified British sex tourist in Ukraine who somehow managed to weasel his way into a war reporter job and who makes undeniably biased statements of his own personal beliefs in the process. Both have provided a great disservice to fair, accurate and objective reporting in this very serious story.

[Adrahil]

35. +1000 NT

[polly7]

5. oops, replied to wrong post ... nt.

[Bluenorthwest]

7. RT lies about the anti gay laws, about gay people.

RT would like to see done to LGBT people what Russia did to the indigenous Crimean Tatars in 1944. Every day it pushes toward that genocidal goal.
You will note that none of the RT promoters ever speak of the ethnic cleansing of the Tatars. They pretend it never happened, and declare Crimea to have been 'always Russian'. Really a terrible thing to do, the workers at RT are all of them complicit in lying to cover up crimes against humanity.

[newfie11]

8. After being lied into a war in Iraq I don't take anything coming from our MSM as truth.

I watch RT as well. It's time American stopped believing everything fed to us by the MSM.

[Duckhunter935]

16. at least the MSM

covered and exposed the lies. Late yes but they eventually did. RT not so much.

[JoeyT]

10. It doesn't have to be one or the other.

They're both perfectly happy to peddle propaganda when it suits them.

[Duckhunter935]

11. RT

is 100% propaganda and I am sure there is a few stories in the US press but it is no contest which is worse. One outright lies and will not run a retraction like the US press.

[TBF]

14. How do you know they are lying -

have you been to Russia?

[Adrahil]

36. This kind of reminds me of creationist arguments.

"How do you know? Were you there?"

[TBF]

41. And your comment sort of reminds me of the book 1984 -

in a "shut up and stick with the party program" kind of way.

[Adrahil]

42. LOL.... Suuuurrrreeee...

You continue to swallow RT.... owned and run by Putin'S government, a man famous for dealing with dissenters quickly and harshly, and tell ME about toeing the "party program."

You can't make this stuff up, folks!

[TBF]

43. Who do you think owns the media here -

Rupert Murdock. One depraved old white guy telling the rest of the world what to think.

You can do a search - I am no fan of Putin and find him to be a thug. But to think RT is the only propaganda out there is so silly you can't possibly be serious.

The really sad thing, even sadder than your blind loyalty, is the fact that so many countries have horrible records regarding how they treat humans.

You can read about the US here - http://www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/countries/americas/usa (don't miss the story about the botched execution in Oklahoma).

[Adrahil]

44. Sure buddy... keep watching RT. I'll keep laughing. NT.

[bvar22]

15. Why do we have to choose one?

Who is blacker?
The Kettle or The Pot?

I find legitimate news and commentary on RT, like Thom Hartmann, Environment, outside commentary on US Politics, the non-Corporate viewpoint on many issues, good in-depth documentaries ( not the ADD mini stories or DocuDramas you get from the US MSM).

The ONLY place I could find that carried the 3rd Party Debates in 2012 was RT.
At least there was some honest debate about important ISSUES that both dominant Parties ignored (becuase they both agree 100% on these issues).

In these United States, EVERYTHING must be checked &cross checked..... The US MSM, Cable Outlets, Internet, Foreign media.... everything.

Attacking RT is like hard core FOX viewers attacking MSNBC.
We need MORE outlets, not fewer.

[MADem]

19. No it isn't. RT is the personal propaganda arm of Vladimir Putin.

They propagandize his personal attitudes, vision and beliefs and they do not ever contradict him. Their sole goal is to make you think the way he does. And that includes all that gay-hating nastiness.

How you can even compare them to MSNBC in any fashion is ludicrous. There is no equivalency. This isn't a case of "who is blacker" -- this is a case of "Who are the assholes, and who are not?"

[bvar22]

20. ...and you believe that Thom Hartmann is Putin's Puppet?

He has a 3hour weekday daytime show on RT,
including Brunch with Bernie.
Hartmann and Bernie have been squeezed out of many Corporate outlets.
Is Bernie Sanders a Putin Puppet.

While I have always voted straight Democratic ticket,
I DO want to know what people like Rocky Anderson and Jill Stein have to say,
and what they have to offer.
Truth is, if NOBODY is offering up what used to be Democratic solutions to our problems,
we will slip continually to the conservative right.

RT was the only outlet I could find offering LIVE coverage for the 3rd party debates.
Are Rocky Anderson and Jill Stein puppets of Putin?


If you are comfortable limiting yourself to just the sanitized, Pro-Corporate "news" from US Outlets,
and limiting yourself to what the dominant Corporate Parties decide is Between-their-Bookends,
then please proceed. YOU are in charge of what you choose to consider important.
Instead of trying to accuse others of being Putin's Puppet so you can close your ears,
maybe you should spend some time figuring out WHOSE Puppet YOU have become.


I would LOVE for the Democratic Party to pick up some of the issues discussed in the 3rs Party debates.
In NOBODY is allowed to HEAR them,
then it will never happen.
I'm NOT OK with the continual slide to the Conservative Right of the Party of FDR that I joined 48 years ago.


[font color=firebrick size=3][center]"If we don't fight hard enough for the things we stand for,
at some point we have to recognize that we don't really stand for them."
--- Paul Wellstone[/font][/center]
[center][/font]
[font size=1]photo by bvar22
Shortly before Sen Wellstone was killed[/center][/font]

[MADem]

21. He's his prostitute, at a minimum. So's Larry King and anyone who takes money from the

propaganda arm of the Russian state.

Those who carry Putin's water need to accept the the loss to their reputation for so doing. Actions do have consequences. Associations can and do damage a reputation.

It's not about me, so just cut that crap right now. Why is it that the standard form of deflection here at DU is to ignore the main argument (RT is a Russian, state controlled media outlet, and anything Putin doesn't like will NOT be broadcast on it, further, it is used to advance Putin's views to the exclusion of others) and instead, the "So YEW don't like....so YEW don't want" bullshit comes out.

If Putin didn't like one or more of those third party candidates you are whinging about, you wouldn't see them. It's not about YOU (never mind me), it's about PUTIN.

And if you want to see third party debates, get off your behind and turn the channel to CSPAN. They carry them. They have for decades now, since shortly after Putin abandoned his illegitimate child in East Germany, and long before your adored "RT" was a gleam in Daddy Putin-Propaganda's bloodshot eye.

Where do you think Putin gets the television feed for these debates? Do you think he actually sends a camera crew to these venues? Do you think he funds them? Good grief.

How amusing--no, telling-- that you "praise" Putin for something that is broadcast thanks to a public broadcasting service funded by American cable companies. All he's doing is kiting off of CSPAN's draft. If RT was the ONLY outlet you found covering the debates, you clearly didn't even bother to look.

Finally--and this is something you need to take aboard--it is not the job of the DEMOCRATIC Party to carry the water of the Greens, the Independents, the Socialists, etc. They need to get off their own asses and sink or swim. This isn't Socialist Underground, BTW....it is DEMOCRATIC (as in the PARTY) Underground. The goal here is to elect more DEMOCRATS and fewer Republicans to public office. It's in the TOS. Nothing wrong with touting "progressive" principles, but there's no damn way the Democrats should feel like they have an obligation to anyone who isn't in the party. Don't like it? Too bad.

[bvar22]

25. Nobody "Praised Putin".

THAT is YOUR Strawman to make your argument for shutting down sources of information "seem" legitimate.

If Thom Hartmann and Larry King are Putin's "prostitutes".
What are those in the MSM who carry water for Corporate America and the 1%?

Nobody said or implied that it was the job of the Democratic Party to "carry the water of the Greens, the Independents, the Socialists, etc"...another fantasy Strawman.
It IS the job of the Democratic Party Grassroots to keep informed,
and hold our leadership accountable for abandoning the values that built the largest, wealthiest, and most upwardly mobile Working Class the World has ever seen.

Only a blind idiot Party Ideologue would try to make the argument that The Greens do not have any worthy ideas. I HUNGER for what other people are saying,
and for solutions that are being ignored by our Party leadership.

You wouldn't have much of a post if we edited out all the fantasy arguments against the things I never said.
For somebody who OPPOSES outside ideas and creative solutions, you do have a vivid imagination.

Like I said, if you choose to limit your sources of information to what lies between the Centrist Corporate Democratic Party and the Corporate Republican Party, and follow the Democratic Party ever to the conservative right, that is your choice.

[Oakenshield]

27. You're wasting your time.

You're never going to reach some of these ultra partisan hacks.

[bvar22]

29. My posts aren't for the handful of blind Party hacks.

They are for the others who will read this thread.
I am not advocating blind trusting RT,
and have never done so.

I stand by my statements that RT is a source of information that is no longer available through the US MSM since the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (Thanks, Bill) allowed for the consolidation of our Media into a shockingly few hands of the Corporate 1%.

[Judi Lynn]

47. You are not alone. There are others here who also hope to reach progressives, not interlopers.

So good to see your worthy post. Thanks.

[Jefferson23]

18. RT is not a trusted source nor are many US sources. It is not wise to try and frame the

concerns about propaganda as an either or, imho.

RT America is not seen by Russians, and the dissenters living in Russia, risking their
safety to protest in Moscow, do not appreciate the Thom Hartman reasoning they
participate with RT...which is understandable because their concern is that he
gives RT legitimacy. I believe the reason he and others participate is likely due
to the fact that his voice is not able to penetrate the MSM. Our corporate
media pigs don't want him on the air. Nevertheless, his participation with RT
and other liberals involved should know this is not appreciated.

[Ash_F]

22. Good points, but some would say it is most prudent to affect change from within the system.

Isn't that what Dems tell each other after being exasperated with the disproportionately powerful right wing of their own party?

[Jefferson23]

26. Thanks. I understand that RT affords an avenue to Thom and others, but it does

come at a price to those Russians I stand in solidarity with, and as I said, they
do not appreciate RT receiving legitimacy.

I see this thread, the issue has become heated, and is it not terribly sad and disturbing
that we in the US see perfectly well intentioned informed individuals ( Thom ) who only wish is
to inform...and they have no place on the MSM?

That is damn scary for us. The Telecommunications Act '96 was a blow to all of us..and just
another item in a long list of initiatives we have to fight to get them back. By comparison the
Russian dissenters have it much harder than we do, so I am inclined to support them and ignore
RT.

[Adrahil]

37. RT employs people like Hartmann for one reason only....

... A chance to poke the US in the eye.

[Jefferson23]

38. Thom and people like him are between a rock and a hard place b/c they do

want exposure they can't easily get here...US corporate swine make it difficult for
him to have a voice on the msm.

It is a messy situation and the irony is rich..he should not need to even be tempted
to participate and although I do not agree that he should continue to do so, I
understand his circumstances.

[Adrahil]

39. I appreciate his position....

... But ultimately, you have to decide if it's worth being a tool for people such as that.

[Jefferson23]

40. Yes, I think so too. The Russians dissenters, who we ultimately stand behind,

with their uphill battle against the Putin machine..they don't need RT to be considered
legitimate..not to suggest that one piece is going to change everything for the better for
them, but it is hard to look the other way when we know their struggle is much more
difficult than ours.

We need to support Thom by focusing on our own issues, he is not a propagandist, he
is a knowledgeable man, deserving of a place on msm...we have the battle to undo
the damage from the Telecom Act '96..so we all can hear Hartman and others like him.

[Igel]

23. RT

http://rt.com/news/156592-odessa-activists-burnt-alive/

"Around 1,500 supporters of the Kiev authorities, accompanied by aggressive fans of the local football club, Chernomorets, tried to march through the center of the city chanting “Glory to Ukraine,” “Death to enemies,” “Knife the Moskals [derogatory for Russians].” Some of the people in the group were wearing ultra-nationalist Right Sector movement insignia, were armed with chains and bats and carried shields."

The march was for "Ukrainian Unity". This is not the same as "supporters of the Kiev authorities."
They were joined by ultras and soccer fans. The total was about 1500. The chants aren't quite right for the time frame of that part of the narrative, unless RT means "among the marchers could also be heard calls of" the following--which includes during the march before it was attacked, during the attack, and after the attack. Leave out time as context and things their meaning. That's a forced reading of the RT text.

Some marchers were wearing RS armbands. The vast majority were not. The take-away is "RS", however. Some police were wearing St. George armbands, too.


"Several hundred anti-government activists eventually confronted the procession. Fighting broke out as a result, with members of the rival groups throwing stones, Molotov cocktails and smoke grenades at each other and at police. The pavements were spattered with blood."

The anti-government activists started from the anti-Maidan and were organized and armed--not just with clubs and shields but also with firearms. Fighting broke out not passively, but when the marchers were confronted with threats and fists/clubs. After the initial attack, they each had primitive weapons.

No mention of pro-Russians shooting marchers. An important omission. Or that of the police, some were pro-Russian, some not pro-Russian, but all in all while the shooting occurred the police did nothing.

"The police failed to draw the rival groups apart. As a result, 4 people were killed and 37 wounded in the violence. Police were among the injured."

This isn't entirely true. Plenty of footage shows that the two groups were separated. The people killed weren't evenly distributed between the two groups. Bullets kill more than thrown rocks. Take-away: Pro-Russians were also killed.

Police were hurt--something like 21 of them. Out of over 170 hurt. Note that in opinion surveys among Russians preference for order and stability handily gets over 50% while "democracy" and things like "free expression" score low.

"'Women and children were hiding in the Trade Union’s building,' an eye-witness told RT. 'First the armed men set fire to tents, then they started throwing Molotov cocktails and grenades at the building. We heard shots fired and saw smoke,' she added.The first floor of the Trade Unions building was soon engulfed in flames. The people inside appeared to be trapped."

The armed men had clubs and molotov cocktails. They set fire to the tents in the anti-Maidan, one of those settlements that nobody complained weren't destroyed under the Geneva agreements. Nobody was hurt during this phase.

The people that "confronted" the marchers were based there. They moved into the building and, fearing the fascists that had been marching and dared to intercept pro-Russian bullets of peace and friendship, barricaded themselves in. At that point they were trapped by (a) their barricades, (b) the people with clubs, pissed that the people inside had been among those shooting at them, (c) their fears.

Those inside were not primarily women and children. Primarily they were men.

Also, a large number of them were Russians and from Dnistria, not citizens of Ukraine.

There's little evidence of grenades beyond possibly stun grenades. Moreover, "shots fired" is passive. The assumption will be that the only armed people in the narrative, the "armed men" attacking, are the ones with the guns. This is an assumption that the readers are led to, and therefore one that they are personally interested in defending to the last shred of their confirmation bias. However, the Russians and pro-Russians had guns a couple of hours before. I don't think it's reasonable to assume that they lost their guns or decided it would be immoral to use them again.

Same with the "building was engulfed in flames" from Molotov cocktails. That seems a safe assumption. The origin of the Molotov cocktails is still at issue. The first footage I saw, yesterday, showed those on the roof hurling Molotov cocktails down on the men with clubs and Molotov cocktails, and the first reports were almost ironic in just stating that it was roof-thrown incendiary devices that was responsible for the fire. That was before the death count was known.

Which brings us back to the "frame," how the RT story will be influenced to interpret it by anybody who looks at it:
"Odessa slaughter: How vicious mob burnt anti-govt activists alive"

"Slaughter" implies that the killing was intentional and possibly planned. The mob was vicious--because it had been attacked and this was a counter-attack. The fire isn't still clearly the result of the vicious mob. And the "activists" were militants a couple of hours before--and no more peaceful than the "vicious mob".

Look out for passives with subjects that the reader infers from previous sentences. Often those inferred subjects aren't the real subjects and the narrative is reduced, and irrelevancies introduced or important details like chronology or source bias ignored. "In response to the 911 call by a wife who saw her husband collapse, an ambulance was dispatched. Two men entered the house. The woman of the house was raped the previous year and recognized one of the men as the paramedic who conducted her to the hospital. She felt confident that the paramedics could help her husband." That can be reduced to . "Two men entered the house. The woman of the house was raped." That kind of bias is the essence of propaganda.

In this case, the pro-Russians are confronting fascists and there's a fight resulting in somebody dead, but not at anybody's hand. Then there's an attack and innocent victims, most of whom must be women and children.

Many of the activists weren't Ukrainian residents. Something else left out. Half of those dead in the union building were, if current claims pan out, from Russia or Dnistria. Odd, that.

The police took the 100+ from the roof into custody. At first it was assumed they were somehow arrested. Then the police said it was to prevent the two groups from fighting again, because many of those on the rooftop thought it was highly unfair for them to be accosted. True believers are like that--it's okay for them to attack and kill, but they are to be held inviolate because theirs is just.

There's no protection for the marchers, whose pictures were taken and also disseminated. Some have already been IDed and have received death threats. Naturally, the police chief was dismissed.

Both sides had murderers in it, and that's the biggest injustice and bit of propaganda in this. The pro-Russians are pure and saintly, innocent victims of Banderists. Only the Russians were provoked. By having a march held several blocks away. The "vicious mob" wasn't provoked; it was merely attacked and shot at, with several marchers killed.

Read the Russian feeds from the sister sources and you hear about the bands of fascists in the woods just waiting to rape good Russian women in the East; read the reports and the self-defense militias kidnapping people suspected of being somehow Right Sector are saddened that they spend nights patrolling and somehow all the fascists keep eluding them--some might think that would imply that the patrols are snipe hunting, but the inference offered is that the RS bandits are well trained. In Russian sources the marchers attacked the anti-Maidan people on the street without provocation because the marchers were all fascists and Banderists. You read about how cars are stolen from car dealerships; you don't read that they're Donetsk People's Republic guys doing it or the cars were then parked outside the DPR's HQ. You read about a bank heist, further evidence of lawlessness, and read in the Ukr news the eyewitness accounts that it was DPR folk breaking in. You read about how the telecom center was taken over and the DPR folk left the broadcasts unchanged out of the goodness of their hearts, and in Ukr you read the technicians' amazement that the DPR folk tried to reset them but were unfamiliar with how to reset the station to rebroadcast the *international* feed of Russia-24 and thought it was the same as the domestic feed.

In Russian you read about how many people the Odessa police rounded up after the deaths on the street and in the Union building, with the clear implication that they're rounding up fascists and the like for the slaughter of innocents. In Ukr you read the same numbers, and then see copies of some of the alleged perp's Russian passports and residency documents.

RT's the thinned down gruel from the much heartier Russian-language versions.

[Duckhunter935]

28. long read

But true

[newthinking]

31. The events leading up to the arson are still coming to light

I have yet to find a clear account. It appears there was shooting on both sides.

One account sounds like it may be credible, but I can't say for sure. They claim it was not really either side and that both pro and anti had been pretty much peaceful up to the events, and that a group of men in military fatigues came in and started the firefight, which escelated and people on both sides were killed. That group then ran to the Trade Union building, were surrounded by police, who went in and arrested them. This account says those were the ones from "Transneistra".

Then, the maidan group, enraged, gathered and grew in size and went back to the Trade Union Building, thinking that the people that started the firefight were there, or believing that everyone in the anti-maidan was involved, and that is when the burning of the building and the 30 deaths happened.

The account is actually from a Russian football fan who was with the maidan/pro Ukraine group. This is (perporting) to be the men that started it.



This, of course, is different from the RT information. But I would not consider this confirmed at all, as things are still coming out, and of course there are interests on all sides that would like a potential version to come forth.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

48. Excellent, excellent deconstruction analysis.

I strongly recommend you post this as an original post.

[OnyxCollie]

32. Both.

And don't think for a moment that we're not being propagandized, i.e. "looking forward" instead of punishing war criminals and not "begrudging the wealth" of fraudulent banksters

[geek tragedy]

33. Rt.com is the clear answer for anyone who fails to belong

to the Russian nationalist right or the "US is the root of all evil" fringe of the left.

Parry is a known Putin humper--try finding a column where he criticizes Moscow or fails to carry water for Putin and Assad etc.

[FBaggins]

45. Easy. RT

There's no doubt that you'll find propaganda in some US reporting... but it's the raison d'être for RT.