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Comments on: Egypt Bans Al Jazeera https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/ On-line Opinion Magazine...OK, it's a blog Tue, 01 Feb 2011 01:30:15 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 By: Bryan https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55269 Tue, 01 Feb 2011 01:30:15 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55269 Oh, yes, I read Pravda, Izvestia, Krasnaya Zvezda, and others constantly scanning for open source information, and there were language shifts that contained a lot of humor that definitely wasn’t supposed to be there. A favorite was using standard propaganda phrases in inappropriate settings. Censors see the phrases and ignore the rest of the sentence.

Krokodil was a humor magazine, and those guys got away with almost everything, because the bureaucracy didn’t take it seriously.

Today in the US, the “journalists” believe the propaganda, they want to be known as “heroes of the People’s Labor” and “Stakhanovites” [and receive regular paychecks, so don’t rock the boat.]

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By: Badtux https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55268 Tue, 01 Feb 2011 01:02:01 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55268 During the dying days of the Soviet Union I had access to official English-language translations of Pravda (i.e., those done in the Soviet Union by the official translators). What was interesting to me was how much those reporters managed to fit between the lines about what was *really* happening in the Soviet Union. I suspect that if I read Russian, I would have seen even more there.

Sadly, the only thing I can read between the lines of most U.S. “reporting” nowadays is “I’m reporting what they pay me to report, my paycheck didn’t bounce, all is well.”

— Badtux the Journalistic Penguin

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By: Bryan https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55267 Tue, 01 Feb 2011 00:00:02 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55267 They didn’t need the police for al Jazeera, Badtux, when a small cable company on Statin Island tried to carry it in response to subscribers requests the Tea Party types and local media were all over them. The difference between American thugs and Egyptians thugs, is that the government has to pay the thugs in Egypt.

I didn’t have that one, Badtux, but the self-censorship that goes on the US is disgusting after the time I spent in Spain under Franco and Greece under the Colonels, as well as a few other places I never was and can prove that I never was there with official government paperwork. You have people dying to print the truth around the world, but it will never get printed in the US.

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By: Badtux https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55266 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 22:15:57 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55266 In Egypt, the government needs policemen to ban al Jazeera. Here in America, our government merely need whisper to their cronies in the cable companies, “al Jazeera would be bad for business”, and the dirty deed of banning al Jazeera is done. Oh, not completely — there is YouTube and the WWW, after all — but close enough from most people’s perspective.

Was it you who had the story about the Soviet official who was given a tour of Washington D.C., was proudly presented with copies of the NYT and Washington Post, and then upon reading them excitedly asked his hosts, “How do you get them to print only the officially sanctioned news without secret policemen to enforce it”?

– Badtux the News Penguin

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By: Bryan https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55265 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 20:47:03 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55265 Well, Ame, they operate primarily is some of the most repressive areas on the planet, so they certainly have a “standard operating procedure” for being banned, or even blown up, as has happened to them. I assume they bought their equipment with these problems in mind, and got the extra-cost ability to switch frequencies on satellites and to re-aim their antennas as required by local conditions. The US uses stuff that requires a semi, and these guys can operate with a Toyota Hi-Lux.

They have a lot of good talent because of the policies of the repressive regimes, which has created a very large pool of well-educated, under=employed university graduates. Many of their reporters know exactly what the young people on the street are thinking, because that’s where they came from.

Steve, the nepotism and “old boy network” in the US media has made it “safe” and arthritic. No one will take chances, and who you know is more important than what you can do. The media isn’t going to challenge the government, they sit on the same boards and are members of the same PTAs. Getting combative could cost you your country club membership.

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By: Steve Bates https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55263 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 19:01:28 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55263 In America today, few in the news business (for it is a business, expected to be a profit center for its network) seem to understand that effective reporting requires an adversarial relationship with the government reported on. Without that tension, we have things like unattributed or weakly attributed quotes, whose sources are upper level government officials who have intimidated reporters into fearing they will lose their source if they insist on attributed quotes. It’s yet another way in which our government is now able to operate in secret in aspects that never were or should have been secret before. Now that this has become the standard, I have no idea how it can be fixed. Calling for reporters with bigger balls won’t accomplish much if anything.

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By: Ame https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55261 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 17:17:23 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55261 I have been quite impressed with their technological agility and dedication to their responsibility to the public.

Our media has violated all our individual rights to be informed citizens IMHO.

I watch as our wars wage on and I am reminded quite frequently how families sat silent, perched on the edges of sofas and chairs or knelt on bended knee before the TV watching news reels for the faces and listening for the voices of friends and loved ones serving in Vietnam. Somber. Saddened. Respectful. Now, the loss of lives in war zones is acknowledged on a silent scrolling text at the end of a program, if at all.

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By: Bryan https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55258 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 04:24:06 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55258 In reply to Ame.

I’ve been watching the feed on and off for days. They are shifting things around and adapting as best they can, which is still better than anything in the US media.

It is sad that younger Americans have no idea how really good US news reporting once was, and I’m talking about newspapers and broadcast news before CNN was launched. We were once an informed nation.

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By: Ame https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55256 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 02:22:09 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55256 Here’s the live stream if you want it

http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/

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By: Bryan https://whynow.dumka.us/2011/01/30/egypt-bans-al-jazeera/comment-page-1/#comment-55252 Sun, 30 Jan 2011 20:00:26 +0000 http://whynow.dumka.us/?p=18747#comment-55252 In reply to Badtux.

Yeah, they were quick enough to “encourage” cable companies not to carry the feed. There was a time, long ago, when CNN did reporting like this, but no longer.

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