Reflections From a Murky Pond

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), in yet another of their attempts to “back door” a reprise of the Fairness Doctrine, enacted a program which they carefully named the, “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs.” This would allow the FCC to destroy any that didn’t meet the government’s approval.

It was meant to hunt out “station bias” and to ensure that the desires and interests of special interest minority subcultures were being fully met by television news programing. Such aims were to be accomplished through a combination of interrogating station managers, news directors, journalists, television anchors and reporters, and by placing government monitors in stations’ news rooms.

The program was scheduled to begin this spring in the “problematic,” Southern market of Columbia, SC., possibly to influence the coverage of 2014 election campaigns.

We Want To Ask You About Your Station Bias

But this has been put “on hold” due to the outrage over it expressed by the American people.

To be clear, media owners and journalists will no longer be asked to participate in the Columbia, S.C. pilot study. The pilot will not be undertaken until a new study design is final. Any subsequent market studies conducted by the FCC, if determined necessary, will not seek participation from or include questions for media owners, news directors or reporters.

— FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler

This sounds both reasonably good and like it’s another victory for we, the People over government tyranny. But, while this is an important victory for the First Amendment, it’s only a partial victory in one small battle in the war we must wage to keep the government from controlling all the information we are allowed access to.

Tags: America | Fairness Doctrine | FCC | Free Press | Free Speech | Information Warfare | Media | News | Politics | Tyranny

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 22nd, 2014 at 12:50 pm and is filed under Politics. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

That Obama considers himself above scrutiny or accountability goes largely without saying. Each and every action that he has taken in his political career has been shrouded in secrecy – to the point that all details of his life, from birth to graduation, have been expunged from the public record, leaving only his voice to provide the narrative for it. His tenure in politics has followed the same shrouded and duplicitous path.

This is a useful and cunning course of action for the would-be demagogue or tyrant.

It is also part and parcel of the iconic image of the Magic Negro, a meme that was largely responsible for Obama’s election to the Presidency and, therefore, not to be considered unexpected behavior by Obama.

This has, however, become a severe problem since he was installed in office because Obama has extended this behavior to his actions as POTUS by denying the press normal access while forming his own State Media Machine so that it is, once again his voice alone is providing the narrative.

Even ABC, who went far out of their way and farther beyond the pale of journalistic ethics to ensure America had it’s First Black President, have begun to cry foul:

The White House Press Office now not only produces a website, blog, YouTube channel, Flickr photo stream, and Facebook and Twitter profiles, but also a mix of daily video programming, including live coverage of the president’s appearances and news-like shows that highlight his accomplishments.

~*~

Over the past few months, as White House cameras have been granted free reign behind the scenes, officials have blocked broadcast news outlets from events traditionally open to coverage and limited opportunities to publicly question the president himself.

Obama’s recent signing of the historic New START treaty with Russia and his post-State of the Union cabinet meeting, for example, were both closed to reporters in a break with tradition. And during a recent question and answer session with the president and visiting Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the White House imposed an unusual limit of just one question each from the U.S. and Canadian press corps.

“The administration has narrowed access by the mainstream media to an unprecedented extent,” said ABC News White House correspondent Ann Compton, who has covered seven administrations. “Access here has shriveled.”

Members of the press have always had quibbles with White House media strategies, calling cut-backs in access an affront to transparency, even as administration officials insist they’re simply taking advantage of new technologies.

But some say the current dynamic is different, and dangerous.

“They’re opening the door to kicking the press out of historic events, and opening the door to having a very filtered format for which they give the American public information that doesn’t have any criticism allowed,” said University of Minnesota journalism professor and political communication analyst Heather LaMarre.

In point of fact, I have little sympathy for ABC or any of the “lamestream” media. They’ve been largely silent about the Obama’s Regime’s incessant attacks upon Fox News. I sort of feel that if you stay silent when they come for Fox you shouldn’t feel entitled to have anyone speak up when they come for you. Also, they had every reason to see this coming.

But the fact that I have little or no sympathy for ABC’s plight doesn’t mean that they’re not right or that this isn’t something that endangers more than just the media’s feelings and ratings.

This strikes like a shiv at the beating heart of American liberty and must not be tolerated by we, the People.

A reasonably free press is a needed to ensure that the government, rarely the true friend of the people, doesn’t go too far astray. Without the press having access to our elected politicians the descent into tyranny and despotism is assured.

Of course Obama, who tells us that he studied Constitutional Law, should know this. He just willfully chooses to violate this fundamental American precept in order to shield himself from criticism.

Does this mean that Obama is a tyrant? Not necessarily, though it is precursor behavior for one. But precursor behaviors do not always lead to full-blown end-states in behavior patterns.

But it doesn’t matter whether Obama is a would-be despot or merely a narcissistic man who believes himself to above scrutiny, criticism, and/or reproach; this method of “controlling the message” must be eradicated by firm and uncertain means.

~*~

Keep your eyes open. Travel light but load heavy, and always put another round in the enemy after they’re down. 😉

Tags: 1st Amendment | 2012 Elections | ABC | Free Press | Information Warfare | Media | Obama | Politics | Propaganda | Social Media | Tyranny

This entry was posted on Friday, February 18th, 2011 at 2:03 pm and is filed under 2012 Election, Politics. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

In the ongoing war against against identity theft, information loss, and digital espionage, sometimes you have to go “old school.”

Aside from the geek humor that I love so dearly, this cartoon by XKCD is very unusual in that it actually uses the correct words instead of gibberish.

• A’la’ih is the phonetic spelling of Diné bizaad (the Navajo Language) word for the numeral one
• Do’neh’lini is the Diné bizaad word for neutral, but could be used as zero since the Navajo do not have that numeral in their language

Of both both of the above are rough approximations since the Navajo language, Diné bizaad, maps very poorly onto English orthography. It maps even more poorly than Gaelic (Gaeilge) does.

Tags: Cartoons | Humor | Information Warfare | InfoSec | Navajo | Technology

This entry was posted on Friday, April 24th, 2009 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Humor, Technology. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Well, we all know the fantasy that nerds and Hollywood put forward as truth in regards to Hacking, Information Security, and such like. To listen to them, it’s all about technology skills and crafty, intuitive intellect. Below is a hilarious – to me at least – cartoon that puts paid to that fantasy.

Cartoon courtesy of xkcd

Trust me, in the world of Information Warfare, advanced technology is neither the most effective means of stealing someone’s information nor the most commonly used methodology. Social Engineering has always been more cost effective and “brute force attacks” are more often the use of actual force than one might expect.

Tags: Cartoons | Humor | Information Warfare | InfoSec | Technology

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 at 9:25 am and is filed under Humor, Technology. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

InfoWar or Information Warfare is the use and management of information in pursuit of an advantage over an opponent. Information warfare may involve collection of tactical information, assurance that one’s own information is valid, spreading of propaganda or disinformation to demoralize the enemy and the public, undermining the quality of opposing force information and denial of information collection opportunities to opposing forces.

InfoWar has always been important in political and military struggles. In the modern world it possibly even more important for adversaries in a conflict to control and shape the information available.

Below is a video reporting on how some African citizen journalists – read that as Bloggers – are waging campaign of information warfare against the ruling parties in their lands who seek to maintain their authority at least partially by controlling and censoring what information is provided to their citizens and the world through the media.

This video is courtesy of Current_TV

These are some very brave and committed people who daily risk their freedom and their lives in an ongoing attempt to break their governments’ stranglehold on information dissemination. Across the globe citizen journalists – bloggers mostly – are engaged in an asymmetric war of information. They often manage though the porous nature of the internet to do what the Main Stream Media (MSM) is unable or unwilling to accomplish – the free and open release of information about unpopular, uncomfortable, and/or unprofitable issues.

Tags: Africa | Blogging | Freedom | Information Warfare | Journalism | Politics | Society | Technology | War

This entry was posted on Friday, July 4th, 2008 at 8:14 am and is filed under 2008 Olympics, Politics, Society. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.