NP Terrorism and Propaganda

[barbara100 at jps.net]

Jbor wrote:

Doug, whatever his motives, is trying to do exactly the same thing, [the thing being] destabilise the U.S. and its allies politically, economically and socially.


Well, it's a damn good thing Doug has 'zero credibility' then, eh?  

And you call HIM an 'hysteria-mongerer'!

You make me laugh, Jbor.

And, Quail, I gave that opinion piece you blasted a once-over and thought it read pretty well. I think maybe you SHOULD pick it apart.  As they say, put up or shut up.

You guys...




Original Message:
-----------------
From: jbor jbor at bigpond.com
Date: Wed, 17 Oct 2001 08:38:55 +1000
To: pynchon-l at waste.org
Subject: Re: NP Terrorism and Propaganda


quail at libyrinth.com wrote:

> So, overlooking the fact that bombing the Taliban is not tactically a move to
> halt Anthrax -- obvious, I should think -- what are the right tactics? Because
> Lord knows, the second the government starts messing with the mail, or any
> freedoms, you will be the first to start squawking. To be honest, I haven't
> heard you offer any solutions except appeasement, inaction, or praying that
> things just go away through diplomacy.

The propaganda and terror campaign from Osama's network is intended to
create fear and havoc in the West, and thus destabilise the U.S. and its
allies politically, economically and socially. Doug, whatever his motives,
is trying to do exactly the same thing. Bush and his advisors and other U.S.
leaders, thankfully, have recognised the psychological war being wrought by
this quite evil little man (Osama, not Doug) and his disciples, the attempt
to hit at transport and media communications systems (with the Anthrax
letters) in particular, and have sensibly used leadership to create calm and
resilience and to urge people to continue with work and leisure activities
(i.e. shopping etc) to prevent the descent into civil disobedience and
social chaos which the enemy (OK, both Osama and Doug) wants.

Both, because Doug, who was and is only using the terrorist attacks as
another pretext for his ongoing propaganda war against Bush, is out to do
much the same thing. Whatever Bush had done in the wake of the attacks Doug
would be denouncing it now, because his single, selfish agenda is to
discredit Bush. I'm thankful that Doug has Zero credibility. It's not just
his rhetorical mode which is offensive, it's the idiocy of his arguments as
well. The sort of appeasement and civil liberties he's called for would have
allowed more trained terrorists more access to more planes with thousands,
maybe hundreds of thousands more perishing. Terrorism of this kind was
something which had to be actively stopped, not politely reasoned with. (I'm
beginning to think the same about Doug, too.)

In this country we are very well-informed, as I assume Americans, Canadians,
Germans, Britons etc are also. For example, we saw the video footage of
Osama's general announcing last week that there would be more plane attacks,
the propaganda machine at work. We've seen the footage of bomb destruction
in Afghanistan, the site of the food drops (no children being blown to
bits), the busload of foreign journalists allowed by the Taliban to inspect
the site of the *one* smart bomb that went astray from its target. It's the
fact that we in Western democracies have freedom in the press and freedom of
speech that we have access to these facts. Many people in other places
haven't had this luxury, and still don't, which is an aspect of the
repressiveness of their political regimes. It's called propaganda, and it
equates exactly to the kind of misinformation and hysteria-mongering which
Doug peddles, and is just as heinous.

What next? Perhaps some idiot'll send in a fake "news" photo to "prove" his
lies true. Message to kwp: if you're going to become a competent
propagandist it'd be an idea to save the photo you've doctored in a file
format other than Adobe PhotoShop. Powell is going to India to try to broker
a peace deal on the war in Kashmir, more credit to him, whether you approve
of it or not.

best





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