Too bad, so sad.

[Mark Kohut]

Just for this journalistic-like online record: I do not understand what you
just wrote.

On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 11:32 AM, Atticus Pinecone <
atticuspinecone at gmail.com> wrote:

> I see some of our Pynchon pals dismissing this way of measuring the media
> (Soul searching?). I sense it has to do with either assuming which way the
> whirring in my internal whirrer whirs or that I'm questioning news outlets
> that are currently anti-the-guy-they-too-are-anti.
>
> Not everyone. And some of it is PM'd to me. But putting human life as the
> priority? That's worth discussing. And it's not a stretch to say journalism
> is a guardian of democracy &c &c
>
> On Dec 18, 2017, at 11:21 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> And what does this mean?---"and this polarization is blocking
> communication (as we're seeing here)"
>
> On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 11:06 AM, Atticus Pinecone <
> atticuspinecone at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> 1: Thanks for the breeze of sanity, Jerky.
>>
>> 2: Let's not condemn journalism as a whole—the yardstick I stuck in the
>> mud was blood spilled vs. saved. Then asked for positive examples (not
>> rhetorically) & I asked so they can be celebrated, modeled, whatever.
>>
>> 3: The capital m Media was either incompetent, mistaken, or complicit.
>> And I disagree with the defeatist attitude that these wars are inevitable.
>> Journalists have a responsibility. Even if it leads to a car bomb (Daphne
>> Galizia).
>>
>> 4: If you've worked with journalists, you're aware of self censorship. I
>> have the blackest of black feelings regarding this.
>>
>> 5: If you're familiar with working at a corporation, you're aware of top
>> down censorship. And where the money comes & goes, &c.
>>
>> 6: To bring it back: Polarizing is happening—and this polarization is
>> blocking communication (as we're seeing here). And yes, the new, young
>> right are polarizing far, far back in time.
>>
>> On Dec 18, 2017, at 6:17 AM, Mark Thibodeau <jerkyleboeuf at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> Well, I know *I* was opposed. And seeing as I was writing a daily email
>> newsletter with an audited readership of just under 300K at the time
>> (Internet famous, I was!), I have a written record to prove it.
>>
>> I also have documentary evidence to prove that conservatives of that time
>> period were just as vile and allergic to reality and reason as are today's
>> Trumptards, all the Frumses', Podhoretzes' and Kristolses' lamentations to
>> the contrary notwithstanding.
>>
>> Recently, I went back and reviewed my writing from that era - much of it
>> involving vigorous back-and-forthing with angry, pro-war, conservative
>> subscribers - and one of the things that jumped out at me was the sneering,
>> condescending joy they exhibited when the first part of the invasion was "a
>> cakewalk". As if the world's only remaining superpower taking over a
>> country that the international community had just spent a decade disarming
>> was something to boast about.
>>
>> In fact, on April 5, 2013, when the conservatives were doing victory laps
>> all over the media landscape, I wrote the following:
>>
>> *NEVER FORGET...*
>>
>> Despite a somewhat hairy start and some rough patches in the early
>> stages of this whole "Iraq Attaq," the city of Baghdad seems about to
>> fall and there are hints that Preznit Dubya is pretty much ready to declare
>> victory. And yes, while it's true that American and British forces seem
>> to be slicing through both the much-ballyhooed Republican Guard and the
>> dreaded Fedayeen militia at will - there was a reported 3000-to-1 kill
>> ratio during Saturday's incursion, alone - there are three things we
>> should always keep in mind:
>>
>> - First: spiritually and physically, this war is mangling a generation
>> <http://www.thedailycamera.com/bdc/county_news/article/0,1713,BDC_2423_1866804,00.html> of
>> Americans, both on the battlefield and at home.
>>
>> - Second: this so-called "war of liberation" is actually a monstrous
>> fucking slaughter.
>> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-2537328,00.html>
>>
>> - Third: Preznit Dubya and his criminal administration constructed this
>> entire wasteful, Satanic enterprise upon a foundation of propaganda,
>> forgery, and outright lies
>> <http://www.buzzflash.com/farrell/03/04/01.html>. There is no valid
>> ethical, moral or legal justification for it, no matter how "easy" the task
>> might eventually turn out to seem… relatively speaking.
>>
>> Never forget these things. Even as you wave your little plastic flag at
>> the homecoming parade on your TV screen, with its smiling soldiers
>> resplendent under a blizzard of confetti and cheers, never forget that it's
>> all a lie, and that no amount of wishful thinking can change that sorry
>> fact.
>>
>> ***
>>
>> In other Daily Dirt editorials, I frequently warned that the occupation
>> was far from secure, and was ultimately proven (tragically) correct. Not
>> that I gloated at the time.
>>
>> Anyhoo, I think the invasion would have taken place no matter what. The
>> Powers That Be wanted in, come Hell or high water.
>>
>> J
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 5:21 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Maybe Joseph is, as I just sent regarding Thomas...
>>> ." a critical mass" is pretty tough to measure for even 'the newspaper
>>> of record' and all the other media which it influences.
>>> and when Judith Miller's sources--her supposed bedmate Chalabi---lied
>>> and deceived, as did she---and lost her career over it, too little too
>>> late, we can now, smart critical thinkers that we are, blame the *whole*
>>> NYTimes, "mainstream media',whatever that is, now throw in the Wa Po and
>>> many others because one very major story in the 'newspaper of record' was
>>> because it--all the editors and publishers---were being played, well, not
>>> too smart in my judgment.
>>>
>>> And as I just said to Thomas, would that administration NOT have gone to
>>> war anyway?
>>>
>>> Some, say Barack Obama, saw through the evil of an impending Iraq war.
>>> Many others too, esp all over media that I bet plisters followed. In fact,
>>> I bet most plisters
>>> were opposed, whaddya think? So now they can displace their anger on the
>>> NYT and other 'mainstream media'? Okay.
>>>
>>> Here's my attempt at an aphorism of the day: When you can find out that
>>> stories in double-sourced (at least) independently-verified stories in
>>> media papers and
>>> other vehicles are wrong---you know you have a way of measuring truth.
>>>
>>> and a simple social observation about a word: Have you all noticed how
>>> the word 'lie' has come often to be used, even by many over trivial things,
>>> to mean a mistake,
>>> a wrongness, a nonfact, a non-truth independent of an actual willed
>>> intention?
>>>
>>> Later,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 5:01 AM, Mark Thibodeau <jerkyleboeuf at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I imagine Joseph might be referring to the role played by such august
>>>> journals as the New York Times in getting a critical mass of the American
>>>> population to switch from opposing to supporting the US invasion of Iraq in
>>>> 2003, a folly which has led to the unnecessary, superfluous deaths of
>>>> upwards of a million innocent souls so far, and counting.
>>>>
>>>> I don't, however, blame "mainstream American journalism" any more than
>>>> I do the populace that allowed itself to be persuaded. And of course, much
>>>> less than the actual criminals at the top, many of whom knew that the
>>>> rationale they proffered for their businessman's war* of first resort was
>>>> nothing but a tissue of lies, because they knew that if they revealed their
>>>> REAL reasons for the invasion (which, to be exceedingly fair, I'm sure they
>>>> thought were good reasons), the American people wouldn't be so gung-ho for
>>>> bloodshed.
>>>>
>>>> J
>>>>
>>>> On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 3:55 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Joseph T:
>>>>> "I agree that mainstream american journalism is complicit in much more
>>>>> mass murder than any good they may have done."
>>>>>
>>>>> A remark so ignorant, even, maybe, so inherently vile in
>>>>> even pretending this makes measurable sense about valid journalism, that
>>>>> one shudders for the polity from the other side.
>>>>>
>>>>> So it goes.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://waste.org/pipermail/pynchon-l/attachments/20171218/3dad0f3f/attachment.html>