Peter Phillips, left, director of Project Censored at Sonoma State University, and former Minnesota federal prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega, the TruthEmergency.us Santa Cruz Media Strategy Summit, Jan. 25-27, 2008. Phillips was a principal organizer of the summit, which drew at least 160 people.About Project Censored
Corporate Media Ownership
The Project Censored team researched the board members of 10 major media organizations from newspaper to television to radio. Of these ten organizations, we found there are 118 people who sit on 288 different American and international corporate boards proving a close on-going interlock between big media and corporate America. We found media directors who also were former Senators or Representatives in the House such as Sam Nunn (Disney) and William Cohen (Viacom). Board members served at the FCC such as William Kennard (New York Times) and Dennis FitzSimmons (Tribune Company) showing revolving door relationships with big media and U.S. government officials.
These ten big media organizations are the main source of news for most Americans. Their corporate ties require us to continually scrutinize the quality of their news for bias. Disney owns ABC so we wonder how the board of Disney reacts to negative news about their board of directors friends such as Halliburton or Boeing. We see board members with connections to Ford, Kraft, and Kimberly-Clark who employ tens of thousands of Americans. Is it possible that the U.S. workforce receives only the corporate news private companies want them to hear? Do we collectively realize that working people in the U.S. have longer hours, lower pay and fewer benefits than their foreign counterparts? If these companies control the media, they control the dissemination of news turning the First Amendment on its head by protecting corporate interests over people.
#9 from 2008
We will soon be paying Wall Street investors, Australian bankers, and Spanish contractors for the privilege of driving on American roads, as more than twenty states have enacted legislation allowing public-private partnerships to build and run highways. Investment firms including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and the Carlyle Group are approaching state politicians with advice to sell off public highway and transportation infrastructure. When advising state officials on the future of this vital public asset, these investment firms fail to mention that their sole purpose is to pick up infrastructure at the lowest price possible in order to maximize returns for their investors. Investors, most often foreign companies, are charging tolls and insisting on “noncompete” clauses that limit governments from expanding or improving nearby roads.
#9 Privatization of America’s Infrastructure (Student Researcher: Rachel Icaza and Ioana Lupu )
#9 Mother Jones: "The Highwaymen"
#9 Bush Administration Quietly Plans NAFTA Super Highway
Top 25 Censored Stories for 2008
#1 No Habeas Corpus for “Any Person”
#2 Bush Moves Toward Martial Law
# 3 AFRICOM: US Military Control of Africa’s Resources
# 4 Frenzy of Increasingly Destructive Trade Agreements
#5 Human Traffic Builds US Embassy in Iraq
#6 Operation FALCON Raids
#7 Behind Blackwater Inc.
#8 KIA: The US Neoliberal Invasion of India
#9 Privatization of America’s Infrastructure
# 10 Vulture Funds Threaten Poor Nations’ Debt Relief
# 11 The Scam of “Reconstruction” in Afghanistan
# 12 Another Massacre in Haiti by UN Troops
# 13 Immigrant Roundups to Gain Cheap Labor for US Corporate Giants
# 14 Impunity for US War Criminals
# 15 Toxic Exposure Can Be Transmitted to Future Generations on a “Second Genetic Code”
#16 No Hard Evidence Connecting Bin Laden to 9/11
# 17 Drinking Water Contaminated by Military and Corporations
# 18 Mexico’s Stolen Election
# 19 People’s Movement Challenges Neoliberal Agenda
# 20 Terror Act Against Animal Activists
# 21 US Seeks WTO Immunity for Illegal Farm Payments
# 22 North Invades Mexico
# 23 Feinstein’s Conflict of Interest in Iraq
# 24 Media Misquotes Threat From Iran’s President
# 25 Who Will Profit from Native Energy?
Goldman Sachs comes up in this story, too! How 'bout that! Ever get the feeling we've been "had" by these millionaires & their corporations? And they're stealing our tax money?
WALL STREET SOCIALISM: This weekend, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, former head of the Goldman Sachs investment house, provided us with a perfect demonstration of Wall Street socialism. He announced that the Bush administration would seek congressional approval to bail out Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac, the government created, but privately owned, profit-making housing finance companies that hold or guarantee nearly half of the US mortgage market -- some $5 trillion in debt.
Indy Mac customers wait outsideas they try to get their money back from the bank. A run on the bank, just like the Great Depression. 150 more banks are expected to fold. Great economy! Huh?
Now-defunct IndyMac Bancorp Inc. is under investigation by the FBI for possible fraud in connection with home loans made to risky borrowers.
As we're all suffering in this economy, Bush continues attack on the middleclass! Have a bill you don't want to pay? Just throw it in the garbage! That's how the Bush administration treats the law, why can't you?Two new reports by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) show the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division, especially under the Bush administration, is conducting fewer and less thorough investigations in allegations of employer wage theft.
Over the past decade, the number of investigations into employers’ refusal to pay minimum wage, overtime or even any wages at all, has dropped from 47,000 in 1997 to just 30,000 last year. And when investigations are launched, sometimes investigators drop their probes simply because an employer hangs up on them or asserts, without proof, they can’t afford to pay the workers what they are owed.
Employer Doesn’t Pay You? Under Bush Wage and Hour Dept., You’re Out of Luck
Seven years on, no answer from White House on anthrax attacks
I'm not sure if the corporate-owned media is just flat-out totally controlled by the Republicans. Or should we call it the "Petroleum Media"? It's propaganda! That's why I keep telling you to watch Free Speech TV on DISH channel 9415, and LINK-TV on DISH channel 9410 & DirecTV channel 275! Look at this video below. Pure lies and propaganda! Absolute 100% LIES! They are allowed to go on TV all over the place and say bold-faced lies right to our face. "We didn’t have one drop of oil spilt when we had the biggest hurricane in recent history, Hurricane Katrina.". Do you want to be lied to? Yes or no? Are there conditions on being lied to, like "it's OK if I'm a Republican voter and Republicans lie to me"??? Here's the deal: You either want to know the truth or you don't care. Period!
FACT: May 2006, the U.S. Minerals Management Service published their offshore damage assessment: 113 platforms totally destroyed, and - more importantly - 457 pipelines damaged, 101 of those major lines with 10" or larger diameter. At least 741,000 gallons were spilled from 124 reported sources (the Coast Guard calls anything over 100,000 gallons a "major" spill).
Officials spread false 'not a drop spilled after Katrina' talking point in support of offshore oil drilling
And, finally, from Democracy NOW! headlines on Free Speech TV & LINK-TV, did you see this anywhere:
Court: US Can Jail Civilians Indefinitely
A federal appeals court has ruled President Bush can order the indefinite jailing of civilians imprisoned in the United States. The five-to-four decision effectively reverses last year’s ruling that the administration cannot label US residents “enemy combatants” and jail them indefinitely without charge. The ruling came in the case of the only person still held as an enemy combatant on US soil. Ali al-Marri was arrested six years ago at his home in Peoria, Illinois, where he lived with his wife and five children. He was initially charged with credit card fraud and lying to federal agents. But in June 2003, President Bush declared him an enemy combatant and ordered him into military custody. He has spent the last four years in solitary confinement at a Navy brig in Charleston, South Carolina. Al-Marri’s attorney Jonathan Hafetz said,
“This decision means the president can pick up any person in the country—citizen or legal resident—and lock them up for years without the most basic safeguard in the Constitution, the right to a criminal trial.”
As I continually say, over and over again, if you don't speak out about this, or don't care about it, or are actually FOR it...I HOPE IT HAPPENS TO YOU!
