Olbermann Departs, as Media Consolidate Further

Informed Comment
Professor Juan Cole

People are blaming the abrupt departure of Keith Olbermann from MSNBC on that company’s merger with Comcast and Olbermann’s loss of the protection and patronage of Jeff Zucker, the former head of NBC programming. MSNBC says that the issue has nothing to do with Comcast.

It seems Olbermann is too extreme for US television. But Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity, now they are mainstream. What universe could that proposition be true in? That of cranky old white billionaires. And television news is owned by them. Not by you.

Whether Comcast is the villain of the piece directly, things like the Comcast merger with MSNBC are responsible for there being very few voices on American television (and despite the proliferation of channels) like Olbermann’s. And for there being relatively little news on the “news” programs. Time Warner, General Electric and Comcast (partners in NBC), Viacom, Disney, and Rupert Murdoch’s Newscorp own almost all television news. In other words, six big corporations determine what you will hear about the world if you get your news from television. There are fewer and fewer t.v. news outlets that do not belong to one of these six, a process called media consolidation.

For reasons of profit-seeking, when Disney acquired ABC, it looted the company’s news divisions. Profits are not to be had in hard news, but rather in tabloid news. It used to be that human interest stories would be ‘desert,’ but they have become the main meal.

Ironically,former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw was one of Olbermann’s biggest critics, afraid that the latter’s flamboyant and polarizing style would tarnish the reputation of regular NBC newsmen for objectivity.

What Brokaw seems not to have noticed is that NBC and MSNBC did, like most television news, a miserable job of covering the Iraq issue in 2002-2003–mainly buying White House propaganda. The powerful bias toward the point of view of the rich and powerful and well-connected in Washington demonstrated by all the major tv news outlets in 2002-2003 makes Olbermann look like a staid centrist.
Senator Al Franken, a former NBC employee, fulminated against the Comcast/ MSNBC merger:


But the FCC has passed it.

We’ll miss Keith. But it isn’t about him. It is about the ever-narrowing character of public comment in the US, about the few having most of everything. It is about media consolidation.

Richard Gage's Gnosis Interview in Tucson

Straight from the airport, Richard Gage, AIA, stops by KJLL 1330AM the JOLT to interview with "The Baron", Chuck Aubrey on his Gnosis Radio program - June 26th, 2010.

No letup in Marine attempted suicides

USA Today

WASHINGTON — Marines are trying to kill themselves at a record pace this year despite a 2009 program aimed at stemming the problem, according to Marine Corps data.

Eighty-nine Marines tried to commit suicide through May, most commonly by overdose or lacerations, according to statistics and the Marine Corps suicide prevention program officer, Navy Cmdr. Aaron Werbel. At that rate, there could be more than 210 attempted suicides this year.

There were a record 164 attempted suicides in 2009.

With 21 confirmed or suspected suicides by Marines this year, the Corps is on track to near last year's record number of 52, Werbel says. The Marine Corps suicide rate in 2009 was 24-per-100,000, the highest in the military, Marine records show. The latest demographically adjusted suicide rate among civilians in 2006 was 20 per 100,000, federal records show.

The Marines introduced a training program for sergeants and corporals last year aimed at suicide education and urging them to become more knowledgeable about the lives of their younger Marines.

"We continue to maintain that this is an issue of leadership and getting our Marines who need help to the care they deserve," says Marine Lt. Gen. Richard Zilmer, deputy commandant of Manpower and Reserve Affairs. "In every case, there is a unique life to understand behind the statistics."

Werbel says there is some hint of progress — the proportion of suicides committed by Marines who are sergeants or lower ranking has declined from a high of 93% to 79% this year.

Recent improvements in tracking suicide attempts may have contributed to more reports, says Werbel, a psychologist. But the Marine Corps has been at the forefront of combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan for more than seven years and the strain is showing, he says.

"It's been a sustained operational tempo for years … and there's no question but that that causes distress on our Marines, on family members," he says.

Twelve of the 21 confirmed or suspected suicides this year were among Marines who were or had been in combat, statistics show.

Suicides are rising across the military and researchers are struggling to understand why.

The increase may be the result of servicemembers acquiring a "fearlessness" about harming themselves and some of those suffering mental health issues where they feel alienated or useless, says Thomas Joiner, a psychology professor at Florida State University who is working with the Army on ways to identify at-risk soldiers through screening.

Much attention has been focused on the active-duty Army, which is more than twice the size of the Marine Corps. It suffered a record 163 soldier suicides in 2009, Army records show.

But the suicide rate in the Marine Corps eclipsed the Army's 22-per-100,000 rate last year. There are fewer Army suicides this year than at this time last year, Army statistics show.

The Air Force rate of 15.5 suicides per 100,000 is its highest since 1995, Air Force statistics show. The suicide rate among sailors, at 13.3 per 100,000 last year, has been increasing since 2005, Navy record show.

Werbel says there are plans to place civilian suicide prevention coordinators at each Marine installation and to provide a distress hotline. "We keep plugging away. We keep fighting to win this (struggle against suicide) and to figure out how to better arm our Marines with tools, resources they need to help each other," Werbel says.

Barack Promise Thoroughly Broken Today as U.S. Troops Remain in Iraq

Today was the deadline set by the Obama Administration for pulling out of Iraq, a war crime that continues to be funded and executed under the Obama Administration with the Democrats in control of both the House and the Senate.

Spot the difference when the "terror suspect" is a Muslim

Stop the War Coalition

By Robin Beste

It's front page news if the suspect is a Muslim, but barely reported when it's a white supremicist convicted of plotting to use deadly poison in terrorist attacks.

On 30 April 2010, a member of a white supremacist gang was convicted of planning terrorist attacks and possessing a jar of the deadly poison ricin and pipe bombs. Members of the gang referred to themselves as the Wolfpack or Legion 88 and used codenames with known references to Hitler and other Nazi leaders. The prosecuting council at the trial, said:

"They are fighting against the government because they believe it has been taken over by Jews, so it must be resisted by those interested in white supremacy."

The trial was barely reported in the media, and no politicians had a word to say about these convicted terrorists. Certainly the prime minister of the day, Gordon Brown, was completely silent.

How different it was in January 2003, when six Algerians were arrested in Wood Green, north London, and the BBC reported:

Terror police find deadly poison

Doctors have been warned to look out for signs of exposure to the potentially lethal poison ricin, after it was found by anti-terrorist police at an address in north London.

Six Algerian men are being questioned in connection with the discovery, made following an intelligence tip-off. The men were arrested on Sunday morning and are in their late teens, 20s and 30s.

Tony Blair said the arrests showed the continued threat of international terrorism was "present and real and with us now and its potential is huge".

The intelligence services are said to be "shocked and worried" by the discovery and are looking at possible links with suspected Islamic extremists.

BBC home affairs correspondent Margaret Gilmore said: "For six months now MI5 and the anti-terrorist branch have been getting intelligence reports indicating that extreme groups want to launch a chemical, biological or radiological attack.

"Now we're being told this is probably the first real evidence they were trying to do this here in the UK." (BBC, 07 January 2003)

For the next few days reporting bordering on hysteria dominated newspaper front pages and the broadcast news channels. The Times reported:

Police believe that the seven men are part of an Algerian-led terrorist cell. As soon as government scientists confirmed the presence of ricin at the flat, Scotland Yard officers informed the leaders of the Jewish community and other vulnerable ethnic groups.

French intelligence services are believed to have provided the vital tip-off which led police and MI5 officers to the scruffy rented flat. Some of the suspects are alleged to have links with a gang seized in Paris last month; they were found with plans to attack the Russian Embassy using chemical weapons. Three of the gang were Algerians and they had a chemical contamination suit in their flat as well as cash, computers and two phials of so far unidentified chemicals.(The Times, 09 January 2010)

The "ricin plot" was used before the Iraq war by Tony Blair as evidence of the danger from weapons of mass destruction, and by Colin Powell, then US Secretary of State, before the UN Security Council as proof that Iraq was aiding al-Qaeda terrorism.

All of this was nonsense. There was no ricin, there was no link to al-Qaeda. Ricin is in any case not a weapon of mass destruction, but a poison which is only fatal when injected into individuals.

The government knew this within 48 hours but did not inform the public until more than two years later when the case collapsed in the law courts.

No lessons have been learnt, least of all by the media. The politics of fear and prejudice are still used endlessly by politicians to justify foreign wars, attacks on civil liberties and to divert attention from the worst economic crisis in a generation. It is Muslims who have become the scapegoat of choice, just as Jews were used in similar circumstances in the 1930s.

In April 2009, after 11 Pakistani students were arrested in Manchester, Gordon Brown – desperate to shore up support for the war in Afghanistan, opposed by a large majority in Britain – said:

"We are dealing with a very big terrorist plot. We have been following it for some time. There were a number of people who are suspected of it who have been arrested. That police operation was successful. We know that there are links between terrorists in Britain and terrorists in Pakistan."
(Daily Mail, 22 April 2009)

Once again, this was nonsense. There was no evidence against these students, all but one of whom were released without charge, the remaining one being charged only with a visa violation.

Gordon Brown has never apologised to these students; instead as soon as they were released the government rushed to cover their embarrassment by seeking to get them all deported immediately.

Across Europe, this Islamophobia is a bushfire, the latest example being the proposed banning of the burka by the Belgium government, a form of dress worn by only thirty women among the half million Muslim population -- a measure also likely to be introduced soon in France, where less than 2000 women wear the burka out of a Muslim population of two million.

It is in this climate of hate and racism that Stop the War and the British Muslim Initiative, supported by numerous other organisations, have organised a one day conference in London on Saturday 5 June. Early booking for the conference is advisable, as early indications are it will be over-subscribed.

Docs Say U.S. Hides Evidence of Mass Graves in Afghanistan

Courthouse News Service

WASHINGTON (CN) - The CIA, FBI and State Department are blowing off FOIA requests about mass graves in Afghanistan where the bodies of 2,000 Taliban soldiers who had surrendered were buried in December 2001, Physicians for Human Rights claims in Federal Court.
After several news stories were published confirming the mass graves and suggesting that members of the U.S. military may have seen the burials, Physicians for Human Rights submitted Freedom of Information Act requests, seeking evidence of war crimes.
The nonprofit says Uncle Sam repeatedly refused to deliver documents, saying, among other things, that the information was classified or unsearchable.
Several thousand Taliban fight surrendered to the Northern Alliance, a U.S. ally, in Konduz, Afghanistan, in late 2001, according to contemporary reports. The Taliban fighters were packed into flatbed-truck shipping containers and driven more than 200 miles to a prison in Sheberghan. As many as 2000 suffocated and died during the trip, and their bodies were dumped in mass graves in Dasht-e-Leili, according to media reports from early 2002.
"According to reports, U.S. forces were providing security at the Sheberghan prison when some of the container trucks arrived there," the complaint states.
Physicians for Human Rights says it sent teams to the site to investigate and asked the Pentagon for records.
The Pentagon released a Department of State intelligence assessment from November 2002, "advising government officials that the remains of between 1,500 and 2,000 individuals were deposited at the site, and that approximately four Afghans who witnessed the death of the prisoners and/or the disposal of their remains had been detained, tortured, killed, and/or disappeared," according to the complaint.
The doctors group says that knowledge of the mass graves was "widespread" in the U.S. government, and that the graves were recently exhumed, leaving little or no evidence.
The group wants to see the documents. It is represented by Peter Brody of Ropes Gray.

Is Changing the Troop/Contractor Ratio "Pulling Out of Iraq"?

Army awards lucrative Iraq support contract to KBR

• AP foreign, Tuesday March 2 2010

RICHARD LARDNER

Associated Press Writers= WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense giant KBR Inc. was awarded a contract potentially worth $2.8 billion for support work in Iraq as U.S. forces continue to leave the country, military authorities said Tuesday.

KBR was notified of the award Friday, a day after the company told shareholders it lost about $25 million in award fees because of flawed electrical work in Iraq.

The Houston-based company was charged with maintaining the barracks where Staff Sgt. Ryan Maseth of Pittsburgh, a 24-year-old Green Beret, was electrocuted in 2008 while showering. The company has denied wrongdoing, and investigators said in August there was "insufficient evidence to prove or disprove" that anyone was criminally culpable in Maseth's death.

The uproar over his death triggered a review of 17 other electrocution deaths in Iraq and widespread inspections and repairs of electrical work in Iraq, much of it performed by KBR.

Dan Carlson, a spokesman for the Army Sustainment Command in Rock Island, Ill., said the new contract is for one year, with an option for four more. KBR will handle logistics support, transportation mission, and postal operations.

KBR has long been the military's largest support contractor in Iraq, providing troops with everything from mail and laundry to housing and meals. The new award was made through a revamped contract structure intended to foster competition among companies.

"The award demonstrates that the government recognizes KBR's ability and expertise in delivering high quality service in challenging contingency environments," KBR said in a statement.

Charles Tiefer, a professor of government contracting at the University of Baltimore Law School and a vocal critic of KBR, called the award an "outrage" because of the company's record in Iraq.

"Giving KBR this contract while denying them award fees for their enormous problem of accidentally electrocuting soldiers amounts to rapping them on the knuckles on one hand while handing them a multibillion dollar deal in the other," said Tiefer, who is also a member of the independent Commission on Wartime Contracting.

Last October, the Defense Contract Audit Agency criticized KBR for having more employees in Iraq than were necessary. The excess, the agency said, was unnecessarily costing U.S. taxpayers.

KBR said it had reduced the size of its work force in Iraq consistent with guidance from U.S. military commanders. The company also fired back at the audit agency for its "heavy-handed intrusion" into the military's complex logistics process.

Carlson said Army Sustainment Command is working closely with commanders in Iraq to make sure the contractor work force is properly sized to support drawdown operations in Iraq.

Iraqi Reaction to Blackwater Immunity

This story begs the question: "Who is left behind to bear the wrath of justice by the people of Iraq?" Our U.S. soldiers, not the contractors.

The Real Terrorism Is this Occupation

"Our real enemy is not the ones living in a distant land whose names or policies we don't understand; The real enemy is a system that wages war when it's profitable, the CEOs who lay us off our jobs..."
- Mike Prysner

45-minute WMD claim 'may have come from an Iraqi taxi driver'

Tory MP and defence specialist Adam Holloway says MI6 got information indirectly from a taxi driver who had heard Iraqi military commanders talking about weapons. I believe the correct term is "hearsay". Article.