Organizing Notes

Bruce Gagnon is coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. He offers his own reflections on organizing and the state of America's declining empire....

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Location: Brunswick, ME, United States

The collapsing US military & economic empire is making Washington & NATO even more dangerous. US could not beat the Taliban but thinks it can take on China-Russia-Iran...a sign of psychopathology for sure. We must all do more to help stop this western corporate arrogance that puts the future generations lives in despair. @BruceKGagnon

Sunday, February 15, 2015

The News is Twisted


Who Are You to Challenge Me?

I heard a story the other day
about a Bangor Daily News (BDN) media official
telling peaceniks they had not covered their recent protest
because it was old news.
Redundant...old hat...
stuff like that

One peacenik thought about it
and wrote the guy back
and wondered if the BDN
was going to judge car crash stories
and murder and fires
by the same journalistic standards.
I'm certain the BDN scribe was insulted by such audacity.
How dare you say such things to me he must have thought.
I am the creator of the community reality
I am the maker of fortunes and careers
I am the breaker of hearts and lives
I am the one who does as his corporate bosses tell him
I am the chief lackey around here
Who are you to challenge me?

I remember many years ago
a media gatekeeper telling a friend and me
not to worry our pretty little heads
about informing the public on a particular concern
The newspaper, the Orlando Sentinel, had a plan
They were on the case and had it under control.
The media was the message
the media the god
A democratic debate was not needed
activism was not needed
agitation was not needed
ideas from the great unwashed were not needed
the media boys were on the case...
Go home and find something useful to do
with your otherwise wasted lives.

And so it goes today
from Iraq to Bangor.
The pages are filled with all the news that is fit to be printed.
Whole sections of the paper are left blank for me now
as I rustle through the daily rag
passing the big adverts,
the color pictures of men in orange suits
in handcuffs
on their way to trial
for another sensational murder
or driving under the influence
of a crazy society.
Pages of stories about oranges looking like grapefruit
and birds singing in winter
while Baghdad blows up again
and people cry invisible tears
and Washington burns our health care money
and politicians tell us they are almost there.

The news is twisted
and turned
and flattened out
and squeezed
and bled
and contorted
and changed
and shortened
to fit the tiny spaces
between the ads for women's underwear
and cars
and SUV's
and hummers
and big stories about violent video games
and returning heroes from a war far away.

A letter here and an announcement there
keep alive the illusion
that all is well here at home.
That democracy and the old ways are sound.
But the truth lies with the rusty scissors
as fewer pages are clipped
and stored
in our scrapbooks
where the stories of our lives
used to be collected
to pass on to our children
so we could teach them
about the good work that was done
the keep the fires burning.

Somehow the spirit rages on.
The Soviets learned to read between the lines
of Pravda
and today we turn the New York Times upside down
trying to learn the same lesson
so we can be free again.

Bruce K. Gagnon
(3/11/2007)

4 Comments:

Blogger denk said...

How many of the bullying countries accusing Sri Lanka of crimes against humanity and war crimes have clean hands or a flawless record?” asks Senaka Weeraratne, a Sri Lankan lawyer and international affairs analyst. [+]

tsk tsk tsk,
unhrc wants to investigate the BS *tam massacre of unarmed protestors*, 1989. [0]
while fukus have been committing a fullujah every other day since
Time immemorial !
then again, how come the world's *highest office on human rights* , the nobel peace prize committee etc have never heard of the world record holder of hunger strike, the iron lady of manipur ? [1]

*Human rights activist Irom Sharmila, on hunger strike for the last 14 years in protest against alleged army atrocities, has been re-arrested a day after being released from detention in India's northeastern Manipur state.

*alleged* my ass.
army/police atrocities in india is practically a daily routine, just that u never hear about it in the western msm, which dutifully remind u about the *tam massacre* every 4/6 without fail.
this was what trigger the *iron lady of manipur* to launch her hunger strike 15 yrs ago.
INDIAN ARMY RAPE US ! [2]

hmm...
myanmar, sri lanka , china, zim etc all in the cross hair of the unhrc, aka UnHumanRightsCommision, can we say...the murcunts *official enemy list* ?
hehehehe

everthing touched by the *shit stirrer* turn into shit,
HUMAN RIGHTS MUST BE THE MOST ABUSED PHRASE OF THE CENTURY.

[+]
http://www.eurasiareview.com/04032014-sri-lanka-unhrcs-navi-pillay-faulted-abuse-power-analysis/


[0]
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-06-04/news/50329833_1_tiananmen-anniversary-hong-kong-internal-affairs

[1]
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/southasia/2015/01/lady-manipur-rearrested-indian-police-150124045215179.html

[2]
http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2118/stories/20040910007400400.htm

2/16/15, 12:24 AM  
Blogger denk said...

mr Gagnon,
u'r an upright yank,
my apology.

2/16/15, 12:38 AM  
Blogger Bruce K. Gagnon said...

Thx Denk....best your way

2/16/15, 4:34 PM  
Blogger Lisa Savage said...

Corporate media are called "stenographers" while real investigative journalists find a way to work for themselves. The news you bring us is often bad news, but it is full of welcome truth.

2/19/15, 6:43 AM  

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