[IMC-Editorial] Fwd: operation mockingbird
Sheri Herndon
sheri at indymedia.org
Tue Oct 9 23:44:14 PDT 2001
>
>http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/MOCK/mockingbird.html
>
>MOCKINGBIRD
>
>The Subversion Of The Free Press By The CIA
>
>"You could get a journalist cheaper than a good call girl, for a
>couple hundred dollars a month." CIA operative discussing with Philip
>Graham, editor Washington Post, on the availability and prices of
>journalists willing to peddle CIA propaganda and cover stories.
>"Katherine The Great," by Deborah Davis (New York: Sheridan Square
>Press, 1991)
>
>As terrible as it is to live in a nation where the press in known to
>be controlled by the government, at least one has the advantage of
>knowing the bias is present, and to adjust for it. In the United
>States of America, we are taught from birth that our press is free
>from such government meddling. This is an insideous lie about the
>very nature of the news institution in this country. One that allows
>the
>government to lie to us while denying the very fact of the lie itself.
>
>
>The Alex Constantine Article
>
>Tales from the Crypt
>The Depraved Spies and Moguls
>of the CIA's Operation MOCKINGBIRD
>
>by Alex Constantine
>
> Who Controls the Media?
>
> Soulless corporations do, of course. Corporations with grinning,
> double-breasted executives, interlocking directorates, labor squabbles
> and flying capital. Dow. General Electric. Coca-Cola. Disney.
> Newspapers should have mastheads that mirror the world: The
> Westinghouse Evening Scimitar, The Atlantic-Richfield Intelligentser .
> It is beginning to dawn on a growing number of armchair ombudsmen that
> the public print reports news from a parallel universe - one that has
> never heard of politically-motivated assassinations, CIA-Mafia banking
> thefts, mind control, death squads or even federal agencies with
> secret budgets fattened by cocaine sales - a place overrun by lone
> gunmen, where the CIA and Mafia are usually on their best behavior. In
> this idyllic land, the most serious infraction an official can commit
> __is a the employment of a domestic servant with (shudder) no
> residency status.
>
> This unlikely land of enchantment is the creation of MOCKINGBIRD.
>
> It was conceived in the late 1940s, the most frigid period of the cold
> war, when the CIA began a systematic infiltration of the corporate
> media, a process that often included direct takeover of major news
> outlets.
>
> In this period, the American intelligence services competed with
> communist activists abroad to influence European labor unions. With or
> without the cooperation of local governments, Frank Wisner, an
> undercover State Department official assigned to the Foreign Service,
> rounded up students abroad to enter the cold war underground of covert
> operations on behalf of his Office of Policy Coordination. Philip
> Graham, __a graduate of the Army Intelligence School in Harrisburg,
> PA, then publisher of the Washington Post., was taken under Wisner's
> wing to direct the program code-named Operation MOCKINGBIRD.
>
> "By the early 1950s," writes formerVillage Voice reporter Deborah
> Davis in Katharine the Great, "Wisner 'owned' respected members of the
> New York Times, Newsweek, CBS and other communications vehicles, plus
> stringers, four to six hundred in all, according to a former CIA
> analyst." The network was overseen by Allen Dulles, a templar for
> German and American corporations who wanted their points of view
> represented in the public print. Early MOCKINGBIRD influenced 25
> newspapers and wire agencies consenting to act as organs of CIA
> propaganda. Many of these were already run by men with reactionary
> views, among them William Paley (CBS), C.D. Jackson (Fortune), Henry
> Luce (Time) and Arthur Hays Sulzberger (N.Y. Times).
>
> Activists curious about the workings of MOCKINGBIRD have since been
> appalled to f__ind in FOIA documents that agents boasting in CIA
> office memos of their pride in having placed "important assets" inside
> every major news publication in the country. It was not until 1982
> that the Agency openly admitted that reporters on the CIA payroll have
> acted as case officers to agents in the field.
>
> "World War III has begun," Henry's Luce's Life declared in March,
> 1947. "It is in the opening skirmish stage already." The issue
> featured an excerpt of a book by James Burnham, who called for the
> creation of an "American Empire," "world-dominating in political
> power, set up at least in part through coercion (probably including
> war, but certainly the threat of war) and in which one group of people
> ... would hold more than its equal share of power."
>
> George Seldes, the famed anti-fascist media critic, drew down on Luce
> in 1947, explaining tha__t "although avoiding typical Hitlerian
> phrases, the same doctrine of a superior people taking over the world
> and ruling it, began to appear in the press, whereas the organs of
> Wall Street were much more honest in favoring a doctrine inevitably
> leading to war if it brought greater commercial markets under the
> American flag."
>
> On the domestic front, an abiding relationship was struck between the
> CIA and William Paley, a wartime colonel and the founder of CBS. A
> firm believer in "all forms of propaganda" to foster loyalty to the
> Pentagon, Paley hired CIA agents to work undercover at the behest of
> his close friend, the busy grey eminence of the nation's media, Allen
> Dulles. Paley's designated go-between in his dealings with the CIA was
> Sig Mickelson, president of CBS News from 1954 to 1961.
>
> The CIA's assimilation of old guard fascists was overseen by the
> Operations Coordination Board, directed by C.D. Jackson, formerly an
> executive of Time magazine and Eisenhower's Special Assistant for Cold
> War Strategy. In 1954 he was succeeded by Nelson Rockefeller, who quit
> a year later, disgusted at the administration's political infighting.
> Vice President Nixon succeeded Rockefeller as the key cold war
> strategist.
>
> "Nixon," writes John Loftus, a former attorney for the Justice
> Department's Office of Special Investigations, took "a small boy's
> delight in the arcane tools of the intelligence craft - the hidden
> microphones, the 'black' propaganda." Nixon especially enjoyed his
> visit to a Virginia training camp to observe Nazis in the "special
> forces" drilling at covert operations.
>
> One of the fugitives recruited by the American intelligence
> underground was heroin smuggler Hubert von Blücher, the son of A
> German ambassador. Hubert often bragged that that he was trained by
> the Abwehr, the German military intelligence division, while still a
> civilian in his twenties. He served in a recon unit of the German Army
> until forced out for medical reasons in 1944, according to his wartime
> records. He worked briefly as an assistant director for Berlin-Film on
> a movie entitled One Day ..., and finished out the war flying with the
> Luftwaffe, but not to engage the enemy - his mission was the smuggling
> of Nazi loot out of the country. His exploits were, in part, the
> subject of Sayer and Botting's Nazi Gold, an account of the knockover
> of the Reichsbank at the end of the war.
>
> In 1948 he flew the coop to Argentina. Posing as a photographer named
> Huberto von Bleucher Corell, he immediately paid court to Eva Peron,
> presenting her with an invaluable Gobelin tapestry (a selection from
> the wealth of artifacts confiscated by the SS from Europe's Jews?).
> Hubert then met with Martin Bormann at the Hotel Plaza to deliver
> German marks worth $80 million. The loot financed the birth of the
> National Socialist Party in Argentina, among other forms of Nazi
> revival.
>
> In 1951, Hubert migrated northward and took a job at the Color
> Corporation of America in Hollywood. He eked out a living writing
> scripts for the booming movie industry. His voice can be heard on a
> film set in the Amazon, produced by Walt Disney. Nine years later he
> returned to Buenos Aires, then Düsseldorf, West Germany, and
> established a firm that developed not movie scripts, but anti-chemical
> warfare agents for the government. At the Industrie Club in Düsseldorf
> in 1982, von Blücher boasted to journalists, "I am chief shareholder
> of Pan American Airways. I am the best friend of Howard Hughes. The
> Beach Hotel in Las Vegas is 45 percent financed by me. I am thus the
> biggest financier ever to appear in the Arabian Nights tales dreamed
> up by these people over their second bottle of brandy."
>
> Not really. Two the biggest financiers to stumble from the drunken
> dreams of world-moving affluence were, in their time, Moses Annenberg,
> publisher of The Philadelphia Inquirer, and his son Walter , the
> CIA/mob-anchored publisher of the TV Guide. Like most American
> high-rollers, Annenberg lived a double life. Moses, his father, was a
> scion of the Capone mob. Both Moses and Walter were indicted in 1939
> for tax evasions totalling many millions of dollars - the biggest case
> in the history of the Justice Department. Moses pled guilty and agreed
> to pay the government $8 million and settle $9 million in assorted tax
> claims, penalties and interest debts. Moses received a three-year
> sentence. He died in Lewisburg Penitentiary.
>
> Walter Annenbeg, the TV Guide magnate, was a lofty Republican. On the
> campaign trail in April, 1988, George Bush flew into Los Angeles to
> woo Reagan's kitchen cabinet. "This is the topping on the cake,"
> Bush's regional campaign director told the Los Angeles Times. The Bush
> team met at Annenberg's plush Rancho Mirage estate at Sunnylands,
> California. It was at the Annenberg mansion that Nixon's cabinet was
> chosen, and the state's social and contributor registers built over a
> quarter-century of state political dominance by Ronald Reagan, whose
> acting career was launched by Operation MOCKINGBIRD.
>
> The commercialization of television, coinciding with Reagan's
> recruitment by the Crusade for Freedom, a CIA front, presented the
> intelligence world with unprecedented potential for sowing propaganda
> and even prying in the age of Big Brother. George Orwell glimpsed the
> possibilities when he installed omniscient video surveillance
> technology in 1948, a novel rechristened 1984 for the first edition
> published in the U.S. by Harcourt, Brace. Operation Octopus, according
> to federal files, was in full swing by 1948, a surveillance program
> that turned any television set with tubes into a broadcast
> transmitter. Agents of Octopus could pick up audio and visual images
> with the equipment as far as 25 miles away.
>
> Hale Boggs was investigating Operation Octopus at the time of his
> disappearance in the midst of the Watergate probe.
>
> In 1952, at MCA, Actors' Guild president Ronald Reagan - a screen idol
> recruited by MOCKINGBIRD's Crusade for Freedom to raise funds for the
> resettlement of Nazis in the U.S., according to Loftus - signed a
> secret waiver of the conflict-of-interest rule with the mob-controlled
> studio, in effect granting it a labor monopoly on early television
> programming. In exchange, MCA made Reagan a part owner. Furthermore,
> historian C. Vann Woodward, writing in the New York Times, in 1987,
> reported that Reagan had "fed the names of suspect people in his
> organization to the FBI secretly and regularly enough to be assigned
> 'an informer's code number, T-10.' His FBI file indicates intense
> collaboration with producers to 'purge' the industry of subversives."
>
> No one ever turned a suspicious eye on Walter Cronkite, a former
> intelligence officer and in the immediate postwar period UPI's Moscow
> correspondent. Cronkite was lured to CBS by Operation MOCKINGBIRD's
> Phil Graham, according to Deborah Davis.
>
> Another television conglomerate, Cap Cities, rose like a horror-film
> simian from CIA and Mafia heroin operations. Among other
> organized-crime Republicans, Thomas Dewey and his neighbor Lowell
> Thomas threw in to launch the infamous Resorts International, the
> corporate front for Lansky's branch of the federally-sponsored mob
> family and the corporate precursor to Cap Cities. Another of the
> investors was James Crosby, a Cap Cities executive who donated
> $100,000 to Nixon's 1968 presidential campaign. This was the year that
> Resorts bought into Atlantic City casino interests. Police in New
> jersey attempted, with no success, to spike the issuance of a gambling
> license to the company, citing Mafia ties.
>
> In 1954, this same circle of investors, all Catholics, founded the
> broadcasting company notorious for overt propagandizing and general
> spookiness. The company's chief counsel was OSS veteran William Casey,
> who clung to his shares by concealing them in a blind trust even after
> he was appointed CIA director by Ronald Reagan in 1981.
>
> "Black radio" was the phrase CIA critic David Wise coined in The
> Invisible Government to describe the agency's intertwining interests
> in the emergence of the transistor radio with the entrepreneurs who
> took to the airwaves. "Daily, East and West beam hundreds of
> propaganda broadcasts at each other in an unrelenting babble of
> competition for the minds of their listeners. The low-price transistor
> has given the hidden war a new importance," enthused one foreign
> correspondent.
>
> A Hydra of private foundations sprang up to finance the propaganda
> push. One of them, Operations and Policy Research, Inc. (OPR),
> received hundreds of thousands of dollars from the CIA through private
> foundations and trusts. OPR research was the basis of a television
> series that aired in New York and Washington, D.C. in 1964, Of People
> and Politics, a "study" of the American political system in 21 weekly
> installments.
>
> In Hollywood, the visual cortex of The Beast, the same CIA/Mafia
> combination that formed Cap Cities sank its claws into the film
> studios and labor unions. Johnny Rosselli was pulled out of the Army
> during the war by a criminal investigation of Chicago mobsters in the
> film industry. Rosselli, a CIA asset probably assassinated by the CIA,
> played sidekick to Harry Cohn, the Columbia Pictures mogul who visited
> Italy's Benito Mussolini in 1933, and upon his return to Hollywood
> remodeled his office after the dictator's. The only honest job
> Rosselli ever had was assistant purchasing agent (and a secret
> investor) at Eagle Lion productions, run by Bryan Foy, a former
> producer for 20th Century Fox. Rosselli, Capone's representative on
> the West Coast, passed a small fortune in mafia investments to Cohn.
> Bugsy Seigel pooled gambling investments with Billy Wilkerson,
> publisher of the Hollywood Reporter.
>
> In the 1950s, outlays for global propaganda climbed to a full third of
> the CIA's covert operations budget. Some 3, 000 salaried and contract
> CIA employees were eventually engaged in propaganda efforts. The cost
> of disinforming the world cost American taxpayers an estimated $265
> million a year by 1978, a budget larger than the combined expenditures
> of Reuters, UPI and the AP news syndicates.
>
> In 1977, the Copely News Service admitted that it worked closely with
> the intelligence services - in fact, 23 employees were full-time
> employees of the Agency.
>
> Most consumers of the corporate media were - and are - unaware of the
> effect that the salting of public opinion has on their own beliefs. A
> network anchorman in time of national crisis is an instrument of
> psychological warfare in the MOCKINGBIRD media. He is a creature from
> the national security sector's chamber of horrors. For this reason
> consumers of the corporate press have reason to examine their basic
> beliefs about government and life in the parallel universe of these
> United States.
>
>
>
>How the Washington Post Censors the News
>
>[Note: Look for the paragraph indicated by asterisks]
>
> How the Washington Post Censors the News
>
> A Letter to the Washington Post
> by Julian C. Holmes
> _________________________________________________________________
>
> April 25, 1992
> Richard Harwood, Ombudsman
> The Washington Post
> 1150 15th Street NW
> Washington, DC 20071
>
> Dear Mr. Harwood,
>
> Though the Washington Post does not over-extend itself in the pursuit
> of hard news, just let drop the faintest rumor of a government
> "conspiracy", and a klaxon horn goes off in the news room. Aroused
> from apathy in the daily routine of reporting assignations and various
> other political and social sports events, editors and reporters
> scramble to the phones. The klaxon screams its warning: the greatest
> single threat to herd-journalism, corporate profits, and government
> stability -- the dreaded "CONSPIRACY THEORY"!!
>
> It is not known whether anyone has actually been hassled or accosted
> by any of these frightful spectres, but their presence is announced to
> Post readers with a salvo of warnings to avoid the tricky, sticky webs
> spun by the wacko "CONSPIRACY THEORISTS".
>
> Recall how the Post saved us from the truth about Iran-Contra.
>
> Professional conspiracy exorcist Mark Hosenball was hired to ridicule
> the idea that Oliver North and his CIA-associated gangsters had
> conspired to do wrong (*1). And when, in their syndicated column, Jack
> Anderson and Dale Van Atta discussed some of the conspirators, the
> Post sprang to protect its readers, and the conspirators, by censoring
> the Anderson column before printing it (*2).
>
> But for some time the lid had been coming off the Iran-Contra
> conspiracy. In 1986, the Christic Institute, an interfaith center for
> law and public policy, had filed a lawsuit alleging a U.S.
> arms-for-drugs trade that helped keep weapons flowing to the
> CIA-Contra army in Nicaragua, and cocaine flowing to U.S. markets
> (*3). In 1988 Leslie Cockburn published Out of Control, a seminal work
> on our bizarre, illegal war against Nicaragua (*4). The Post
> contributed to this discovery process by disparaging the charges of
> conspiracy and by publishing false information about the
> drug-smuggling evidence presented to the House Subcommittee on
> Narcotics Abuse and Control. When accused by Committee Chairman
> Charles Rangel (D-NY). of misleading reporting, the Post printed only
> a partial correction and declined to print a letter of complaint from
> Rangel (*5).
>
> Sworn testimony before Senator John Kerry's Subcommittee on Terrorism,
> Narcotics, and International Operations confirmed U.S. Government
> complicity in the drug trade (*6). With its coverup of the arms/drug
> conspiracy evaporating, the ever-accommodating Post shifted gears and
> retained Hosenball to exorcise from our minds a newly emerging threat
> to domestic tranquility, the "October Surprise" conspiracy (*7). But
> close on the heels of Hosenball and the Post came Barbara Honegger and
> then Gary Sick who authored independently, two years apart, books with
> the same title, "October Surprise" (*8). Honegger was a member of the
> Reagan/Bush campaign and transition teams in 1980. Gary Sick,
> professor of Middle East Politics at Columbia University, was on the
> staff of the National Security Council under Presidents Ford, Carter,
> and Reagan. In 1989 and 1991 respectively, Honegger and Sick published
> their evidence of how the Republicans made a deal to supply arms to
> Iran if Iran would delay release of the 52 United States hostages
> until after the November 1980 election. The purpose of this deal was
> to quash the possibility of a pre-election release(an October
> surprise). which would have bolstered the reelection prospects for
> President Carter.
>
> Others published details of this alleged Reagan-Bush conspiracy. In
> October 1988, Playboy Magazine ran an expose "An Election Held
> Hostage"; FRONTLINE did another in April 1991 (*9). In June, 1991 a
> conference of distinguished journalists, joined by 8 of the former
> hostages, challenged the Congress to "make a full, impartial
> investigation" of the election/hostage allegations. The Post reported
> the statement of the hostages, but not a word of the conference itself
> which was held in the Dirksen Senate Office Building Auditorium (*10).
> On February 5, 1992 a gun-shy, uninspired House of Representatives
> begrudgingly authorized an "October Surprise" investigation by a task
> force of 13 congressmen headed by Lee Hamilton (D-IN). who had chaired
> the House of Representatives Iran-Contra Committee. Hamilton has named
> as chief team counsel Larry Barcella, a lawyer who represented BCCI
> when the Bank was indicted in 1988 (*11).
>
> Like the Washington Post, Hamilton had not shown interest in pursuing
> the U.S. arms-for-drugs operation (*12). He had accepted Oliver
> North's lies,and as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee he
> derailed House Resolution 485 which had asked President Reagan to
> answer questions about Contra support activities of government
> officials and others (*13). After CIA operative John
>
> Hull (from Hamilton's home state). was charged in Costa Rica with
> "international drug trafficking and hostile acts against the nation's
> security", Hamilton and 18 fellow members of Congress tried to
> intimidate Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez into handling
> Hull's case "in a manner that will not complicate U.S.-Costa Rican
> relations" (*14). The Post did not report the Hamilton letter or the
> Costa Rican response that declared Hull's case to be "in as good hands
> as our 100 year old uninterrupted democracy can provide to all
> citizens" (*15).
>
> Though the Post does its best to guide our thinking away from conspiracy
> theories, it is difficult to avoid the fact that so much wrongdoing involves
> government or corporate conspiracies:
>
> In its COINTELPRO operation, the FBI used disinformation, forgery,
> surveillance, false arrests, and violence to illegally harass
> U.S.citizens in the 60's (*16).
>
> The CIA's Operation MONGOOSE illegally sabotaged Cuba by "destroying
> crops, brutalizing citizens, destabilizing the society, and
> conspiring with the Mafia to assassinate Fidel Castro and other
> leaders" (*17).
>
> "Standard Oil of New Jersey was found by the Antitrust Division of
> the Department of Justice to be conspiring with I.G.Farben...of
> Germany. ...By its cartel agreements with Standard Oil, the
> United States was effectively prevented from developing or
> producing [fo rWorld War-II] any substantial amount of
> synthetic rubber," said Senator Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin
> (*18).
>
> U.S. Government agencies knowingly withheld information about
> dosages of radiation "almost certain to produce thyroid
> abnormalities or cancer" that contaminated people residing near
> the nuclear weapons factory at Hanford, Washington (*19).
>
> Various branches of Government deliberately drag their feet in
> getting around to cleaning up the Nation's dangerous nuclear
> weapons sites (*20). State and local governments back the
> nuclear industry's secret public relations strategy (*21).
>
> "The National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society and some
> twenty comprehensive cancer centers, have misled and confused
> the public and Congress by repeated claims that we are winning
> the war against cancer. In fact, the cancer establishment has
> continually minimized the evidence for increasing cancer rates
> which it has largely attributed to smoking and dietary fat,
> while discounting or ignoring the causal role of avoidable
> eposures to industrial carcinogens in the air, food, water, and
> the workplace." (*22).
>
> The Bush Administration coverup of its pre-Gulf-War support of Iraq
> "is yet another example of the President's people conspiring to
> keep both Congress and the American people in the dark" (*23).
>
> If you think about it, conspiracy is a fundamental aspect of
> doing business in this country.
>
> Take the systematic and cooperative censorship of the Persian Gulf
> War by the Pentagon and much of the news media (*24).
>
> Or the widespread plans of business and government groups to spend
> $100 million in taxes to promote a distorted and truncated
> history of Columbus in America (*25). along the lines of the
> Smithsonian Institution's "fusion of the two worlds", (*26).
> rather than examining more realistic aspects of the Spanish
> invasion, like "anger, cruelty, gold, terror, and death" (*27).
>
> Or circumstances surrounding the U.S. Justice Department theft from
> the INSLAW company of sophisticated, law-enforcement computer
> software which "now point to a widespread conspiracy
> implicating lesser Government officials in the theft of
> INSLAW's technology", says former U.S. Attorney General Elliot
> Richardson (*28).
>
> Or Watergate.
>
> Or the "largest bank fraud in world financial history" (*29), where
> the White House knew of the criminal activities at "the Bank of
> Crooks and Criminals International" (BCCI) (*30), where U.S.
> intelligence agencies did their secret banking (*31), and where
> bribery of prominent American public officials "was a way of
> doing business" (*32).
>
> Or the 1949 conviction of "GM [General Motors], Standard Oil of
> California, Firestone, and E. Roy Fitzgerald, among others, for
> criminally conspiring to replace electric transportation with
> gas- and diesel-powered buses and to monopolize the sale of
> buses and related products to transportation companies
> throughout the country" [in, among others, the cities of New
> York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, St. Louis, Oakland, Salt Lake
> City, and Los Angeles] (*33).
>
> Or the collusion in 1973 between Senator Abraham Ribicoff (D-CT).
> and the U.S. Department of Transportation to overlook safety
> defects in the 1.2 million Corvair automobiles manufactured by
> General Motors in the early 60's (*34).
>
> Or the A. H. Robins Company, which manufactured the Dalkon Shield
> intrauterine contraceptive, and which ignored repeated warnings
> of the Shield's hazards and which "stonewalled, deceived,
> covered up, and
>
> covered up the coverups...[thus inflicting] on women a
> worldwide epidemic of pelvic infections." (*35).
>
> Or that cooperation between McDonnell Douglas Aircraft Company and
> the FAA resulted in failure to enforce regulations regarding
> the unsafe DC-10 cargo door which failed in flight killing all
> 364 passengers on Turkish Airlines Flight 981 on March 3, 1974
> (*36).
>
> Or the now-banned, cancer-producing pregnancy drug
> Diethylstilbestrol (DES). that was sold by manufacturers who
> ignored tests which showed DES to be carcinogenic; and who
> acted "in concert with each other in the testing and marketing
> of DES for miscarriage purposes" (*37).
>
> Or the conspiracies among bankers and speculators, with the
> cooperation of a corrupted Congress, to relieve depositors of
> their savings. This "arrogant disregard from the White House,
> Congress and corporate world for the interests and rights of
> the American people" will cost U.S. tapayers many hundreds of
> billions of dollars (*38).
>
> Or the Westinghouse, Allis Chalmers,Federal Pacific, and General
> Electric executives who met surreptitiously in hotel rooms to
> fix prices and eliminate competition on heavy industrial
> equipment (*39).
>
> Or the convictions of Industrial Biotest Laboratories (IBT).
> officers for fabricating safety tests on prescription drugs
> (*40).
>
> Or the conspiracy by the asbestos industry to suppress knowledge of
> medical problemsrelating to asbestos (*41).
>
> Or the 1928 Achnacarry Agreement through which oil companies "agreed
> not to engage in any effective price competition" (*42).
>
> Or the conspiracy among U.S. Government agencies and the Congress to
> cover up the nature of our decades-old war against the people
> of Nicaragua
>
> a covert war that continues in 1992 with the U.S. Government
> applying pressure for the Nicaraguan police to reorganize into
> a more repressive force (*43).
>
> Or the conspiracy by the CIA and the U.S. Government to interfere in
> the Chilean election process with military aid, covert actions,
> and an economic boycott which culminated in the overthrow of
> the legitimately elected government and the assassination of
> President Salvador Allende in 1973 (*44).
>
> Or the conspiracy among U.S. officials including Secretary of State
> Henry Kissinger and CIA Director William Colby to finance
> terrorism in Angola for the purpose of disrupting Angola's
> plans for peaceful elections in October 1975, and to lie about
> these actions to the Congress and the news media (*45). And CIA
> Director George Bush's subsequent cover up of this
> U.S.-sponsored terrorism (*46).
>
> Or President George Bush's consorting with the Pentagon to invade
> Panama in 1989 and thereby violate the Constitution of the
> United States, the U.N. Charter, the O.A.S. Charter, and the
> Panama Canal Treaties (*47).
>
> Or the "gross antitrust violations" (*48) and the conspiracy of
> American oil companies and the British and U.S. governments to
> strangle Iran economically after Iran nationalized the
> British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951. And the
> subsequent overthrow by the CIA in 1953 of Iranian Prime
> Minister Muhammed Mossadegh (*49).
>
> Or the CIA-planned assassination of Congo head-of-state Patrice
> Lumumba (*50).
>
> Or the deliberate and wilful efforts of President George Bush,
> Senator Robert Dole, Senator George Mitchell, various U.S.
> Government agencies, and members of both Houses of the Congress
> to buy the 1990 Nicaraguan national elections for the
> presidential candidate supported by President Bush (*51).
>
> Or the collective approval by 64 U.S. Senators of Robert Gates to
> head the CIA, in the face of "unmistakable evidence that Gates
> lied about his role in the Iran-Contra scandal" (*52).
>
> Or "How Reagan and the Pope Conspired to Assist Poland's Solidarity
> Movement and Hasten the Demise of Communism" (*53).
>
> Or how the Reagan Administration connived with the Vatican to ban
> the use of USAID funds by any country "for the promotion of
> birth control or abortion" (*54).
>
> Or "the way the Vatican and Washington colluded to achieve common
> purpose in Central America" (*55).
>
> Or the collaboration of Guatemalan strong-man and mass murderer
> Hector Gramajo with the U.S. Army to design "programs to build
> civilian-military cooperation" at the U.S. Army School of the
> Americas (SOA) at Fort Benning, Georgia; five of the nine
> soldiers accused in the 1989 Jesuit massacre in El Salvador are
> graduates of SOA which trains Latin/American military personnel
> (*56).
>
> Or the conspiracy of the Comanche Peak Nuclear Plant administration
> to harass and cause bodily harm to whistleblower Linda Porter
> who uncovered dangerous working conditions at the facility
> (*57).
>
> Or the conspiracy of President Richard Nxion and the Government of
> South Vietnam to delay the Paris Peace Talks until after the
> 1968 U.S. presidential election (*58).
>
> Or the pandemic coverups of police violence (*59).
>
> Or the always safe-to-cite worldwide communist conspiracy (*60).
>
> Or maybe the socially responsible, secret consortium to publish The
> Satanic Verses in paperback (*61).
>
> Conspiracies are obviously a way to get things done, and the Washington Post
> offers little comment unless conspiracy theorizing threatens to expose a
> really important conspiracy that, let's say, benefits big business or big
> government.
>
> Such a conspiracy would be like our benevolent CIA's 1953 overthrow of
> the Iranian government to help out U.S. oil companies; or like our
> illegal war against Panama to tighten U.S. control over Panama and the
> Canal; or like monopoly control of broadcasting that facilitates
> corporate censorship on issues of public importance (*62). When the
> camouflage of such conspiracies is stripped away, public confidence in
>> the conspiring officials can erode -- depending on how seriously the
> citizenry perceives the conspiracy to have violated the public trust.
> Erosion of public trust in the status quo is what the Post seems to
> see as a real threat to its corporate security.
>
> Currently, the Post has mounted vituperative, frenzied attacks on
> Oliver Stone's movie "JFK", which reexamines the U.S. Government's
> official (Warren Commission. finding that a single gunman, acting
> alone, killed President John F. Kennedy. The movie also is the story
> of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's unsuccessful
> prosecution of Clay Shaw, the only person ever tried in connection
> with the assassination. And the movie proposes that the Kennedy
> assassination was the work of conspirators whose interests would not
> be served by a president who, had he lived, might have disengaged us
> from our war against Vietnam.
>
> The Post ridicules a reexamination of the Kennedy assassination along
> lines suggested by "JFK". Senior Post journalists like Charles
> Krauthammer, Ken Ringle, George Will, Phil McCombs, and Michael
> Isikoff, have been called up to man the bulwarks against public
> sentiment which has never supported the government's
> non-conspiratorial assassination thesis. In spite of the facts that
> the Senate Intelligence Committee of 1975 and 1976 found that "both
> the FBI and CIA had repeatedly lied to the Warren Commission" (*63)
> and that the 1979 Report of the House Select Committee on
> Assassinations found that President Kennedy was probably killed "as a
> result of a conspiracy" (*64), a truly astounding number of Post
> stories have been used as vehicles to discredit "JFK" as just another
> conspiracy (*65).
>
> Some of the more vicious attacks on the movie are by editor Stephen
> Rosenfeld, and journalists Richard Cohen, George Will, and George
> Lardner Jr (*66). They ridicule the idea that Kennedy could have had
> second thoughts about escalating the Vietnam War and declaim that
> there is no historical justification for this idea. Seasoned
> journalist Peter Dale Scott, former Pentagon/CIA liaison chief L.
> Fletcher Prouty, and investigators David Scheim and John Newman have
> each authored defense of the "JFK" thesis that Kennedy was not
> enthusiastic about staying in Vietnam (*67). But the Post team just
> continues ranting against the possibility of a high-level
> assassination conspiracy while offering little justification for its
> arguments.
>
> An example of particularly shabby scholarship and unacceptable
> behavior is George Lardner Jr's contribution to the Post's campaign
> against the movie. Lardner wrote three articles, two before the movie
> was completed, and the third upon its release. In May, six months
> before the movie came out, Lardner obtained a copy of the first draft
> of the script and, contrary to accepted standards, revealed in the
> Post the contents of this copyrighted movie (*68). Also in this
> article, (*69). Lardner discredits Jim Garrison with hostile
>> statements from a former Garrison associate Pershing Gervais. Lardner
> does not tell the reader that subsequent to the Clay Shaw trial, in a
> U.S. Government criminal action brought against Garrison, Government
> witness Gervais, who helped set up Garrison for prosecution, admitted
> under oath that in a May 1972 interview with a New Orleans television
> reporter, he, Gervais, had said that the U.S. Government's case
> against Garrison was a fraud (*70). The Post's 1973 account of the
> Garrison acquittal mentions this controversy, but when I recently
> asked Lardner about this, he was not clear as to whether he remembered
> it (*71).
>
> Two weeks after his first "JFK" article, Lardner blustered his way
> through a justification for his unauthorized possession of the early
> draft ofthe movie (*72). He also defended his reference to Pershing
> Gervais by lashing out at Garrison as a writer "of gothic fiction".
>
> When the movie was released in December, Lardner "reviewed" it (*73).
> He again ridiculed the film's thesis that following the Kennedy
> assassination, President Johnson reversed Kennedy's plans to
> de-escalate the Vietnam War. Lardner cited a memorandum issued by
> Johnson four days after Kennedy died. Lardner says this memorandum was
> written before the assassination, and that it "was a continuation of
> Kennedy's policy". In fact, the memorandum was drafted the day before
> the assassination by McGeorge Bundy (Kennedy's Assistant for National
> Security Affairs) Kennedy was in Texas, and may never have seen it.
> Following the assassination, it was rewritten; and the final version
> provided for escalating the war against Vietnam (*74) -- facts that
> Lardner avoided.
>
> The Post's crusade against exposing conspiracies is blatantly dishonest:
>
> The Warren Commission inquiry into the Kennedy Assassination was for
> the most part conducted in secret. This fact is buried in the Post
> (*75). Nor do current readers of this newspaper find meaningful
> discussion of the Warren Commission's secret doubts about both the FBI
> and the CIA (*76). Or of a dispatch from CIA headquarters instructing
> co-conspirators at field stations to counteract the "new wave of books
> and articles criticizing the [Warren] Commission's findings...[and]
> conspiracy theories ...[that] have frequently thrown suspicion on our
> organization" and to "discuss the publicity problem with liaison and
> friendly elite contacts, especially politicians and editors "and to
> "employ propaganda assets to answer and refute the attacks of the
> critics. ...Book reviews and feature articles are particularly
> appropriate for this purpose. ...The aim of this dispatch is to
> provide material for countering and discrediting the claims of the
> conspiracy theorists..." (*77).
>
> In 1979, Washington journalist Deborah Davis published Katharine The Great,
> the story of Post publisher Katharine Graham and her newspaper's close ties
> with Washington's powerful elite, a number of whom were with the CIA.
>
> Particularly irksome to Post editor Benjamin Bradlee was a Davis claim
> that Bradlee had "produced CIA material" (*78). Understandably
> sensitive about this kind of publicity, Bradlee told Davis' publisher
> Harcourt Brace Jovanovich ,"Miss Davis is lying ...I never produced
> CIA material ...what I can do is to brand Miss Davis as a fool and to
> put your company in that special little group of publishers who don't
> give a shit for the truth". The Post bullied HBJ into recalling the
> book; HBJ shredded 20,000 copies; Davis sued HBJ for breach of
> contract and damage to reputation; HBJ settled out of court; and Davis
> published her book elsewhere with an appendix that demonstrated
> Bradlee to have been deeply involved with producing cold-war/CIA
> propaganda (*79). Bradlee still says the allegations about his
> association with people in the CIA are false, but he has apparently
> taken no action to contest the xetensive documentation presented by
> Deborah Davis in the second and third editions of her book (*80).
>
> And it's not as if the Post were new to conspiracy work.
>
>****************************************************************************
> Former Washington Post publisher Philip Graham "believing that the
> function of the press was more often than not to mobilize consent for
> the policies of the government, was one of the architects of what
> became a widespread practice:the use and manipulation of journalists
> by the CIA" (*81). This scandal was known by its code name Operation
> MOCKINGBIRD. Former Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein cites a
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^
> former CIA deputy director as saying, "It was widely known that Phil
> Graham was someone you could get help from" (*82). More recently the
> Post provided cover for CIA personality Joseph Fernandez by "refusing
> to print his name for over a year up until the day his indictmen twas
> announced ...for crimes committed in his official capacity as CIA
> station chief in Costa Rica" (*83).
>***************************************************************************
>
> Of the meetings between Graham and his CIA acquaintances at which the
> availability and prices of journalists were discussed, a former CIA
> man recalls, "You could get a journalist cheaper than a good call
> girl, for a couple hundred dollars a month" (*84). One may wish to
> consider Philip Graham's philosophy along with a more recent statement
> from his wife Katharine Graham, current Chairman of the Board of the
> Washington Post. In a lecture on terrorism and the news media, Mrs.
> Graham said: "A second challenge facing the media is how to prevent
> terrorists from using the media as a platform fortheir views. ... The
> point is that we generally know when we are being manipulated, and
> we've learned better how and where to draw the line, though the
> decisions are often difficult" (*85).
>
> Today, the Post and its world of big business are apparently terrified
> that our elite and our high-level public officials may be exposed as
> conspirators behind Contra drug-smuggling, October Surprise, or the
> assassination of President Kennedy. This fear is truly remarkable in
> that, like most of us and like most institutions, the Post runs its
> business as a conspiracy of like-minded entrepreneurs -- a conspiracy
> "to act or work together toward the same result or goal" (*86). But
> where the Post really parts company from just plain people is when it
> pretends that conspiracies associated with big business or government
> are "coincidence". Post reporter Lardner vents the frustration
> inherent in having to maintain this dichotomy. He lashes out at Oliver
> Stone and suggests that Stone may actually believe that the Post's
> opposition to Stone's movie is a "conspiracy". Lardner assures us that
> Stone's complaints are "groundless and paranoid and smack of
> McCarthyism" (*87).
>
> So how does the Post justify devoting so much energy to ridiculing those who
> investigate conspiracies?
>
> The Post has answers: people revert to conspiracy theories because
> they need something "neat and tidy" (*88) that "plugs a gap no other
> generally accepted theory fills', (*89. and "coincidence ...is always
> the safest and most likely explanation for any conjunction of curious
> circumstances ..." (*90).
>
> And what does this response mean? It means that "coincidence theory"
> is what the Post espouses when it would prefer not to admit to a
> conspiracy. In other words, some things just "happen". And, besides,
> conspiracy to do certain things would be a crime; "coincidence" is a
> safer bet.
>
> Post Ombudsman Richard Harwood, who, it is rumored, serves as
> Executive Director of the Benevolent Protective Order of Coincidence
> Theorists, (*91) recently issued a warning about presidential
> candidates "who have begun to mutter about a press conspiracy".
> Ordinarily, Harwood would simply dismiss these charges as "symptoms of
> the media paranoia that quadrennially engulfs members of the American
> political class" (*92). But a fatal mistake was made by the mutterers;
> they used the "C" word against the PRESS! And Harwood exploded his
> off-the-cuff comment into an entire column -- ending it with:"We are
> the new journalists, immersed too long, perhaps, in the cleansing
> waters of political conformity. But conspirators we ain't".
>
> Distinguished investigative journalist Morton Mintz, a 29-year veteran
> of the Washington Post, now chairs the Fund for Investigative
> Journalism. In the December issue of The Progressive, Mintz wrote "A
> Reporter Looks Back in Anger -- Why the Media Cover Up Corporate
> Crime". Therein he discussed the difficulties in convincing editors to
> accept important news stories. He illustrated the article with his own
> experiences at the Post, where he says he was known as "the biggest
> pain in the ass in the office" (*93).
>
> Would Harwood argue that grief endured by journalists at the hands
>of editors
> is a matter of random coincidence?
>
> And that such policy as Mintz described is made independently by
> editors without influence from fellow editors or from management?
> Would Harwood have us believe that at the countless office "meetings"
> in which news people are ever in attendance, there is no discussion of
> which stories will run and which ones will find inadequate space? That
> there is no advanced planning for stories or that there are no
> cooperative efforts among the staff? Or that in the face of our
> news-media "grayout" of presidential candidate Larry Agran, (*94) a
> Post journalist would be free to give news space to candidate Agran
> equal to that the Post lavishes on candidate Clinton? Let's face it:
> these possibilities are about as likely as Barbara Bush entertaining
> guests at a soup kitchen.
>
> Would Harwood have us believe that media critic and former Post
> Ombudsman Ben Bagdikian is telling less than the truth in his account
> of wire-service control over news: "The largely anonymous men who
> control the syndicate and wire service copy desks and the central wire
> photo machines determine at a single decision what millions will see
> and hear. ...there seems to be little doubt that these gatekeepers
> preside over an operation in which an appalling amount of press
> agentry sneaks in the back door of American journalism and marches
> untouched out the front door as 'news'" (*95).
>
> When he sat on the U.S. District Court of Appeals in Washington, Judge
> Clarence Thomas violated U.S. law when he failed to remove himself
> from a case in which he then proceeded to reverse a $10 million
> judgment against the Ralston Purina Company (*96). Ralston Purina, the
> animal feed empire, is the family fortune of Thomas' mentor, Senator
> John Danforth. The Post limited its coverage of the Thomas malfeasance
> to 56 words buried in the middle of a 1200-word article (*97). Would
> Harwood have us believe that the almost complete blackout on this
> matter by the major news media and the U.S. Senate was a matter of
> coincidence? Could a Post reporter have written a story about Ralston
> Purina if she had wanted to? Can a brick swim?
>
> Or take the fine report produced last September by Ralph Nader's
> Public Citizen. Titled All the Vice President's Men, it documents "How
> the Quayle Council on Competitiveness Secretly Undermines Health,
> Safety, and Environmental Programs". Three months later, Post
> journalists David Broder and Bob Woodward published "The President's
> Understudy", a seven-part series on Vice President Quayle. Although
> this series does address Quayle's role with the Competitiveness
> Council, its handling of the Council's disastrous impact on America is
> inadequate. It is 40,000 words of mostly aimless chatter about Quayle
> memorabilia: youth, family, college record, Christianity, political
> aspirations, intellectual aspirations, wealthy friends, government
> associates, golf, travels, wife Marilyn, and net worth -- revealing
> little about Quayle's abilities, his understanding of society's
> problems, or his thoughts about justice and freedom, and never
> mentioning the comprehensive Nader study of Quayle's record in the
> Bush Administration (*98).
>
> Now, did Broder or did Woodward forget about the Nader study? Or did
> both of them forget? Or did one, or the other, or both decide not to
> mention it? Did these two celebrated, seasoned Post reporters ever
> discuss together their jointly authored stories? Did they decide to
> publish such a barren set of articles because it would enhance their
> reputations? How did management feel about the use of precious news
> space for such frivolity? Is it possible that so many pages were
> dedicated to this twaddle without people "acting or working together
> toward the same result or goal"? (*99) Do crocodiles fly?
>
> On March 20, front-page headlines in the Wall Street Journal, the New
> York Times, USA Today, and the Washington Post read respectively:
>
> TSONGAS DROPPED OUT OF THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE CLEARING CLINTON'S PATH
>
> TSONGAS ABANDONS CAMPAIGN LEAVING CLINTON CLEAR PATH TOWARD SHOWDOWN
> WITH BUSH
>
> TSONGAS CLEARS WAY FOR CLINTON
>
> TSONGAS EXIT CLEARS WAY FOR CLINTON
>
> This display of editorial independence should at least raise questions
> of whether the news media collective mindset is really different from
> that of any other cartel -- like oil, diamond, energy, (*100) or
> manufacturing cartels, a cartel being "a combination of independent
> commercial enterprises designed to limit competition" (*101).
>
> The Washington Post editorial page carries the heading:
>
> AN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
>
> Is it? Of course not. There probably is no such thing. Does the Post
> "conspire" to keep its staff and its newspaper from wandering too far
> from the safety of mediocrity? The Post would respond that the
> question is absurd. In that I am not privy to the Post's telephone
> conversations, I can only speculate on how closely the media elite
> must monitor the staff. But we all know how few micro-seconds it takes
> a new reporter to learn what subjects are taboo and what are "safe",
> and that experienced reporters don't have to ask.
>
> What is more important, however, than speculating about how the Post
> communicates within its own corporate structure and with other members
> of the cartel, is to document and publicize what the Post does in
> public, namely, how it shapes and censors the news.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Julian C. Holmes
>
> Copies to: Public-spirited citizens, both inside and outside the news
> media, And - maybe a few others.
> _________________________________________________________________
>
> Notes to Letter of April 25, 1992:
>
> 1. Mark Hosenball, "The Ultimate Conspiracy", Washington Post,
> September 11, 1988, p.C1
>
> 2a. Julian Holmes, Letter to Washington Post Ombudsman Richard
> Harwood, June 4,1991. Notes that the Post censored, from the
> Anderson/Van Atta column, references to the Christic Institute and to
> Robert Gates.
>
> 2b. Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta, "Iran-Contra Figure Dodges
> Extradition", Washington Merry-Go-Round, United Feature Syndicate, May
> 26, 1991. This is the column submitted to the Post (see note 2a)..
>
> 2c. Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta, "The Man Washington Doesn't Want
> to Extradite", Washington Post, May 26, 1991. The column (see note
> 2b). as it appeared in the Post (see note 2a)..
>
> 3a. Case No. 86-1146-CIV-KING, Amended Complaint for RICO Conspiracy,
> etc., United States District Court, Southern District of Florida, Tony
> Avirgan and Martha Honey v. John Hull et al., October 3, 1986.
>
> 3b. Vince Bielski and Dennis Bernstein, "Reports: Contras Send Drugs
> to U.S.", Cleveland Plain Dealer, November 16, 1986.
>
> 3c. Neal Matthews, "I Ran Drugs for Uncle Sam" (based on interviews
> with Robert Plumlee, contra resupply pilot)., San Diego Reader, April
> 5, 1990.
>
> 4. Leslie Cockburn, Out of Control. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press,
> 1987.
>
> 5a. Peter Dale Scott and Jonathan Marshall, Cocaine Politics,
> University ofCalifornia Press, 1991, p.179-181.
>
> 5b. David S. Hilzenrath, "Hill Panel Finds No Evidence Linking Contras
> to Drug Smuggling", Washington Post, July 22, 1987, p.A07.
>
> 5c. Partial correction to the Washington Post of July 22, Washington
> Post, July 24,1987, p.A3.
>
> 5d. The Washington Post declined to publish SubCommittee Chairman
> Rangel's Letter- to-the-Editor of July 22, 1987. It was printed in the
> Congressional Record on August 6, 1987, p.E3296-7.
>
> 6a. Michael Kranish, "Kerry Says US Turned Blind Eye to Contra-Drug
> Trail", Boston Globe, April 10, 1988.
>
> 6b. Mary McGrory, "The Contra-Drug Stink", Washington Post, April 10,
> 1988, p.B1. 6c. Robert Parry with Rod Nordland, "Guns for Drugs?
> Senate Probers Trace an Old Contra Connection to George Bush's
> Office", Newsweek, May 23, 1988, p.22.
>
> 6d. Dennis Bernstein, "Iran-Contra -- The Coverup Continues", The
> Progressive, November 1988, p.24.
>
> 6e. "Drugs, Law Enforcement and Foreign Policy", A Report Prepared by
> the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics, and International Operations
> of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, December
> 1988.
>
> 7a. Mark Hosenball, "If It's October ... Then It's Time for an Iranian
> Conspiracy Theory", Washington Post, October 9, 1988, p.D1.
>
> 7b. Mark Hosenball, "October Surprise! Redux! The Latest Version of
> the 1980 'Hostage- Deal' Story Is Still Full of Holes", Washington
> Post, April 21, 1991,p.B2.
>
> 8a. Barbara Honegger, October Surprise, New York: Tudor, 1989.
>
> 8b. Gary Sick, October Surprise, New York: Times Books, Random House,
> 1991.
>
> 9a. Abbie Hoffman and Jonathan Silvers, "An Election Held Hostage",
> Playboy, October 1988, p.73.
>
> 9b. Robert Parry and Robert Ross, "The Election Held Hostage",
> FRONTLINE, WGBH-TV,April 16, 1991.
>
> 10a. Reuter, "Ex-Hostages Seek Probe By Congress", Washington Post,
> June 14,1991,p.A4.
>
> 10b. "An Election Held Hostage?", Conference, Dirksen Senate Office
> Building Auditorium, Washington DC, June 13, 1991; Sponsored by The
> Fund For New Priorities in America, 171 Madison Avenue, New York, NY,
> 10016.
>
> 11a. David Brown and Guy Gugliotta, "House Approves Inquiry Into
> 'OctoberSurprise'", Washington Post, February 6, 1992, p.A11.
>
> 11b. Jack Colhoun, "Lawmakers Lose Nerve on October Surprise", The
> Guardian, December 11, 1991, p.7.
>
> 11c. Jack Colhoun, "October Surprise Probe Taps BCCI Lawyer", The
> Guardian, February 26, 1992, p.3.
>
> 12. See note 5a, p.180-1.
>
> 13a. See note 4, p.229, 240-1.
>
> 13b. Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the
> Iran-Contra Affair, Senate Report No. 100-216, House Report No.
> 100-433, November 1987, p.139-141.
>
> 14a. Letter to His Excellency Oscar Arias Sanchez, President of the
> Republic of Costa Rica; from Members of the U.S. Congress David
> Dreier, Lee Hamilton, Dave McCurdy, Dan Burton, Mary Rose Oakar, Jim
> Bunning, Frank McCloskey, Cass Ballenger, Peter Kostmayer, Jim Bates,
> Douglas Bosco, James Inhofe, Thomas Foglietta, Rod Chandler, Ike
> Skelton, Howard Wolpe, Gary Ackerman, Robert Lagomarsino, and Bob
> McEwen; January 26, 1989.
>
> 14b. Peter Brennan, "Costa Rica Considers Seeking Contra Backer in
> U.S. -- Indiana Native Wanted on Murder Charge in 1984 Bomb Attack in
> Nicaragua", WashingtonPost, February 1, 1990.
>
> 14c. "Costa Rica Seeks Extradition of Indiana Farmer", Scripps-Howard
> News Service,April 25, 1991.
>
> 15. Press Release from the Costa Rican Embassy, Washington DC, On the
> Case of the Imprisonment of Costa Rican Citizen John Hull", February
> 6, 1989.
>
> 16. Brian Glick, War at Home, Boston: South End Press, 1989.
>
> 17. John Stockwell, The Praetorian Guard-- The U.S. Role in the New
> World Order, Boston: South End Press, 1991, p.121.
>
> 18. Hearings Before the Committee on Patents, United States Senate,
> 77th Cong., 2nd Session (1942)., part I, as cited in Joseph Borkin,
> The Crime and Punishment of I.G. Farben, New York: The Free Press,
> Macmillan, 1978, p.93.
>
> 19. R. Jeffrey Smith, "Study of A-Plant Neighbors' Health Urged",
> Washington Post, July 13, 1990, p.A6.
>
> 20. Tom Horton, "A Cost Higher Than the Peace Dividend -- Price Tag
> Mounts to Clean Up Nuclear Weapons Sites", Baltimore Sun, February 23,
> 1992, p.1K.
>
> 21. "The Nuclear Industry's Secret PR Strategy", EXTRA!, March 1992,
> p.15.
>
> 22a. Samuel S. Epstein, MD et al, Losing the War Against Cancer: Need
> for PublicPolicy Reform", Congressional Record, April 2, 1992,
> p.E947-9.
>
> 22b. Samuel S. Epstein, "The Cancer Establishment", Washington Post,
> March 10, 1992.
>
> 23a. Hon. Henry B. Gonzalez, "Efforts to Thwart Investigation of the
> BNL Scandal", Congressional Record, March 30, 1992, p.H2005-2014.
>
> 23b. Hon. David E. Skaggs (CO)., White House Spin Control on Pre-War
> Iraq Policy", Congressional Record, April 2, 1992, p.H2285.
>
> 23c. Nicholas Rostow, Special Assistant to the President and Legal
> Adviser, Memorandum to Jeanne S. Archibald et al, "Meeting on
> congressional requests for information and documents", April 8, 1991;
> Congressional Record, April 2, 1992,p.H2285.
>
> 24a. Michio Kaku, "Operation Desert Lie: Pentagon Confesses", The
>
> Guardian, March11, 1992, p.4.
>
> 24b. J. Max Robins, "NBC's Unaired Iraq Tapes Not a Black and White
> Case", Variety Magazine, March 4, 1991, p.25.
>
> 25. Emory R. Searcy Jr., Clergy and Laity Concerned, Spring 1991
> Letter to"Friends", p.1.
>
> 26. Jean Dimeo, "Selling Hispanics on Columbus -- Luis Vasquez-Ajmac
> Is Hired to Promote Smithsonian Project", Washington Post, November
> 18, 1991, p.Bus.8.
>
> 27. Hans Koning, "Teach the Truth About Columbus", Washington Post,
> September 3,1991, p.A19.
>
> 28a. James Kilpatrick, "Software-Piracy Case Emitting Big Stench", St.
> Louis Post/Dispatch, March 18, 1991, p.3B. Elliot L. Richardson, "A
> High-Tech Watergate", New York Times, October 21,1991.
>
> 29. "BCCI -- NBC Sunday Today", February 23, 1992, p.12; transcript
> prepared by Burrelle's Information Services. The quote is from New
> York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau who is running his own
> independent investigation of BCCI.
>
> 30. Norman Bailey, former Reagan White House intelligence analyst;
> from an interview with Mark Rosenthal of NBC News. See note 29, p.5.
>
> 31. Jack Colhoun, "BCCI Skeletons Haunting Bush's Closet", The
> Guardian, September 18, 1991, p.9.
>
> 32. Robert Morgenthau. See note 29, p.10.
>
> 33. Russell Mokhiber, Corporate Crime and Violence, San Francisco:
> Sierra ClubBooks, 1989 paperback edition, p.227.
>
> 34. See note 33, p.136-7.
>
> 35. Morton Mintz, At Any Cost: Corporate Greed, Women, and the Dalkon
> Shield, NewYork: Pantheon, 1985. As cited in Mokhiber, see note 33,
> p.157.
>
> 36. See note 33, p.164-171.
>
> 37. See note 33, p.172-180.
>
> 38. Michael Waldman, Who Robbed America?, New York: Random House,
> 1990. The quote is from Ralph Nader's Introduction, p.iii.
>
> 39. See note 33, p.217.
>
> 40. See note 33, p.235.
>
> 41. See note 33, p.277-288.
>
> 42. See note 33, p.323.
>
> 43. Katherine Hoyt Gonzalez, Nicaragua Network Education Fund
> Newsletter, March1992, p.1.
>
> 44. William Blum, The CIA -- A Forgotten History, London: Zed Books
> Ltd., 1986,p.232-243.
>
> 45a. John Stockwell, In Search of Enemies, New York: Norton, 1978.
>
> 45b. See note 44, p.284-291.
>
> 46. See note 17, p.18.
>
> 47a. Letter to President George Bush from The Ad Hoc Committee for
> Panama (James Abourezk et al)., January 10, 1990; published in The
> Nation, February 5, 1990, p.163.
>
> 47b. Philip E. Wheaton, Panama, Trenton NJ: Red Sea Press, 1992,
> p.145-7.
>
> 48a. Morton Mintz and Jerry S. Cohen, Power, Inc., New York: Bantam
> Books, 1977,p.521.
>
> 48b. "The International Oil Cartel", Federal Trade Commission,
> December 2, 1949. Cited in 48a, p.521.
>
> 49a. See note 44, p.67-76.
>
> 49b. See note 48a, p.530-1.
>
> 50. Ralph W. McGehee, Deadly Deceits, New York: Sheridan Square
> Publications, 1983,p.60.
>
> 51. HR-3385, "An Act to Provide Assistance for Free and Fair Elections
> in Nicaragua". Passed the U.S. House of Representatives on October 4,
> 1989 by avote of 263 to 136, and the Senate on October 17 by a vote of
> 64 to 35.
>
> 52. Jack Colhoun, "Gates Oozing Trail of Lies, Gets Top CIA Post", The
> Guardian,November 20, 1991, p.6.
>
> 53. Carl Bernstein, Time, February 24, 1992, Cover Story p.28-35.
>
> 54. "The U.S. and the Vatican on Birth Control", Time, February 24,
> 1992, p.35.
>
> 55. "Time's Missing Link: Poland to Latin America", National Catholic
> Reporter,February 28, 1992, p.24.
>
> 56a. Jim Lynn, "School of Americas Commander Hopes to Expand Mission",
> Benning Patriot, February 21, 1992, p.12.
>
> 56b. Vicky Imerman, "U.S. Army School of the Americas Plans
> Expansion", News Release from S.O.A. Watch, P.O. Bo 3330, Columbus,
> Georgia 31903.
>
> 57. 60 MINUTES, CBS, March 8, 1992.
>
> 58. Jack Colhoun, "Tricky Dick's Quick Election Fix", The Guardian,
> January 29,1992, p.18.
>
> 59a. Sean P. Murphy, "Several Probes May Have Ignored Evidence Against
> Police", Boston Globe, July 28, 1991, p.1.
>
> 59b. Christopher B. Daly, "Pattern of Police Abuses Reported in Boston
> Case", Washington Post, July 12, 1991, p.A3.
>
> 59c. Associated Press, "Dayton Police Probing Erasure of Arrest
> Video", WashingtonPost, May 26, 1991, p.A20.
>
> 59d. Gabriel Escobar, "Deaf Man's Death In Police Scuffle Called
> Homicide", Washington Post, May 18, 1991, p.B1.
>
> 59e. Jay Mathews, "L.A. Police Laughed at Beating", Washington Post,
> March 19, 1991, p.A1.
>
> 59f. David Maraniss, "One Cop's View of Police Violence", Washington
> Post, April 12,1991, p.A1.
>
> 59g. From News Services, "Police Abuse Detailed", Washington Post,
> February 8, 1992,p.A8.
>
> 60. Michael Dobbs, "Panhandling the Kremlin: How Gus Hall Got
> Millions", Washington Post, March 1, 1992, p.A1.
>
> 61. David Streitfeld, "Secret Consortium To Publish Rushdie In
> Paperback", Washington Post, March 14, 1992, p.D1.
>
> 62a. See notes 48 and 49.
>
> 62b. See note 47b, p.63-76.
>
> 62c. "Fairness In Broadcasting Act of 1987", U.S. Senate Bill S742.
>
> 62d. "Now Let That 'Fairness' Bill Die", Editorial, Washington Post,
>
> June 24, 1987. The Post opposed the Fairness in Broadcasting Act.
>
> 63. David E. Scheim, Contract on America -- The Mafia Murder of
> President John F.Kennedy, New York: Shapolsky Publishers, 1988,
> p.viii.
>
> 64. See note 63, p.28.
>
> 65a. Chuck Conconi, "Out and About", Washington Post, February 26,
> 1991, p.B3.
>
> 65b. George Lardner Jr., "On the Set: Dallas in Wonderland",
> Washington Post, May19, 1991, p.D1.
>
> 65c. George Lardner, "...Or Just a Sloppy Mess", Washington Post, June
> 2, 1991,p.D3.
>
> 65d. Charles Krauthammer, "A Rash of Conspiracy Theories -- When Do We
> Dig Up BillCasey?", Washington Post, July 5, 1991, p.A19.
>
> 65e. Eric Brace, "Personalities", Washington Post, October 31, 1991,
> p.C3.
>
> 65f. Associated Press, "'JFK' Director Condemned -- Warren Commission
> Attorney Calls Stone Film 'A Big Lie'", Washington Post, December 16,
> 1991, p.D14.
>
> 65g. Gerald R. Ford and David W. Belin, "Kennedy Assassination: How
> About the Truth?", Washington Post, December 17, 1991, p.A21.
>
> 65h. Rita Kemply, "'JFK': History Through A Prism", Washington Post,
> December 20,1991, p.D1.
>
> 65i. George Lardner Jr., "The Way it Wasn't -- In 'JFK', Stone
> Assassinates the Truth", Washington Post, December 20, 1991, p.D2.
>
> 65j. Desson Howe, "Dallas Mystery: Who Shot JFK?", Washington Post,
> December 20,1991, p.55.
>
> 65k. Phil McCombs, "Oliver Stone, Returning the Fire -- In Defending
> His 'JFK' Conspiracy Film, the Director Reveals His Rage and
> Reasoning", Washington Post, December 21, 1991, p.F1.
>
> 65l. George F. Will, "'JFK': Paranoid History", Washington Post,
> December 26, 1991,p.A23.
>
> 65m. "On Screen", 'JFK' movie review, Washington Post, Weekend,
> December 27, 1991.
>
> 65n. Stephen S. Rosenfeld, "Shadow Play", Washington Post, December
> 27, 1991, p.A21.
>
> 65o. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, "The Paranoid Style", Washington Post,
> December 29,1991, p.C7.
>
> 65p. Michael Isikoff, "H-e-e-e-e-r-e's Conspiracy! -- Why Did Oliver
> Stone Omit (Or Suppress!). the Role of Johnny Carson?", Washington
> Post, December 29, 1991,p.C2.
>
> 65q. Robert O'Harrow Jr., "Conspiracy Theory Wins Converts --
> Moviegoers Say 'JFK' Nourishes Doubts That Oswald Acted Alone",
> Washington Post, January 2, 1992, p.B1.
>
> 65r. Michael R. Beschloss, "Assassination and Obsession", Washington
> Post, January 5, 1992, p.C1.
>
> 65s. Charles Krauthammer, "'JFK': A Lie, But Harmless", Washington
> Post, January 10,1992, p.A19.
>
> 65t. Art Buchwald, "Bugged: The Flu Conspiracy", Washington Post,
> January 14, 1992,p.E1.
>
> 65u. Ken Ringle, "The Fallacy of Conspiracy Theories -- Good on Film,
> But the Motivation Is All Wrong", Washington Post, January 19, 1992,
> p.G1.
>
> 65v. Charles Paul Freund, "If History Is a Lie -- America's Resort to
> Conspiracy Thinking", Washington Post, January 19, 1992, p.C1.
>
> 65w. Richard Cohen, "Oliver's Twist", Washington Post Magazine,
> January 19, 1992, p.5.
>
> 65. Michael Isikoff, "Seeking JFK's Missing Brain", Washington Post,
> January 21,1992, p.A17.
>
> 65y. Don Oldenburg, "The Plots Thicken -- Conspiracy Theorists Are
> Everywhere", Washington Post, January 28, 1992, p.E5.
>
> 65z. Joel Achenbach, "JFK Conspiracy: Myth vs. the Facts", Washington
> Post, February 28, 1992, p.C5.
>
> 65A. List of books on the best-seller list: On the Trail of the
> Assassins is characterized as "conspiracy plot theories", Washington
> Post, March 8, 1992,Bookworld, p.12
>
> 66. See notes 65n, 65w, 65l, 65b, 65c, and 65i.
>
> 67a. Peter Dale Scott, "Vietnamization and the Drama of the Pentagon
> Papers". Published in The Senator Gravel Edition of The Pentagon
> Papers, Volume V,p.211-247.
>
> 67b. Peter Dale Scott, The War Conspiracy -- The Secret Road to the
> Second Indochina War, Indianapolis/New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1972, p.
> 215-224.
>
> 67c. L. Fletcher Prouty, The Secret Team, Copyright 1973. New
> printing, Costa Mesa CA: Institute for Historical Review, 1990,
> p.402-416.
>
> 67d. See note 63, p.58, 183, 187, 194, 273-4.
>
> 67e. John M. Newman, JFK and Vietnam, New York: Warner Books, 1992.
>
> 67f. Peter Dale Scott, Letter to the Editor, The Nation, March 9,
> 1992, p.290.
>
> 68a. See note 65b.
>
> 68b. Oliver Stone, "The Post, George Lardner, and My Version of the
> JFK Assassination", Washington Post, June 2, 1991, p.D3.
>
> 69. See note 65b.
>
> 70. Jim Garrison, On the Trail of The Assassins, New York: Warner
> Books, 1988, 315/318.
>
> 71. Associated Press, "Garrison, 2 Others, Found Not Guilty Of Bribery
> Charge", Washington Post, September 28, 1973, p.A3.
>
> 72. See note 65c.
>
> 73. See note 65i.
>
> 74. See note 67e, p.438-450.
>
> 75. John G. Leyden, "Historians, Buffs, and Crackpots", Washington
> Post, Bookworld, January 26, 1992, p.8.
>
> 76a. Tad Szulc, "New Doubts, Fears in JFK Assassination Probe",
> Washington Star,September 19, 1975, p.A1.
>
> 76b. Tad Szulc, "Warren Commission's Self-Doubts Grew Day by Day --
> 'This Bullet Business Leaves Me Confused'", Washington Star, September
>
> 20, 1975, p.A1.
>
> 76c. Tad Szulc, "Urgent and Secret Meeting of the Warren Commission --
> Dulles Proposed that the Minutes be Destroyed", Washington Star,
> September 21, 1975,p.A1.
>
> 77. "Cable Sought to Discredit Critics of Warren Report", New York
> Times, December 26, 1977, p.A37.
>
> 78. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, New York: Harcourt Brace
> Jovanovich, 1979,p.141-2.
>
> 79a. Eve Pell, "Private Censorship -- Killing 'Katharine The Great'",
> The Nation, November 12, 1983.
>
> 79b. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, Bethesda MD: National Press,
> 1987. Davis says, "...corporate documents that became available during
> my subsequent lawsuit against him [Harcourt Brace Jovanovich chairman,
> William Jovanovich] showed that 20,000 copies [of Katharine the Great]
> had been "processed and converted into waste paper"".
>
> 79c. Daniel Brandt, "All the Publisher's Men -- A Suppressed Book
> About Washington Post Publisher Katharine Graham Is On Sale Again"
> National Reporter, Fall 1987, p.60.
>
> 79d. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, New York: Sheridan Square
> Press, 1991. "...publishers who don't give a shit", p.iv-v; bullying
> HBJ into recalling the book, p.iv-vi; lawsuit and settlement, p..
>
> 80. Benjamin C. Bradlee, Letter to Deborah Davis, April 1, 1987. See
> note 79d, p.304.
>
> 81. See note 79d, p.119-132.
>
> 82. Carl Bernstein, "The CIA and the Media -- How America's Most
> Powerful News Media Worked Hand in Glove with the Central Intelligence
> Agency and Why the Church Committee Covered It Up", Rolling Stone,
> October 20, 1977, p.63.
>
> 83a. Daniel Brandt, Letter to Richard L. Harwood of The Washington
> Post, September 15, 1988. The letter asks for the Post's rationale for
> its policy of protecting government covert actions, and whether this
> policy is still in effect.
>
> 83b. Daniel Brandt, "Little Magazines May Come and Go", The National
> Reporter, Fall 1988, p.4. Notes the Post's protection of the identity
> of CIA agent Joseph F.Fernandez. Brandt says, "America needs to
> confront its own recent history as well as protect the interests of
> its citizens, and both can be accomplished by outlawing peacetime
> covert activity. This would contribute more to thesecurity of
> Americans than all the counterterrorist proposals and elite strike
> forces that ever found their way onto Pentagon wish-lists."
>
> 83c. Richard L. Harwood, Letter to Daniel Brandt, September 28, 1988.
> Harwood's two- sentence letter reads, "We have a long-standing policy
> of not naming covert agents of the C.I.A., except in unusual
> circumstances. We applied that policy to Fernandez."
>
> 84. See note 79d, p.131.
>
> 85. Katharine Graham, "Safeguarding Our Freedoms As We Cover Terrorist
> Acts", Washington Post, April 20, 1986, p.C1.
>
> 86. "conspire", ß4ßRandom House Dictionary of the English Language,
> Second Edition Unabridged, 1987.
>
> 87. Howard Kurtz, "Media Notes", Washington Post, June 18, 1991, p.D1.
>
> 88. See note 65y.
>
> 89. See note 65n.
>
> 90. See note 65d.
>
> 91. William Casey, Private Communications with JCH, March 1992.
>
> Richard Harwood, "What Conspiracy?", Washington Post, March 1, 1992,
> p.C6.
>
> 93. p. 29-32.
>
> 94a. Washington Post Electronic Data Base, Dialog Information Services
> Inc., April 25, 1992. In 1991 and 1992, the name Bill Clinton appeared
> in 878 Washington Post stories, columns, letters, or editorials;
> "Jerry" Brown in 485, Pat Buchanan in 303, and Larry Agran in 28. In
> those 28, Agran's name appeared 76 times, Clinton's 151, and Brown
> 105. In only 1 of those 28 did Agran's name appear in a headline.
>
> 94b. Colman McCarthy, "What's 'Minor' About This Candidate?",
> Washington Post, February 1, 1992. Washington Post columnist McCarthy
> tells how television and party officials have kept presidential
> candidate Larry Agran out of sight. The Post's own daily news-blackout
> of Agran is not discussed.
>
> 94c. Scot Lehigh, "Larry Agran: 'Winner' in Debate With Little Chance
> For the Big Prize", Boston Globe, February 25, 1992.
>
> 94d. Joshua Meyrowitz, "The Press Rejects a Candidate", Columbia
> Journalism Review,March/April, 1992.
>
> 95. Ben H. Bagdikian, The Effete Conspiracy And Other Crimes By The
> Press, NewYork: Harper and Row, 1972, p.36-7.
>
> 96a. 28 USC Section 455. "Any justice, judge, or magistrate of the
> United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his
> impartiality might reasonably be questioned." [emphasis added]
>
> 96b. Alpo Petfoods, Inc. v. Ralston Purina Co., 913 F2d 958 (CA DC
> 1990)..
>
> 96c. Monroe Freedman, "Thomas' Ethics and the Court -- Nominee 'Unfit
> to Sit' For Failing to Recuse In Ralston Purina Case", Legal Times,
> August 26, 1991.
>
> 96d. Paul D. Wilcher, "Opposition to the Confirmation of Judge
> Clarence Thomas to become a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court on the
> grounds of his JUDICIAL MISCONDUCT", Letter to U.S. Senator Joseph R.
> Biden, October 15, 1991.
>
> 97. Al Kamen and Michael Isikoff, "'A Distressing Turn', Activists
>
> Decry What Process Has Become", Washington Post, October 12, 1991,
> p.A1.
>
> 98. January 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 1992, p.A1 each day.
>
> 99. See note 86.
>
> 100. Thomas W. Lippman, "Energy Lobby Fights Unseen 'Killers'",
> Washington Post,April 1, 1992, p.A21. This article explains that
> "representatives of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National
> Association of Manufacturers and the coal, oil, natural gas, offshore
> drilling and nuclear power industries, whose interests often conflict,
> pledged to work together to oppose amendments limiting offshore oil
> drilling, nuclear power and carbon dioxide emissions soon to be
> offered by key House members".
>
> 101. "cartel", Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, 1977.
>
>
>
>
>NOTES
>
>A good source on the Washington Post and Katharine Graham's attempt
>to suppress the Davis book,"Katherine The Great,", which was largely
>successful, is Carol Felsenthal's, "Power and Privilege at
>the Post, the Katharine Graham Story."
>
>For more information on Johnny Rosselli and Moses and Walter
>Annenberg, an excellent source is "All American Mafioso, the Johnny
>Rosselli Story," by Ed Becker and Charles Rappelye.
>
>An additional good short reference is "The CIA's Greatest Hits" by
>Mark Zepezauer. There you will find the reference to Carl Bernstein's
>classic "The CIA and the Media" which appeared in Rolling
>Stone on Oct. 20, 1977.
>
>Still another recent example of the CIA's control of the media is the
>spiking of Sally Denton's & Roger Morris' story,"THE CRIMES OF MENA"
>by Washington Post managing editor Bob Kaiser even
>though the story had been legally vetted and cleared for publication.
>Indeed the story, which details the CIA's involvement in drug
>trafficing, was already typeset and ready to go when it was killed
>withouty explanation.
>
>A recent example of media lies can be found in this example of a
>faked newspaper photograph.
>
>
>Mo' MOCKINGBIRD Blues
>
>Serendipity's CIA page.
>
>Back To The Top.
>
>Back To The Political Page.
>
>Mail to: Michael Rivero
>
>
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