Six sleeps to Christmas and the nights are anything but silent. Community carols
The Blog, The Press, The Media: Balance in the Service of Falsehood
The Media's Failure to Challenge Official Deception Over Iraq was the Product of a Journalism with Built-in Bias
The British and US governments stand accused of lying their way to war on Iraq, both at home and abroad. But while a series of what were widely regarded as nobbled inquiries have at least gone through the motions of holding them to account, there has been no attempt to hold the media to account for its role in making war possible. To his credit, George Monbiot argued on these pages earlier this year that "the falsehoods reproduced by the media before the invasion of Iraq were massive and consequential: it is hard to see how Britain could have gone to war if the press had done its job." But an examination of this failure, and its roots in a mass media with a long history of protecting and promoting the powerful, is conspicuous by its absence.
Like egomaniacal rulers forever, dating back to the cave, our pollies demonized the people they wanted to kill. They have "weapons of mass destruction," they asserted. Yeah, like we don't. Like India doesn't. Like Israel doesn't. Like Pakistan doesn't. Like China doesn't. Like Russia doesn't. Why don't we invade them? Or ourselves?
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