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Assault on our Free Press Could Make America no Better than a Banana Republic

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Photo Credit: Irish Central Totalitarian governments have long known, if you control the press, you control the country.

The main watch dog that protects citizens from the evil deeds and intent of its government is a free press. A free press can expose the blunders, malfeasance and criminality of a government that would rather keep that information from the public view. When the freedom of the press is being assaulted, the very foundation of a free society is being eroded.

When nations fall to a coup; the first move is the seizing of broadcast stations and other media, so that the new rulers can control the information given to the public.

China censors the information its citizens are allowed to hear, like North Korea and other totalitarian states, if you write or speak out against the government, you can disappear.

In Mexico, drug cartels, which have a large influence on the country, kill reporters and editors if they write on their illegal activity. The result of this intimidation has meant many news agencies and journalists refuse to report on the drug violence. See reporters deaths

Americas press is under an insidious assault by the government using the guise of protecting “national security.”

Shocking revelations of seizing phone records and other privileged communications of the Associated Press by Eric holders Justice Department, sparked alarm last week by even stalwart Democrats like Congressman Jerrold Nadler of New York, who said:

“I am quite concerned by the appearance of overreach by the Justice Department in its pursuit of records from the Associated Press.” In a key part of his statement he finished up with: We must also examine the use of the Espionage Act to criminalize whistle blowers and leaks. While the government has a legitimate need for secrecy – especially to protect the lives of operatives abroad – the aggressive use of this powerful law in recent years needs to be reviewed to ensure that its use is appropriate and not a hindrance to journalistic freedom or the free flow of ideas and information.”

But Nadler’s statement was made before revelations that Fox News had its communications under surveillance and its Washington correspondent, James Rosen, was the target of a criminal probe involving leaks of national security. It is reported that communications records of other Fox News employees were investigated as well.

Even CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson, who has been aggressively looking into the Benghazi scandal, stated her work and home computers seem to have been compromised. Attkisson suggested “there could be some relationship between these things and what’s happened to James Rosen.” Read more in World Net Daily

Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” said: The Justice Department’s secret seizure of phone records from a top Fox News reporter is “disturbing” and suggests the agency is “out of control.” He went on to say: “It would be one thing if you’re monitoring MSNBC’s number … but you talk about the Fox News bureau, that’s what makes it so damning for this White House.”

Congressman Ted Poe (R) Texas, member of a group of bi partisan Congress members who are pushing for greater press protection, said:

“We all agree that free press is extremely important for a democracy, especially America’s democracy,” Poe said at a press conference. “This May should probably be renamed ‘May Intimidation Month’ because of what has happened in the month of May.”

“First, earlier this month, we learned that the Department of Justice secretly launched an investigation to find out who leaked information to the press that was justified by saying it was taken in the interest of national security. But it was nothing short of, in my opinion, a massive intimidation fishing expedition where the government seized phone records of journalists.” Read more about this in Politico

Both left and right agree, this intrusion by the government into our free press needs to be checked now, before they checkmate our free press and put us on the slippery slope of many totalitarian states.

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Ed Farnan is the conservative columnist at IrishCentral, where he has been writing on the need for energy independence, strong self defense, secure borders, 2nd amendment, smaller government and many other issues. His articles appear in many publications throughout the USA and world. He has been a guest on Fox News and a regular guest on radio stations in the US and Europe.

Proof: Establishment Media Controlled by Government

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There was a rather low-key confession made in the New York Times last week that deserves to be blared throughout this country so that every American understands what they are reading in the establishment’s ultra-controlled, government-managed “press” – and I use that last word loosely indeed.

The admission came in the form of a story by Jeremy Peters on the politics page of the Times July 16. I’ve been waiting for others to point it out, discuss it, debate it, express shock and exasperation over it. But I’ve waited for naught.

What this shocking story reveals is that even I – one of the kingpins of the new media and a refugee from the state-controlled spin machine – underestimated the utter and total corruption of the euphemistically called “mainstream press.”

It shows that most – not some – members of the print media establishment with access to the White House submit their copy to government officials for review, “correction” and approval before it reaches the American people!

Here are some key excerpts from the piece, if you think I’m exaggerating:

  • “The quotations come back redacted, stripped of colorful metaphors, colloquial language and anything even mildly provocative.”
  • “They are sent by e-mail from the Obama headquarters in Chicago to reporters who have interviewed campaign officials under one major condition: the press office has veto power over what statements can be quoted and attributed by name.”
  • “Most reporters, desperate to pick the brains of the president’s top strategists, grudgingly agree. After the interviews, they review their notes, check their tape recorders and send in the juiciest sound bites for review. The verdict from the campaign – an operation that prides itself on staying consistently on script – is often no, Barack Obama does not approve this message.”
  • “Now, with a millisecond Twitter news cycle and an unforgiving, gaffe-obsessed media culture, politicians and their advisers are routinely demanding that reporters allow them final editing power over any published quotations.”
  • “Quote approval is standard practice for the Obama campaign, used by many top strategists and almost all mid-level aides in Chicago and at the White House – almost anyone other than spokesmen who are paid to be quoted. (And sometimes it applies even to them.) It is also commonplace throughout Washington and on the campaign trail.”
  • “Many journalists spoke about the editing only if granted anonymity, an irony that did not escape them.”
  • “From Capitol Hill to the Treasury Department, interviews granted only with quote approval have become the default position. Those officials who dare to speak out of school, but fearful of making the slightest off-message remark, shroud even the most innocuous and anodyne quotations in anonymity by insisting they be referred to as a ‘top Democrat’ or a ‘Republican strategist.’”
  • “Those [reporters] who did speak on the record said the restrictions seem only to be growing. ‘It’s not something I’m particularly proud of because there’s a part of me that says, Don’t do it, don’t agree to their terms,’ said Major Garrett, a correspondent for The National Journal.”
  • “It was difficult to find a news outlet that had not agreed to quote approval, albeit reluctantly. Organizations like Bloomberg, The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, Reuters and The New York Times have all consented to interviews under such terms.”

Read more from this story HERE.