Top Journalists Prevented From Reporting Major News Stories

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Top Journalists Prevented From

Reporting Major News Stories

" The story was developing a momentum of its own,

despite a virtual news blackout from the major media.

Ultimately, public pressure forced the national

newspapers into the fray. The Washington Post, the NY

Times, and the LA Times published stories, but spent

little time exploring the CIA’s activities. Instead,

my reporting became the focus. It was remarkable [my

editor] Ceppos wrote, that the four Post reporters

assigned to debunk the series “could not find a single

significant factual error.” A few months later, the

Mercury News [due to intense CIA pressure] backed away

from the story, publishing a long column by Ceppos

apologizing for “shortcomings.” The NY Times hailed

Ceppos for “setting a brave new standard,” and

splashed his apology on their front page. " (click for

more)

-- Pulitzer Prize winner Webb, excerpted from

landmark book Into The Buzzsaw

May 7, 2006

Dear friends,

We all know that the U.S. and other developed

countries have a relatively free press. Yet we also

know that corporate ownership of the press at times

influences what is published. After reading the

revealing summary below of Emmy Award winning reporter

a Borjesson's book Into the Buzzsaw, you may

come to agree with me that the media is much more

controlled than most people think. Please join in

calling for a truly free press by spreading this

information to your friends and colleagues and

insisting that the media cover the most crucial

stories mentioned here. Thanks for caring, and you

have a great day!

With best wishes,

Fred Burks for the WantToKnow.info Team

Former language interpreter for Presidents Bush and

Clinton

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Below are concise excerpts from the revealing accounts

of 20 award-winning journalists in the highly

acclaimed book Into the Buzzsaw. These courageous

writers were prevented by corporate media ownership

from reporting major news stories. Some were even

fired or laid off. They have won numerous awards,

including several Emmys and a Pulitzer.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jane Akre—Fox News. After our struggle to air an

honest report on hormones in milk, Fox fired the

general manager of our station. The new GM said that

if we didn’t agree to changes that the lawyers were

insisting upon, we’d be fired for insubordination in

48 hours. We pleaded with him to look at the facts

we’d uncovered. His reply: “We paid $3 billion dollars

for these stations. We’ll tell you what the news is.

The news is what we say it is!” After we refused,

Fox’s GM presented us an agreement that would give us

a full year of salary, and benefits worth close to

$200,000, but with strings attached: no mention of how

Fox covered up the story and no opportunity to ever

expose the facts. After declining, we were fired.

(click for more)

Dan Rather—CBS, Multiple Emmy Awards. What's going on

is a belief that you can manipulate communicable trust

between the leadership and the led. The way you do

that is you don't let the press in anywhere. Access to

war is extremely limited. The fiercer the combat, the

more the access is limited, including access to

information. This is a direct contradiction of the

stated policy of maximum access to information

consistent with national security...There was a time

in South Africa when people would put flaming tires

around people's necks if they dissented. In some ways

the fear now in the U.S. is that you will have a

flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your

neck. That fear keeps journalists from asking the

tough questions. I am humbled to say, I do not except

myself from this criticism. (click for more)

Monika Jensen-son—Emmy-winning producer for 60

minutes. R. Garwood—14 years a prisoner of the

Vietnamese—was found guilty in the longest

court-martial in US history. At the end of the

court-martial, there seemed no question that Garwood

was a monstrous traitor. Several years later in 1985,

Garwood was speaking publicly about something that had

never made the news during his court-martial. He knew

of other American prisoners in Vietnam long after the

war was over. He was supported by Vietnam veterans

whose war records were impeccable….My sources included

outstanding experts like former head of the Defense

Intelligence Agency General Tighe and returned POWs

like Captain Mc, who held the Navy’s top award

for bravery. With such advocates, it was hard not to

consider the possibility that prisoners (some 3,500)

had in fact been kept by the Vietnamese as hostages to

make sure the US would pay the more than $3 billion in

war reparations. After the war, American POWs had

become worthless pawns. The US had not paid the

promised monies and had no intention of paying in the

future. (click for more)

a Borjesson—CBS, Emmy award winner. Pierre

Salinger announced to the world on Nov. 8, 1996, that

he’d received documents proving that a US Navy missile

had accidentally downed TWA flight 800. That same day,

FBI’s Jim Kallstrom called a press conference. A man

raised his hand and asked why the Navy was involved in

the recovery and investigation while a possible

suspect. “Remove him!” Kallstrom yelled. Two men leapt

over to the questioner and grabbed him by the arms.

There was a momentary chill in the air after the guy

had been dragged out of the room. Kallstrom and

entourage acted as if nothing had happened. [Kallstrom

was later hired by CBS.] (click for more)

Greg Palast—BBC. In the months leading up to the

November 2000 balloting, Gov. Jeb Bush ordered

elections supervisors to purge 58,000 voters on the

grounds they were felons not entitled to vote. As it

turns out, only a handful of these voters were felons.

This extraordinary news ran on page one of the

country’s leading paper. Unfortunately, it was the

wrong country: Britain. In the USA, it was not

covered. The office of the governor also illegally

ordered the removal of felons from voter rolls—real

felons—but with the right to vote under law. As a

result, 50,000 of these voters could not vote. The

fact that 90% of these were Democrats should have made

it news as this alone more than accounted for Bush’s

victory. (click for more)

Levine—25-year veteran of DEA, writer for New

York Times, Los Angeles Times, USA Today. The Chang

Mai “factory” that the CIA prevented me from

destroying was the source of massive amounts of heroin

being smuggled into the US in the bodies and body bags

of GIs killed in Vietnam. Case after case was killed

by CIA and State Department intervention and there

wasn’t a thing we could do about it….In 1980,

CIA-recruited mercenaries and drug traffickers

unseated Bolivia’s democratically elected president.

Immediately after the coup, cocaine production

increased massively. Bolivia became the source of

virtually 100% of the cocaine entering the US. This

was the beginning of the crack “plague.”…The CIA along

with State and Justice Departments had to protect

their drug-dealing assets by destroying a DEA

investigation. How do I know? I was the inside source.

I sat down at my desk in the American embassy and

wrote evidence of my charges. I addressed it to

Newsweek. Three weeks later DEA’s internal security

called to notify me that I was under

investigation….The highlight of the 60 Minutes piece

is when the administrator of the DEA, Federal Judge

Bonner, tells Mike Wallace, “There is no other

way to put it, Mike, what the CIA did is drug

smuggling. It’s illegal.” (click for more)

Webb—San Mercury News, Pulitzer Prize

winner. In 1996, I wrote a series of stories that

began this way: For the better part of a decade, a Bay

Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and

Bloods gangs of LA and funneled millions in drug

profits to a guerilla army run by the CIA. The cocaine

that flooded in helped spark a crack explosion in

urban America….The story was developing a momentum all

of its own, despite a virtual news blackout from the

major media. Ultimately, it was public pressure that

forced the national newspapers into the fray. The

Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los

Angeles Times published stories, but spent little time

exploring the CIA’s activities. Instead, my reporting

and I became the focus of their scrutiny. It was

remarkable [Mercury News editor] Ceppos wrote, that

the four Washington Post reporters assigned to debunk

the series “could not find a single significant

factual error.” A few months later, the Mercury News

[due to intense CIA pressure] backed away from the

story, publishing a long column by Ceppos apologizing

for “shortcomings.” The New York Times hailed Ceppos

for “setting a brave new standard,” and splashed his

apology on their front page, the first time the series

had ever been mentioned there. I quit the Mercury News

not long after that….Do we have a free press today?

Sure. It’s free to report all the sex scandals, all

the stock market news, and every new health fad that

comes down the pike. But when it comes to the real

down and dirty stuff—such stories are not even open

for discussion. (click for more)

—Author, ABC producer. ABC hired me to help

produce a story about an investment firm that was

heavily involved with the CIA. Part of the ABC report

charged that the CIA had plotted to assassinate an

American, Ron Rewald, the president of the investment

firm. said on camera that the CIA had

asked him to kill Rewald. After the show aired, CIA

officials met with ABC executive Burke, who was

sufficiently impressed “by the vigor with which they

made their case” to order an on-air “clarification.”

But that was not enough. CIA Director Casey called ABC

Chairman Goldenson. Thus, despite all the documented

evidence presented in the program, despite ABC

standing by the program in a second broadcast,

Jennings reported that ABC could no longer

substantiate the charges. That same day, the CIA filed

a formal complaint with the FCC charging that ABC had

“deliberately distorted” the news. In the complaint,

Casey asked that ABC be stripped of its TV and radio

licenses….During this time, Capital Cities

Communications was maneuvering to buy ABC. CIA

Director Casey was one of the founders of Cap Cities.

Cap Cities bought ABC. Within months, the entire

investigative unit was dispersed. (click for more)

McChesney—500 radio & TV appearances. There has

been a striking consolidation of the media from

hundreds of firms to an industry dominated by less

than ten enormous transnational conglomerates. The

largest ten media firms own all US TV networks, most

TV stations, all major film studios, all major music

companies, nearly all cable TV channels, much of the

book and magazine publishing industry, and much, much

more. Expensive investigative journalism—especially

that which goes after national security or powerful

corporate interests—is discouraged. Largely irrelevant

human interest/tragedy stories get extensive

coverage….A few weeks after the war began in

Afghanistan, CNN president Isaacson authorized CNN to

provide two different versions of the war: a more

critical one for the global audience and a sugarcoated

one for Americans….It is nearly impossible to conceive

of a better world without some changes in the media

status quo. We have no time to waste. (click for more)

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For a powerful 10-page summary of this material:

www.WantToKnow.info/massmedia

For other reliable resources on the media cover-up:

Media Information Center

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