The Word
by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
Originally, I drafted this article with a preface about the story Michael Hastings recently broke on BuzzFeed about an amendment to the latest defense authorization bill that would “legalize the use of propaganda on American audiences.” However, as I worked on it this morning, our very own poet laureate and research librarian extraordinaire Elaine Magliaro cut me off at the pass with her own excellent article on the subject. So instead of repeating the points she makes which illustrate why understanding propaganda is important, I will refer you to her post “How about Some Government Propaganda for the People Paid for by the People Being Propagandized?”
Now that the kid gloves have come off regarding the governmental efforts to control your mind by controlling both your information and how you receive it, let’s discuss the nature of propaganda. Now more than ever, it is important to know the basics of how propaganda works. Since words are the basic building block of the English language, we’ll start with asking what is propaganda, look at some general history of the practice, consider the importance of meaning of words, the ideas of connotation and denotation, and the process of selecting “value loaded” words.
What is propaganda? Webster’s defines the word as follows:
propaganda \ˌprä-pə-ˈgan-də, ˌprō-\, n.,
1 capitalized : a congregation of the Roman curia having jurisdiction over missionary territories and related institutions (ed. note: Not relevant, but interesting.)
2: the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person
3: ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one’s cause or to damage an opposing cause; also : a public action having such an effect
But that’s not exactly what people feel when they hear the word, is it? Why do most people have a negative reaction to the word “propaganda”? After all, by definition, “propaganda” is much like the verb “to persuade” in meaning.
persuade \pər-ˈswād\, v., v.t.,
1: to move by argument, entreaty, or expostulation to a belief, position, or course of action
2: to plead with : urge
Etymologically speaking, the word “propaganda” is fairly new as a political science term. “Propaganda” didn’t come into common use as a political science term until World War I. Even then it was not a pejorative in use like it is today. The word originated (some would say unsurprisingly so) as shorthand referring to the Roman Catholic Church’s Congregatio de Propaganda Fide or the “congregation for propagating the faith”. This committee of cardinals was established in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV to supervise foreign missions. The word “propaganda” is the feminine gerund of the Italian verb “propagando” which in turn is derived from the Latin verb prōpāgō, meaning “to propagate”.
propagate \ˈprä-pə-ˌgāt\, v., v.t.,
3a : to cause to spread out and affect a greater number or greater area : extend b : to foster growing knowledge of, familiarity with, or acceptance of (as an idea or belief) : publicize c : to transmit (as sound or light) through a medium
Clearly the largest distinction between persuasion and propaganda is that propaganda is a form of large scale persuasion. Persuasion isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Changing someone’s mind is a better tactic than violence. Persuasion is at the heart of society’s pillar and replacement for self-help justice and dispute resolution, the adversarial court system. Persuasion is an alternative to coercion.
So what is propaganda? It’s a tool to change people’s minds. Like any tool, it is capable of beneficial use and horrific misuse. This makes understanding how the tool works critical if you want to recognize (and possibly work to prevent) its misuse.
If that is the case the word originally had no pejorative use, then why do most people have an automatic negative reaction to the word “propaganda”? This brings us to the ideas of connotation and denotation. Plainly put, denotation is a direct specific meaning; the literal meaning of a word and nothing more. Connotation is a “something” suggested by a word or thing; an implied meaning. I suggest the negative connotation for the word “propaganda” comes from both the negative denotation built in to the word itself (part of the definition is “for the purpose of helping or injuring” and injury carries the negative notion of harm to self and/or others) and the recent historical use of propaganda to dastardly ends culminating to create an implied negative meaning beyond the definition. The denotation of a word is not the direct province of the propagandist. They have to know what the words actually mean, but that is of limited value to them. The edge of the propagandist’s knife so to speak lies in the connotation of words. More on that topic as we move along. In the 20th Century, we have seen what truly evil injury propaganda is capable of inflicting on a society. To know how we got to today, it is important to have a bit of historical perspective.
Historically, the idea of propaganda has been around as long as there have been society and governments. For example, in ancient Egypt, the Pharaoh Ramses II claimed a great victory over the Hittites in the Battles of Kadesh (possibly the largest chariot battle in history). The two most common forms of Egyptian records of the battles are known as “The Poem” and “The Bulletin”. Both are found carved into multiple sites in Egypt, all built or expanded upon by Ramses II – one of the greatest builders of ancient Egypt. “The Bulletin” is found on seven different temples or monuments and eight total sites have “The Poem”. When you add numerous other references on papyrus and in tangentially related carvings, this makes the Battles of Kadesh one of the best recorded battles of antiquity. The tale told is of an overwhelming victory for Ramses II and Egypt.
There’s only one problem with that depiction.
It is most certainly a lie at worst and an exaggeration at best.
Hittite records, although not as numerous, all tell the tale of a Hittite victory. Archaeological evidence is inconclusive. One of the two parties is lying and possibly both. Most modern historians have come to the conclusion that the battle likely ended in a draw. Given that, why did Ramses II carve his non-existent victory into stone? Propaganda is the answer. Ramses II wanted the reputation as a strong military leader even if the reality wasn’t so glorious. So he fluffed the details and spread the word that “Ramses II Kicks Ass!” Unless you were at the Battles of Kadesh, who were you to argue with a Living God? Then realizing that his chances for immediate military exploits were practically nil, Ramses II did what any respectable Pharaoh would do and a secondary exercise in propaganda: he returned to the building spree he started as a young man. Some would say the greatest building spree in the history of the ancient Egypt. Just like the Romans after him, Ramses knew that impressive buildings were a kind of psychological warfare – non-verbal propaganda geared at projecting the power of the throne to the masses, but more on this at a later date. The focus here is language and the basics of propaganda.
In the beginning, there was the word. Those with the word were limited. If they could not speak directly, they were limited by how many manual physical copies they could get out to the masses and how many of the masses could read. Then came the printing press in the 15th Century. When Guttenberg invented it, one of the early adopters of the technology was the Holy Roman Empire. By the end of the Renaissance, book making was industrialized to the point that printer/binders could produce between three and four thousand pages per day: a hundred fold increase in production compared to the most prolific of scribes. Books and written material went from rare treasures to common items. As knowledge became democratized, the use of printed propaganda grew in unison: public notices, political flyers and proto-newspapers became cheap and abundant.
The 20th Century was in some ways a Golden Age for deploying propaganda. Unlike any previous age, the 20th Century was the age of mass communications. Industrial mass printing of newspapers, radio, television, telephones and the Internet radically changed the way humans communicate. The word became King and the picture became Queen. Even illiteracy wasn’t the barrier it had posed to the ancient world as the spoken word supplemented the written and the truism that “a picture is worth a thousand words” is a truism for a reason. Even physical handicap was less of a barrier to getting the message out as those blind to the printed word and picture and deaf to the spoken word now had the channel of communication created by the 19th Century invention of Braille. As propaganda is large scale persuasion, mass media provided a natural accelerant. What had previously been a candle of propaganda became a bonfire necessarily becoming a political science term in common usage. The 20th Century saw probably the most devastating use of propaganda to date on any population. Propaganda was instrumental to both the Nazi war effort and their social engineering that allowed them to industrially murder six million Jews, Roma, homosexuals and handicapped. Propaganda was key to the crimes of the Khemer Rouge. Mao’s Cultural Revolution. Castro’s rise to power in Cuba. The wrongful, misguided and likely illegal U.S. invasion of Iraq. These are a few of many examples where propaganda has been used to either garner public support for ethically wrong actions by government or obfuscate the truth to aid the guilty from being brought to justice. This point will be addressed further in a later column, but it goes a long way to explaining how a word of neutral value became a word of negative value due to recent history.
We are still left with the word. As far as the word “propaganda” proper, we know what it means. We know where it comes from. We know the goal of propaganda in general. That leaves us with word choice and the idea of “value loaded” word and how it relates to propaganda. What are words loaded with? They are loaded with implication. This is why connotation is the edge of the propagandist’s knife. Word choice is critical. As I noted earlier, the denotation of a word is not the direct province of the propagandist. The edge of the propagandist’s knife so to speak lies in the connotation of words. However, knowing the proper denotation of words – i.e. having a large vocabulary – puts one at a tactical advantage against the propagandist. If one knows the actual meaning of words, it becomes more difficult for the propagandist to use connotation against you.
For example, consider the use of media outlets like NPR that made a public and conscious decision to refrain from reporting on “torture” – a word with extremely negative denotation and connotation – and instead choosing to use the euphemistic language “enhanced interrogation”. Everyone with a conscience thinks torture is a bad thing and torturers are ethically abhorrent people. It’s not only a Federal crime, cruel and unusual punishment is specifically barred by the 8th Amendment of the Constitution. The word choice here is designed to clearly shift public attitudes from “those guys need to be prosecuted as criminals” to “maybe they aren’t so bad after all”. NPR (aided by the Bush Administration no doubt) chose words with a neutral/positive value load compared to the word “torture”. Connotation plays to your emotional response over your rational response. When the word choice becomes more subtle, the damage of connotations can be even more insidious. Compare:
- war – limited police action
- conquest – liberation
- famine – widespread hunger
- pestilence – outbreak
- death – casualties
Be aware and suspicious of word choice, certainly. Especially when dealing with adjectives as they have by their nature a great capacity to carry connotation. However, it is equally important to consider the speaker. When evaluating something you suspect is propaganda, ask these questions:
- Who is the speaker?
- What does the speaker want from me?
- What advantage does the speaker gain from my agreement or lose from my disagreement? And vice-versa?
- Does the speaker represent other interests that may not be obvious?
- Why is the speaker giving this message now?
What is your first line of defense against propaganda?
Be aware of the meaning and choice of words. To that end, work to strengthen your vocabulary. Buy a “Word A Day” calender or download an app for your phone, use a website or download a tickler program for your computer.
Always question the message and the messenger as well as any who may have sent the messenger. Practice reading with emotional detachment and a critical eye to not only what is said, but how it is said and by whom.
Keep in mind that propaganda is a tool. It is inherently neutral. The good or evil is found in the intent of the speaker and their desired actions and/or reactions on your part.
What is your first line of defense against propaganda? You are. And that is my unhidden message to you: Wake up. Civilization calls. The world is what we make it.
The next article in this series will address methodology, strategy and tactics in deploying propaganda.
~submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
The Propaganda Series;
Propaganda 105: How to Spot a Liar
Propaganda 104 Supplemental: The Streisand Effect and the Political Question
Propaganda 104 Supplemental: The Sound of Silence
Propaganda 104: Magica Verba Est Scientia Et Ars Es
Propaganda 103: The Word Changes, The Word Remains The Same
Propaganda 102 Supplemental: Holly Would “Zero Dark Thirty”
Propaganda 102: Holly Would and the Power of Images
Propaganda 101 Supplemental: Child’s Play
Propaganda 101 Supplemental: Build It And They Will Come (Around)
Related articles of interest;
Gene H:
I never said you were. I was wondering why talkingbacktocspan was.
I would no more think you capable of rounding up 1 person let alone 6 million people and herding them off to a prison camp for systematic slaughter than I would be able to fly to the moon unaided.
Talkingbacktocspan has admitted he is perfectly capable and so I was wondering what kind of mind would do that and why.
Bron, “why the Nazis were Nazis” — yes, I know you didn’t say exactly that, but it is a related question.
Fear. Rage. Misplaced rage, and more rage, and more fear.
I read a study (cannot now cite it, cannot now find it) about 20-30 years ago that said that using an American definition of what is child abuse and what is not child abuse (kicking, beating with sticks, belts or objects, starvation, position torture, deliberate humiliation, etc. etc.), a survey of adult Germans from all different socioeconomic groups who were at that time 60 years old or older (thus, they were the youth of Germany at the time of WWII) showed that 80% of them had been “seriously abused.” In other words, strict authoritarian parenting with the full panoply of corporal punishment was just the norm in Germany during the 20th Century, at least during the first half of the 20th Century.
A whole generation of people (one can extrapolate and say probably more, but I did not read about that) fearful, defensive, rageful, embittered. Under those circumstances, it’s not so hard to imagine identifying with the Nazi philosophy or psychology, social persona, or even behavior.
There was a work of nonfiction entitled “Diary of a Man in Despair” — it has been translated, but I cannot remember the author (no time now to look it up) that really opened my eyes to what it might have been like to live in Germany and NOT be a Jew. Still, a pretty frightening thing.
Bron,
I can only tell you so many times that I’m not for the state for the good of the state, I’m for the state being the servant of all the people.
That you cannot understand that is entirely your failing.
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/05/secretary-clinton-we-hacked-yemen-al-qaeda-sites/
Gene H:
I am trying to find out why talkingbacktocspan is pro-Nazi. I am still trying to figure out why Nazis were pro-Nazi.
Maybe talkingbacktocspan is a former SS private or something? That alone would be interesting to hear his views as a German who lived through that time and to get his take on it. Albeit one sided take.
I just wonder about the mindset of someone who would support collectivism and this guy seems to be a real collectivist. The kind who thinks the state has a right to murder people at odds with the state for the good of the state.
Offensive Information Warfare and Psychological Operations
Wayne Madsen
Nov. 2001
Critical infrastructure protection is a two-edged sword. While stressing defensive infrastructure protection methods quite publicly, the U.S. government is not so keen on discussing its plans to conduct offensive cyber-attacks against other countries. However, one part of the U.S. plan to wage such warfare falls into the category of psychological warfare operations, which consists of infusing the electronic media with propaganda aimed at managing or changing popular perceptions about U.S. policies.
In October 1999, the U.S. Defense Department consolidated its defensive and offensive information warfare activities within the U.S. Space Command in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The subordinate activity responsible for these operations is the Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense.
On April 30, 1999, Presidential Decision Directive 68 (PDD-68) was signed by President Clinton. This directive carried out the perception management proposals contained in the Marsh Report. PDD-68 authorized the creation of the International Public Information (IPI) system. A “core group” composed of representatives of the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, Treasury, and Commerce, the CIA and NSA was to develop methods “to prevent and mitigate crises and to influence foreign audiences in ways favorable to the achievement of U.S. foreign policy objectives.” According to the directive, information aimed at U.S. audiences is to be “coordinated, integrated, de-conflicted, and synchronized with the [IPI] to achieve a synergistic effect.” Essentially, the world’s electronic media, including the Internet, will be manipulated to achieve maximum propaganda success for U.S. government policies and strategies. The man behind the idea of an Internet-based international propaganda system is the architect of America’s Critical Infrastructure/Information Warfare doctrine – Richard Clarke.
In a May 2000 a Defense Science Board Task Force, which included members from the leading homeland security and information warfare contractors Booz Allen, SAIC, and ANSER, as well as Walt Disney Imagineering, concluded that the IPI system should be merged with the Pentagon’s psychological warfare (PSYOP) capabilities. The report stated, “of particular concern is the lack of an integrated PSYOP capability with the strategic International Public Information (IPI) initiative . . . DoD certainly possesses capabilities and experience which would enhance the development of the IPI initiative.”[1] The report also called for the federal government to influence media through the buying of content to spread propaganda – clearly something that was on the mind of presidential counselor Karl Rove when he met in Los Angeles on November 12, 2001 with Hollywood’s leading movie and television producers, including those from Paramount, Sony, Viacom, CBS, Dreamworks, and MGM. Although Rove denied the administration’s goal was spreading propaganda and influencing content, the DSB Task Force report explicitly stated its intentions to influence the content of popular media: “Buying good content on which the messages will ‘ride’ is a necessary and desirable expenditure.”[2]
It was not the first time the government was caught trying to infiltrate the media with disinformation specialists. From June 1999 to March 2000, five interns from the Fourth Psychological Operations Group, Fort Bragg in North Carolina were found to have worked at CNN headquarters in Atlanta. From September 1998 to May 1999, another three Fort Bragg PSYOPs personnel were discovered at National Public Radio (NPR). They worked on the programs All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and Talk of the Nation. The networks involved first denied they knew where the individuals were from but then terminated the agreement with the U.S. Army that permitted them to work inside the news organizations.[3]
Furthermore, the DSB Task Force recommended a permanent national propaganda infrastructure be set up within the national security framework during peacetime. It stated, “a permanent, properly constituted interagency body should be established within the National Security Council charged with all U.S. Government IPI, PD [public diplomacy], PSYOP and other peacetime management policies and operations. An authoritative standing body would ensure on-going, front-end, continuous interagency dialogue, coordination, and integration.”[4] The Task Force also set its eyes on the Internet in calling for PSYOPs to be adapted to support “Internet War.” Specifically, the report states the targets for such an Internet War:
Web sites: “quite suitable for dissemination of PSYOP content.”
E-mail: “Email is probably the predominant means of communication for Internet consumers and could also be an excellent medium for PSYOP. If desired, each message could be tailored to an individual recipient, thus providing some rough form of geographic tailoring and helping to keep opposing authorities somewhat in the dark about what everyone is receiving.”
Chat rooms and messaging: “Internet chat rooms may also have potential PSYOP uses, in that “guided discussions” could perhaps be used to influence how citizens think about certain topics. In the Chinese approach, offending messages are deleted before, or just after, they have been sent to everyone.”
Video games and other media: [Video games] can be disseminated by a number of techniques, ranging from diskettes to web downloads. Other important media at this moment include CDs, CD-ROMs, and DVDs. All are suitable for PSYOP in some situations.”[5]
In late 1999, a legal team at the Defense Department cautioned against the use of computer hacking and disinformation in offensive information campaigns. In a document titled “An Assessment of International Legal Issues in Information Operations,” the Pentagon’s Office of General Counsel opined that it was dangerous for the military to contemplate launching information warfare attacks on banks, stock exchanges, and universities. The lawyers warned of the possibility of a ripple effect on civilian populations and unintended consequences for neutral or allied nations. As for disinformation campaigns contemplated by some within the Pentagon and intelligence community, the Pentagon report was straightforward: “it might be possible to use computer morphing techniques to create an image of the enemy’s chief of state informing his troops that an armistice or cease-fire agreement had been signed. If false, this also would be a war crime.” [6]
[1] Office of the Under Secretary of Defense For Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, “Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on The Creation and Dissemination of All Forms of Information in Support of Psychological Operations (PSYOP) in Time of Military Conflict,” May 2000.
[2] Ibid.
[3] J. Max Robins, “Military Interns Booted From CNN, NPR: How Did Army Officers get Into the News Business?” TV Guide, 15-21 April 2000; Mike Janssen, “NPR news chiefs deny they knew of Army interns,” Current, 17 April 2000.
[4] Office of the Under Secretary of Defense For Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, op. cit.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Bradley Graham, “Military Grappling With Rules for Cyber Warfare,” The Washington Post, November 8, 1999, p. A1.
Gene,
you are ruining all of my fun reading these rants by actually producing factual information and logical reviews of the reasoning! It is so much fun reading the decades old crap about the Jews being responsible for everything bad in the world.
You really don’t know a damn thing about how military strategy works, do you, Brownshirt? That’s a rhetorical question. Too bad that glaring gap in your education isn’t the only one.
Your statements beg the question (which is a logical fallacy by the way) that the British Zionist Federation or Chaim Weizmann set British policy regarding Germany or military deployment. He wasn’t a member of the either the British government or their military. He had no say whatsoever about British military strategy.
First, some context. WWI ran from July, 8 1914 and lasted until November, 11 1918. It started when the Austro-Hungarian Empire invaded Serbia and the Germans invaded of Belgium, Luxembourg and France (which subsequently led to Russia attacking Germany). The blockade of Germany lasted from 1914 to 1919.
The intent was to indeed starve the Germans of both food and other war materials. This tactic is as old as siege warfare. It’s a perfectly valid military tactic and it made perfect sense given the British dominance of the seas and Germany’s dependence on foreign materials. You starve out and deprive materials to an entrenched force until they surrender. I could list dozens of time this tactic was used by Romans and others but instead I’ll simply say that next to battering down the walls with whatever siege engine technology you had available, that this was (and still is) the primary component of siege warfare tactics. The Germans even tried to do the same thing to the British, but their Navy was simply no match for the British Navy. That the blockade was held past the end of hostilities to force the German signing of the Treaty of Versailles was an inexcusable action by the British, but the decision was theirs and it had repercussions – none of which necessitated the Third Reich’s Final Solution.
Since strategy had been on the boards well before 1914 because all involved could see war brewing, the first person to suggest the strategy of the British blockades was the then Director of Naval Intelligence Department Capt. Charles Ottley who served as Director from 1905-1907. He is not to be confused with Charles Ottley Groom Napier, his relative who was a famous figure in British Israelism. However, as a student of military history, he’d have known this tactic and Occam’s Razor suggests he would have picked it based upon British resources and the tactical lay of the situation whether Chaim Weizmann approved or not. The bottom line is Ottley was out at NID by the time the blockade was implemented. The person responsible for setting British Naval war strategy at the time the blockade was begun is First Sea Lord Admiral of the Fleet John Arbuthnot “Jacky” Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher of Kilverstone, GCB, OM, GCVO. He reported to then First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill. He was replaced by First Sea Lord Admiral of the Fleet Sir Henry Bradwardine Jackson GCB, KCVO, FRS after arguing with Churchill over strategy at Gallipoli. As Gallipoli went south, so did his relationship with Churchill and Churchill eventually resigned in 1915 as First Lord of the Admiralty after pushing the disastrous campaign against the advice of Lord Fisher. Neither Lord Adm. Fisher or Adm. Jackson were involved with the British Israelism movement but both were competent military commanders well versed in military history, strategy and tactics.
The reasons for setting the blockade had nothing to do with the British Zionist Federation or Chaim Weizmann and everything to do with sound military strategy and tactics. The results in Germany, particularly the holding of the blockade after the Armistice, did indeed result in unnecessary suffering of German civilians – a condition that set the stage for someone like Hitler and the Nazis to take power, but it had nothing to do with Jews, the British Zionist Federation or Chaim Weizmann. It was about winning a war and getting the exact terms of surrender the Allies wanted which were admittedly draconian and only exacerbated the situation in interwar Germany that Hitler later exploited to his advantage.
Also, what the German civilians had to endure in WWI was not industrialized slaughter, dumbass. It was simply the horrors of war. No one was setting up camps and murdering them with factory efficiency.
So why was that you took down that post from your blog about the Jews being responsible for 9/11?
I was really interested in talking about that.
You goose-stepping moron.
Now the interesting thing about this is the spillover it has showed me from the Zimmerman/Martin thread. After Zimmerman killed Martin, it was possible that his initial intent was not going to work any more. I believe his initial intent was to catch someone so he could increase his “dominance units” in his community, which was yet another place where his attention-getting misbehavior was not working out as he had hoped. So he’s standing there, hoping to hell that the guy he killed could be proven to be a criminal so he would be a hero, which was his original intent. So they do a little this and a little that and he goes in to the police station. He doesn’t want to go to the hospital first because he doesn’t really need a defense, and the cops don’t want to take him to the hospital first because THEY don’t really need a defense (against charges of brutality or the like) since they know Zimmerman is on their side, and not ready to complain about them beating him up.
Everybody goes back in a friendly way to the station. They talk. Everything gets wrapped up. The guy doesn’t pop up at first from fingerprints or anything, but what the Hell, they’ll find something on him, not to worry. After all, what was he doing around there?
When it turns into a problem, however, then there has to be a campaign and it has to be presented as an attack on Zimmerman by the mean, nasty, criminal, vicious — what were all those other words? — thug.
Now we have a couple of months of screaming and hollering about:
1. Blacks killing whites and nobody cares;
2. Blacks getting off when they commit crimes and nobody cares;
3. Zimmerman being nice and kind and unracist;
4. Zimmerman being done to and hurt and roughed up and mistreated;
5. Witnesses seeing badness on Martin’s part;
6. Any witnesses seeing badness on Zimmerman’s part are racist;
7. Duh…
Oh. I get it. Blacks in the South and Jews in Germany have been engaged, for centuries and centuries, in efforts to make good people feel bad about themselves, and efforts to hurt them, rob them, brutalize them and slander them, and why?
Because they’re bad people.
They’re just plain rotten bad people.
They need to be killed.
What an old story. What a stupid, successful old story. And why is it so successful in spite of being stupid?
Reason number 1 – because PEOPLE ARE STUPID.
Reason number 2 – PROPAGANDA.
(Hey TalkingBack: What’s good for the goose is good propaganda. Yark Yark Yark!!)
Oh, and TalkingBack, I will now put words in your mouth, too:
“WORDS WORDS WORDS” meaning only that TalkingBack feels a little stronger when he can say things that he thinks will make others really think he’s tough and big and dangerous and so forth but when you get right down to it, he’s scared, because all the big bad Jews in the world are gonna hurt him some more.
WORDS WORDS WORDS!!
See, I put them in your mouth. Copyright them, right away! After all they’re your “intellectual property” which in your case rhymes with oxymoron.
BTW, I love the word “coincidink.” I used to own two of them myself!
Talkingback, “Notice: All material posted on this blog under the username/ID/avatar “talkingbacktocspan” is the intellectual property of talkingbacktocspan. This declaration serves to protect it as copyrighted.
No use of any of this material in any form, without the express written permission of the copyright owner is prohibited.
“talkingbacktocspan”
Hey TalkingBack: If I don’t obey you, you’ll have to sue me! Na na na na naaaa naaaaa!
(BTW, do you have the phrase “eat shit” trademarked? Just checking!)
malisha, eat shit
Notice: All material posted on this blog under the username/ID/avatar “talkingbacktocspan” is the intellectual property of talkingbacktocspan.
This declaration serves to protect it as copyrighted.
No use of any of this material in any form, without the express written permission of the copyright owner is prohibited.
talkingbacktocspan
Gene H, German civilians did nothing to merit “industrialized slaughter” either, but that is what they endured, from 1915-1919, when Chaim Weizmann threw his support (as head of world zionist organization) behind Great Britain’s blockade of German ports and was rewarded for his efforts with the Balfour Declaration.
Nor did German civilians do anything to merit “industrialized slaughter” by firebombing, but that is what approx. 600,000 incinerated Germans suffered.
For some reason, Erich Mendelsohn did not receive a Nobel prize for his part in the firebombing of 150 of Germany’s cities and the obliteration of Germany’s “bridge to its medieval past.”
Read about the firebombing itself here http://www.literaryreview.co.uk/overy_03_07.html
and about Mendelsohn’s role in it here — http://tinyurl.com/76yggbt
QUOTE
“One of the most compelling sidebars in Mendelsohn’s life (and in the film) involves a village he helped construct in the Nevada desert. The U.S. had entered World War II, but there were troubles. Allied bombs, dropped onto the rooftops of enemy cities, were failing to have the intended devastating effect; since Germany’s top-level topography was different than what America had reckoned. The government enlisted Mendelsohn’s aid (or rather, Mendelsohn volunteered) in designing a mock German village for purposes of target practice. Mendelsohn, the architect who in many ways built modern Berlin, was now helping to destroy it; there are unpursued parallels here between Einstein and the Manhattan Project. The German Village period might be the pinnacle of the Mendelsohnian tragedy, but Dror leaves it up to us to decide. With minimal editorial framing, we are stuck weighing the horrors of Allied firebombing against the evils of Axis aggression. We yearn for a third choice, and wonder if such a thing is possible.”
END QUOTE
read them, but only if you think you can get your head out of Malisha’s ostrich’s arse
Say, why did you take down that article on the Jews being responsible for 9/11? Speaking of which, you offer no proof whatsoever for statements 1 & 2. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
Bron “Why didn’t we do that?” [let Germany & Russia annihilate each other].
1. Because Churchill was in the pay of the Focus group — Jewish businessmen and British oil men who wanted a Jewish colony in Palestine as a Mediterranean fortress for their oil fleets & for British access to its empire. Churchill desperately needed the money: he was trying to support Chartwell, complete w/ 24 servants, as well as his son’s gambling debts, on what amounted to a mid-level bureaucrat’s salary.
2. Part of Churchill’s task was to draw US into the fight in Europe.
3. Lloyd George, chief negotiator, had been Theodor Herzl’s and the zionist organization’s attorney. (“A Place Among the Nations,” Benj. Netanyahu)
4. Baron Rothschild spent so much time visiting Lord Balfour that Rothschild’s future daughter in law thought the Baron worked in Balfour’s offices. (Niall Ferguson’s biography of the Rothschilds)
5. “My gratitude to Chaim Weizmann for providing acetone for our ships made me a believer in zionism.” – Lloyd George
6. -Samuel Untermyer was a major Democratic party activist/fund raiser in New York City, FDR’s home turf before his presidency. (Richard Hawkins, “Untermyer: Hitler’s Bitterest Foe.”)
7. -“As the former governor of New York, FDR was attuned to the pulse of the Jewish constituency. The legends of FDR’s strong friendship with Stephen Wise were feared in Berlin.” (The Transfer Agreement, p. 6)
8. -“[. . .] the top leadership of the Congress attended, led by Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, the Congress’ founder, currently serving as its honorary president. . . .Wise . . .had been in touch with with Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, a leading American Zionist and one of Wise’s close personal friends. The advice was to delay a direct appeal to newly sworn-in President Roosevelt, who was preoccupied with America’s Depression and a calamitous banking crisis. But Brandeis did feel that ultimately the matter should be brought to the ear of FDR personally.” (Transfer Agreement, p. 10).
9. -“[I]n 1933, Rabbis wise was growing increasingly frustrated with Roosevelt’s failure to speak out. . . .when he sought in vain to meet with the president, Rabbi Wise wrote to his wife, ‘If he refuse to see me, I shall return and let loose an avalance of demands for actions by Jewry. I have other things up my sleeve. Perhaps it will be better, for I shall be free to speak as I have never spoken before. And God helping me, I will fight.’ ” (“In the Garden of Beasts,” Erik Larson, p 29)
10. – ” On the other side stood Jewish groups . . .headed by Judge Proscauer, which counseled a quieter path . . .[and including] Chicago attorney Leo Wormser. . . .who opposed Untermyer’s plan because it could impair Germany’s ability to pay its bond debt to American holders.” (Larson, Garden of Beasts, p. 29)
11. “In the Garden of Beasts” is the story of the first year — 1933-1934 — of William Dodd and his family’s posting to Berlin as ambassador to Germany.
In this passage, Dodd is running the gauntlet of introductions to Washington and New York persons of influence. FDR had already instructed Dodd to concentrate on collecting Germany’s war debt.
“First . . .Dodd met the bankers . . .at the offices of the National City Bank, . . .later called Citibank. Dodd was startled to learn that National City Bank and Chase National Bank held over one hundred million dollars in German bonds, which Germany at this point was proposing to pay back at a rate of 30 cents on the dollar. ‘There was much talk but no agreement that I should do all I possibly cold to prevent Germany’s defaulting openly,’ Dodd wrote. He had little sympathy for the bankers. The prospect of high interest rates on German bonds had blinded them to the all-too-obvious risk that a war-crushed, politically volatile country might default.” (Larson, p. 37)
Or the short answer, Bron: We didn’t do that in 1933 for the same reason the US does not enter into a reasonable entente with Iran today — an arrangement greatly in the American interest. That reason is that powerful interest groups and money men exert their power to shape events to their benefit, not to the benefit of the people of the USA.
12. “That evening, the Jewish leaders arrived as schedled, among them Felix M. Warburg, a leading financier who tended to favor the quieter tactis of the American Jewish Committee.and Rabbi Wise of the noisier American Jewish Congress. [shades of J-Street and AIPAC] . . .Dodd’s visitors urged him to press Roosevelt for official intervention, but he demurred.” ( Larson, p. 37)
13. -“On Dodd’s second day at sea, as he strolled the deck of the Washington [on his way to Berlin], he spotted a familiar face, Rabbi Wise . . .Over the week’s voyage . . .they spoke together about Germany ‘half a dozen times or more,’ Wise reported to a fellow Jewish leader, Julian W. Mack, a federal appellate judge.” (Larson, p. 42) (what a coincidink).
While Jewish influencers enjoyed access to the highest decision makers, Germany’s representatives were given short shrift. When Germany’s finance minister Hjalmar Schacht called on Secretary Hull, Hull carried out the scheme Roosevelt had instructed him: when Schacht appeared in Hull’s office, Hull ignored him for three full minutes, pretending to look for a document. After the uncomfortable period had elapsed, Hull presented the document to Schacht: “a stern note from Roosevelt condemning any attempt by Germany to default.” (Larson, p. 27)
When the German ambassador to the USA made repeated trips to the State Department to protest anti-German activities such as mock trials, he was treated with contempt and lectured on ‘freedom of speech.’
TalkingBack, now I see how you got to your conclusions: The Jews took away your education and naturally you’re mad about that.
But don’t feel too bad, if you had been able to support an education, it would have been dominated by all the Jews in Academia and they just would have made you so confused by all their propaganda, you would have actually believed that the Germans inappropriately started at least one war during the 20th Century. See, you’dabeen brain-washed. Lucky THAT didn’t happen!
It reminds me of a woman I met in about 1988 or so. She was from Iran, and had come here, gotten an education, and was a social worker. She married an American guy from the mid-West. They had 2 kids. When they got a divorce she contacted me through mutual friends because she wanted to have someone to talk to who would be sympathetic about divorce court proceedings. Our mutual friend was a very religious Mormon, and this lady presumed I was a Mormon too. When she was commiserating with me about how difficult custody battles were, she said that all the divorces in America were the fault of the Jews. I wondered how that worked, and she told me: when people get divorced they have to sell their houses and they go from one house to two separate apartments. Since the Jews own all the apartment buildings, they cause divorces so that they rent twice as many apartments as necessary!
Wow, why didn’t I THINK OF THAT?
Malisha,
I checked his blog out right after I saw his comment in moderation.
Malisha,
A lovely display of reductio ab absurdum.