Friday, September 08, 2006
Bush, Corporate Corruption, ABC and "The Path to 9/11": Buzzflash sums it all up for you. It doesn't get explained any better than this.
A License to Lie
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Fri, 09/08/2006 - 6:29am. Editorials
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
As BuzzFlash readers know by now, the ABC Television Network, owned by entertainment behemoth Disney, has spent $40 million to run a commercial-free, fictionally-"enhanced" account of the events leading up to and surrounding 9/11.
The fiction, by all accounts, comes from fabricated scenes that place much of the blame, were they actually true, for 9/11 on the Clinton Administration. Some of these television "moments" were made up out of whole cloth. In short, like the Bush Administration itself, you won’t be able to tell the truth from the lies.
A project of an avowed right wing shill, the 9/11 "Disney in Wonderland" television drama appears to be a pre-election pay-off to the Bush Administration.
We have been running a slew of stories about this travesty on BuzzFlash this past week, so we won’t get into the details. But we bet our bottom dollar that you won’t see a scene of Bush kicking a CIA briefing officer out of the room after the man gave Bush a document entitled ""Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US." This occurred on August 6, 2001.
According to a recent book by Ron Suskind, Bush’s reaction to being told that our nation was about to come under likely terrorist attack was to get peevish for having his vacation disrupted. He kicked the briefer out of the room by dismissing him with these words, "'All right, you’ve covered your ass."
Bush then did nothing – absolutely nothing – to attempt to forestall the attack or prevent hijackings by having heightened screening implemented at airports. He did nothing at all, except go back to relax on his month-long vacation in Crawford.
Do you think that will be in the film?
Or how about the scene of Bush cluelessly reading "My Pet Goat" in a classroom at the Brooker Elementary School while America was under attack and people were leaping from the twin towers in New York. Will that be in this piece of Mickey Mouse GOP propaganda?
We somehow doubt it.
Anyone who reads BuzzFlash knows that we never stop raising the alarm about how Republican politics, entertainment, news and corporate profits have morphed, for the most part, into one synergistic pump. All the "news coverage" water, more or less, comes from the same well. Or, perhaps a more apt description, as the ABC-Bushevik vision of 9/11 aptly illustrates, the Republicans and the news and entertainment television companies are on the same script – in this case, literally.
Suffice it to say, ABC would not run a $40 million film that is a hit job on the Democrats – and leaves Bush barely grazed – a few weeks before a national election if it weren’t expecting something in return from the White House.
For-profit companies don’t blow $40 million without advertising revenue out of "goodwill." They want something in return – and you can be sure, if the Republicans maintain control of both houses of Congress, Disney will be well-rewarded by the Bush Administration -– well-rewarded indeed.
We long ago arrived at the point in the world of television that broadcast networks were given the public airwaves basically free of cost – and then abused that privilege by putting profits before service to the public. They are given a license to lie in order to ingratiate themselves with the GOP and reap a return on their political investment by getting legislative and regulatory financial "advantages."
The uproar over the ABC propaganda film – and it is heartening to see the Democrats fighting so aggressively against this shameful act of collusion on the part of ABC – is a symbolic apotheosis of sorts. It represents a recognition that the entire Bush administration is based on rule by a series of mutually complimentary "scripts." All of these scripts, including the ABC 9/11 rewrite of history and Bush’s ongoing "War on Terrorism" mini-series, are part of a larger "narrative" stitched together by Karl Rove.
It’s a narrative that has little to do with reality. It’s storytelling at its best, like reading a nightmarish bedtime tale to a child and then reassuring him or her that all will be well because Daddy is guarding the house against goblins and evil doers with a big gun.
But, needless to say, in a democracy, a major broadcast network, owned by the company that is synonymous with the creation of "branded" fantasy for children, should not be in the business of providing campaign support to a political party through a $40 million television program (for which, we repeat, they will receive no advertising revenue).
Democracy in America is on the endangered species list as long as big media companies are given a license to lie and influence election outcomes, even though we, the public, own the airwaves.
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Fri, 09/08/2006 - 6:29am. Editorials
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
As BuzzFlash readers know by now, the ABC Television Network, owned by entertainment behemoth Disney, has spent $40 million to run a commercial-free, fictionally-"enhanced" account of the events leading up to and surrounding 9/11.
The fiction, by all accounts, comes from fabricated scenes that place much of the blame, were they actually true, for 9/11 on the Clinton Administration. Some of these television "moments" were made up out of whole cloth. In short, like the Bush Administration itself, you won’t be able to tell the truth from the lies.
A project of an avowed right wing shill, the 9/11 "Disney in Wonderland" television drama appears to be a pre-election pay-off to the Bush Administration.
We have been running a slew of stories about this travesty on BuzzFlash this past week, so we won’t get into the details. But we bet our bottom dollar that you won’t see a scene of Bush kicking a CIA briefing officer out of the room after the man gave Bush a document entitled ""Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US." This occurred on August 6, 2001.
According to a recent book by Ron Suskind, Bush’s reaction to being told that our nation was about to come under likely terrorist attack was to get peevish for having his vacation disrupted. He kicked the briefer out of the room by dismissing him with these words, "'All right, you’ve covered your ass."
Bush then did nothing – absolutely nothing – to attempt to forestall the attack or prevent hijackings by having heightened screening implemented at airports. He did nothing at all, except go back to relax on his month-long vacation in Crawford.
Do you think that will be in the film?
Or how about the scene of Bush cluelessly reading "My Pet Goat" in a classroom at the Brooker Elementary School while America was under attack and people were leaping from the twin towers in New York. Will that be in this piece of Mickey Mouse GOP propaganda?
We somehow doubt it.
Anyone who reads BuzzFlash knows that we never stop raising the alarm about how Republican politics, entertainment, news and corporate profits have morphed, for the most part, into one synergistic pump. All the "news coverage" water, more or less, comes from the same well. Or, perhaps a more apt description, as the ABC-Bushevik vision of 9/11 aptly illustrates, the Republicans and the news and entertainment television companies are on the same script – in this case, literally.
Suffice it to say, ABC would not run a $40 million film that is a hit job on the Democrats – and leaves Bush barely grazed – a few weeks before a national election if it weren’t expecting something in return from the White House.
For-profit companies don’t blow $40 million without advertising revenue out of "goodwill." They want something in return – and you can be sure, if the Republicans maintain control of both houses of Congress, Disney will be well-rewarded by the Bush Administration -– well-rewarded indeed.
We long ago arrived at the point in the world of television that broadcast networks were given the public airwaves basically free of cost – and then abused that privilege by putting profits before service to the public. They are given a license to lie in order to ingratiate themselves with the GOP and reap a return on their political investment by getting legislative and regulatory financial "advantages."
The uproar over the ABC propaganda film – and it is heartening to see the Democrats fighting so aggressively against this shameful act of collusion on the part of ABC – is a symbolic apotheosis of sorts. It represents a recognition that the entire Bush administration is based on rule by a series of mutually complimentary "scripts." All of these scripts, including the ABC 9/11 rewrite of history and Bush’s ongoing "War on Terrorism" mini-series, are part of a larger "narrative" stitched together by Karl Rove.
It’s a narrative that has little to do with reality. It’s storytelling at its best, like reading a nightmarish bedtime tale to a child and then reassuring him or her that all will be well because Daddy is guarding the house against goblins and evil doers with a big gun.
But, needless to say, in a democracy, a major broadcast network, owned by the company that is synonymous with the creation of "branded" fantasy for children, should not be in the business of providing campaign support to a political party through a $40 million television program (for which, we repeat, they will receive no advertising revenue).
Democracy in America is on the endangered species list as long as big media companies are given a license to lie and influence election outcomes, even though we, the public, own the airwaves.
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
# posted by The Punisher @ Friday, September 08, 2006 
