REMEMBERING NEIL POSTMAN

The insightful media reporter and critic Aaron Barnhart of TVBarn.com has an excellent piece on the year on television carried by Knight Ridder:

”A review of the year in television must begin with its most significant milestone: the 20th anniversary of the publication of “Amusing Ourselves to Death,'’ Neil Postman’s laser beam of a tract about TV.

“The professor, who died in 2003, correctly prophesied that viewers one day (that is, now) would have in their households a perfect instrument for entertainment — one that was tragically and ironically inept at helping us communicate.

“Americans are the best entertained and quite likely the least well-informed people in the Western world,'’ he wrote. And he pinned the blame squarely on TV for, in his words, “transforming our culture into
one vast arena for show business.'’

Postman’s son, Andrew, writes in the new 20th-anniversary edition of the book:

“My father asked such good questions that they can be asked of non-television things. `What happens to us when we become infatuated with and then seduced by (these gizmos)? Do they free us or imprison us? Do they make our leaders more accountable or less so?’“

“And the question we should reflect on every Christmas Day: “Do they make us better citizens or better consumers?’

Http://www.TVBarn.com

US JOURNALISTS PRESSURED BY EDITORS

Robert Fisk Fisk writes in the Independent:

I first realized the enormous pressures on American journalists in the Middle East when I went some years ago to say goodbye to a colleague from the Boston Globe. I expressed my sorrow that he was leaving a region
where he had obviously enjoyed reporting. I could save my sorrows for someone else, he said. One of the joys of leaving was that he would no longer have to alter the truth to suit his paper’s more vociferous readers.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11391.htm

ICH: Israel and the Neocons, The Libby Affair and the Internal War. James Petras writes:

”Who were the fabricators of war propaganda, who was Libby protecting? And not only the “fabricators of war”, but the strategic planners, speech-makers and architects of war who acted hand in hand with the propagandists and the journalists who disseminated the propaganda? What is the link between all these high- level functionaries, propagandists and journalists?”

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11385.htm

PRESS RELEASE: JOURNO FROM ARAB SATELLITE CHANNEL BANNED

Dubai, 27/12/2005: Al Arabiya News Channel is outraged at the continued ban imposed by the Israeli occupation forces on Basim El Jamal, one of its seasoned journalists, prohibiting him entry into the Palestinian Territories. Al Arabiya considers this unwarranted and unexplained embargo as flying straight into the face of freedom of the press and the right of journalists to go about their legitimate duties unhindered.
Basim El Jamal, a British citizen, was prevented from entering the Palestinian territories to carry out professional duties on three occasions - two attempts (in April 2005) via Daima Bridge and Lodd airport in Jordan were thwarted by Israeli occupation forces for “security reasons”, with no further elaboration. Two weeks ago, Basim sought the intervention of the Palestinian Authorities in Gaza- again to no avail - with the Israelis alleging that Basim has contacts with “hostile groups”. Again, no further explanation was provided.

FREE PRESS: RECENT EVENTS REIGNITE DEBATE OVER PROPAGANDA

” Within every war there is a war of words, a battle for hearts and minds designed both to bolster the morale on the home front and to deflate the enemy. And in recent weeks, that battle has come into focus for the Bush administration and its Iraq policy.

http://www.freepress.net/news/13058