Monthly Archives: August 2018

2018-08-29: News Headlines

Max Blumenthal (2018-08-29). Leaked Scenes from Censored Documentary Reveal Israel Lobbyist Noah Pollak Astroturfing an Anti-Palestinian Protest. grayzoneproject.com Exclusive leaked scenes from Al Jazeera's "The Lobby — USA" documentary show how Emergency Committee for Israel Executive Director Noah…

Hezvo Mpunga (2018-08-29). Leak From Censored Israel Lobby Film Exposes Anti-Palestinian Operatives. therealnews.com The first leaked excerpt of Al Jazeera's censored film on the Israel Lobby in the U.S. claims to identify the funder behind the Canary Mission, an anonymous website devoted to smearing and silencing vocal supporters of Palestinian rights. We play a clip from the film and speak to Asa Winstanley of the Electronic Intifada, which…

wsws.org (2018-08-29). What is FireEye? wsws.org The cyber-security firm FireEye has high-level connections with military intelligence and Wall Street and is working with social media companies to promote censorship.

DLi (2018-08-29). RussiaGate is a sophisticated Shell Game. indybay.org The current U.S. corporate media's hysteria over the "RussiaGate" affair is the outcome of a highly sophisticated Shell Game launched by the deepest bowels of the USA Imperial ruling junta. At its most basic nucleus, it is a desperate last-ditch attempt, by the Empire's GateKeepers, to return to the halcyon days of the 1950s Cold War era; a time when the manipulated consensus and bi-partisan ideological unity existed to promote the post-WW II Pax Americana across the entire Globe.

RT (2018-08-29). WaPo column praises McCain as human rights champion with photo of him next to 'literal neo-Nazi'. rt.com Mainstream US media have been singing eulogies to the late Senator John McCain after he succumbed to brain cancer last weekend. Among them is a column in the Washington Post titled 'The human rights community lost a champion.'

RT (2018-08-29). CNN's own source says Michael Cohen story is fake news, but network stands by it. rt.com A bombshell story that was supposed to be the end of President Donald Trump — until the celebrity source recanted. It sounds like a typical media screw-up, with one key difference: for whatever reason, CNN is standing by it.

Justin Anderson (2018-08-28). Media Continues Writing Premature Obituaries for the Democratic Left. fair.org US News ( 8/8/18): "A band of far-left candidates have suffered a string of defeats in Democratic primaries this year." | The insurgent left wing of the Democratic Party, sometimes self-identified as democratic socialists and exemplified by rising star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and associated with groups like Bernie Sanders' Our Revolution, the Justice Democrats and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), took some losses in primaries on August 7. These included high-profile candidates like Abdul El-Sayed, a candidate for Michigan governor and Brent Welder in Kansas's 2nd district, along with losses by Cori Bush in Missouri's 1st district. Following the losses, corporate media outlets were quick to declare the Democratic left wing dead in the water: | "Bernie and His Army Are Losing 2018" (Politico, 8/8/18) | "Down Goes Socialism" (Politico, 8/8/18) | "Democratic Party's Liberal Insurgency Hits…

Ben Norton (2018-08-28). Google, Facebook, and Twitter Are Censoring Iranians — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks Out. mintpressnews.com Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of real life Iranians who are falsely dubbed as "government trolls." Student journalist Sayed Mousavi warns "this is just the tip of an iceberg."

Asa Winstanley (2018-08-28). Censored Film Names Adam Milstein as Canary Mission Funder. mintpressnews.com Israel lobby financier Adam Milstein has been identified as the funder of Canary Mission, the anonymous website that aims to tarnish the reputations of US supporters of Palestinian rights. | Milstein is named as the financier of Canary Mission by Eric Gallagher, a former employee of The Israel Project, in Al Jazeera's censored investigative film, The Lobby — USA. | The Electronic Intifada is releasing segments it has obtained of the film: one shows Gallagher telling an undercover Al Jazeera reporter about Milstein's role and the other shows Milstein talking about the need to "investigate" and "expose" critics of Israel, who Milstein believes are not only anti-Semites, but also "anti-Christian" and "anti-freedom" activists who "terrorize us." | The film also reveals that Israel lobby operatives who rely on information provided by Canary Mission "coordinate" their activities with the…

Hezvo Mpunga (2018-08-28). Facebook & Google Play the Censor: Are our Civil Liberties Endangered? therealnews.com Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi joins us to examine the dangerous juncture our freedom finds itself in when Facebook, Twitter, and Google work with the government and its intelligence services to control what we see and hear

Ben Norton (2018-08-28). Google, Facebook, And Twitter Are Censoring Iranians. iranian.com Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of real life Iranians who are falsely dubbed as "government trolls." Student journalist Sayed Mousavi warns "this is just the tip of an iceberg." [dropcap]U[/dropcap]nder apparent government pressure, big tech corporations in the United States have tightened their social media grip, censoring accounts that criticize the […]

Joe Conason, Creators Syndicate (2018-08-28). Here's Why Right-Wing Attacks on Real Journalism Are So Dangerous for the Country. alternet.org Real investigative journalism makes us also safer, and it needs to be protected. | Whenever the president complains about "Fake News," always capitalized and often punctuated with exclamation points, rest assured that he doesn't mean the actual sources of fraudulent information that infest the internet and haunt American politics. No, Donald Trump's definition of "fake" has nothing to do with factuality or responsibility in media. It merely means news. . .

Abigail Curlew (2018-08-28). Canadian Intelligence: The Case of Media Manipulation and the CSIS Agenda. globalresearch.ca Accusations of fake news across the political spectrum have transformed a very concerning issue into a weapon of delegitimization. A recent report published by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) titled …

Scott Rasmussen, Creators.com (2018-08-28). Here's What the Mainstream Media Keeps Getting Wrong About Politics. alternet.org Fifty-four percent of Americans just don't fit into the usual narrative. | For many obsessed with politics, the upcoming midterm elections are perceived as a fight between good and evil that will determine the fate of the nation. In the narrative framed by true believers and much media coverage, it's a fight between those who are convinced that President Donald Trump can make America great and those who dream of a socialist future. Fif. . .

Ryan Gallagher (2018-08-28). World's Leading Human Rights Groups Tell Google to Cancel Its China Censorship Plan. theintercept.com A blistering letter from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch calls a forthcoming search engine with blacklists "an alarming capitulation by Google on human rights."

RT (2018-08-28). Trump calls out Google for 'rigged' search results, 'illegal' censorship, vows to take action. rt.com President Donald Trump has accused search giant Google of deliberately highlighting negative news about his administration, and "controlling what we can and cannot see." Trump vowed that the situation "will be addressed." |

Ben Norton (2018-08-24). Big Tech Corporations Are Now Censoring Iranian Social Media Accounts — A Banned Student Journalist Speaks out. therealnews.com Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of average Iranians falsely being dubbed "government trolls." Student journalist Sayed Mousavi warns "this is just the tip of an iceberg."

Ben Norton (2018-08-24). Big Tech Corporations Are Now Banning Iranian Social Media Accounts — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks out. grayzoneproject.com Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of real life Iranians who are falsely dubbed as "government trolls."…

Hezvo Mpunga (2018-08-24). The Baltimore Bureau Podcast Show: August 24, 2018. therealnews.com Eze, Dharna, Khalilah and guest host DDm (aka Secretary of Shade) discuss censoring on social media, Maryland environmentalists fighting a new fracked gas pipeline, national lead crises rivaling Flint's, the national prison strike, and more

splcenter.org (2018-08-24). Weekend Read: From cable to the White House, the mainstreaming of white nationalism. splcenter.org It doesn't take the infiltration of a hate group meeting or a deep dive into extremist chat rooms to be exposed to white nationalist ideas.

RT (2018-08-24). Trump accuses social media giants of censorship, says 'millions' being silenced. rt.com US President Donald Trump has lashed out at tech companies for deplatforming "millions" of users, arguing that people must be allowed to decide for themselves what is true. |

RT (2018-08-24). 'Information ops': Secret meeting of social media & tech giants to tackle midterm elections. rt.com Representatives from America's tech giants are meeting in private to discuss strategies for countering "information operations" ahead of the midterm elections. The meeting comes amid growing concern over social media censorship.

RT (2018-08-24). Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to testify before House committee over 'shadow banning' & bias claims. rt.com Twitter's chief executive Jack Dorsey will appear before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Sept. 5 to testify about the company's algorithms that have repeatedly raised suspicions of judgment bias and stealth censorship.

RT (2018-08-24). 'It looks like spam': Facebook hit with more claims that it unfairly censors conservatives. rt.com As Facebook continues to be hit with claims of censorship from Donald Trump and other conservative voices, two more alleged cases have been added to the pile, with the social network claiming the posts "look like spam."

Alan MacLeod (2018-08-22). That Facebook Will Turn to Censoring the Left Isn't a Worry—It's a Reality. fair.org On August 6, a number of giant online media companies, including Facebook, YouTube, Apple, Spotify and Pinterest, took the seemingly coordinated decision to remove all content from Alex Jones and his media outlet Infowars from their platforms. | Jones, perhaps the internet's most notorious far-right conspiracy theorist, has claimed that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax, the Democratic Party is running a child sex ring inside a DC pizzeria and that the Las Vegas shooting was perpetrated by Antifa. Despite or perhaps because of such claims, his website Infowars has built up an enormous following: 3 million Americans, almost 1 percent of the population, visited the site in July 2018, according to Alexa. Alex Jones: First they came for the conspiracy theorists…. | The reaction from the media to the decision to ban Jones and Infowars was largely celebratory. On…

2018-08-29: Social Media Postees

Leaked Scenes from Censored Documentary Reveal Israel Lobbyist Noah Pollak Astroturfing an Anti-Palestinian Protest
Max Blumenthal | grayzoneproject.com | 2018-08-29
Exclusive leaked scenes from Al Jazeera's "The Lobby — USA" documentary show how Emergency Committee for Israel Executive Director Noah… | The post Leaked Scenes from Censored Documentary Reveal Israel Lobbyist Noah Pollak Astroturfing an Anti-Palestinian Protest appeared first on Grayzone Project.
grayzoneproject.com/2018/08/28/leaked-sc…

Leak From Censored Israel Lobby Film Exposes Anti-Palestinian Operatives
Hezvo Mpunga | therealnews.com | 2018-08-29
The first leaked excerpt of Al Jazeera's censored film on the Israel Lobby in the U.S. claims to identify the funder behind the Canary Mission, an anonymous website devoted to smearing and silencing vocal supporters of Palestinian rights. We play a clip from the film and speak to Asa Winstanley of the Electronic Intifada, which… | The post Leak From C…
therealnews.com/stories/leak-from-censor…

CNN's own source says Michael Cohen story is fake news, but network stands by it
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-29
A bombshell story that was supposed to be the end of President Donald Trump — until the celebrity source recanted. It sounds like a typical media screw-up, with one key difference: for whatever reason, CNN is standing by it.
rt.com/usa/437101-cnn-michael-cohen-fake…

What is FireEye?
wsws.org | wsws.org | 2018-08-29
The cyber-security firm FireEye has high-level connections with military intelligence and Wall Street and is working with social media companies to promote censorship.
www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/08/29/feye…

RussiaGate is a sophisticated Shell Game
DLi | indybay.org | 2018-08-29
The current U.S. corporate media's hysteria over the "RussiaGate" affair is the outcome of a highly sophisticated Shell Game launched by the deepest bowels of the USA Imperial ruling junta. At its most basic nucleus, it is a desperate last-ditch attempt, by the Empire's GateKeepers, to return to the halcyon days of the 1950s Cold War era; a time when the manipulated consensus and bi-partisan ideological unity existed to promote the post-WW II Pax Americana across the entire Globe.
indybay.org/newsitems/2018/08/24/1881709…

WaPo column praises McCain as human rights champion with photo of him next to 'literal neo-Nazi'
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-29
Mainstream US media have been singing eulogies to the late Senator John McCain after he succumbed to brain cancer last weekend. Among them is a column in the Washington Post titled 'The human rights community lost a champion.'
rt.com/usa/437104-mccain-ukraine-nazis-w…

Media Continues Writing Premature Obituaries for the Democratic Left
Justin Anderson | fair.org | 2018-08-28
US News ( 8/8/18): "A band of far-left candidates have suffered a string of defeats in Democratic primaries this year." | The insurgent left wing of the Democratic Party, sometimes self-identified as democratic socialists and exemplified by rising star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and associated with groups like Bernie Sanders' Our Revolution, the Justice Democrats and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), took some losses in primaries on August 7. These included high-profile candidates like Abdul El-Sayed, a candidate for Michigan governor and Brent Welder in Kansas's 2nd district, along with losses by Cori Bush in Missouri's 1st district. Following the losses, corporate media outlets were quick to declare the Democratic left wing dead in the water: | "Bernie and His Army Are Losing 2018" (Politico, 8/8/18) | "Down Goes Socialism" (Politico, 8/8/18) | "Democratic Party's Liberal Insurgency Hits…
fair.org/home/media-writing-premature-ob…

Here's Why Right-Wing Attacks on Real Journalism Are So Dangerous for the Country
Joe Conason, Creators Syndicate | alternet.org | 2018-08-28
Real investigative journalism makes us also safer, and it needs to be protected. | Whenever the president complains about "Fake News," always capitalized and often punctuated with exclamation points, rest assured that he doesn't mean the actual sources of fraudulent information that infest the internet and haunt American politics. No, Donald Trump's definition of "fake" has nothing to do with factuality or responsibility in media. It merely means news. . .
alternet.org/news-amp-politics/heres-why…

Canadian Intelligence: The Case of Media Manipulation and the CSIS Agenda
Abigail Curlew | globalresearch.ca | 2018-08-28
Accusations of fake news across the political spectrum have transformed a very concerning issue into a weapon of delegitimization. A recent report published by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) titled …
globalresearch.ca/canadian-intelligence-…

Censored Film Names Adam Milstein as Canary Mission Funder
Asa Winstanley | mintpressnews.com | 2018-08-28
Israel lobby financier Adam Milstein has been identified as the funder of Canary Mission, the anonymous website that aims to tarnish the reputations of US supporters of Palestinian rights. | Milstein is named as the financier of Canary Mission by Eric Gallagher, a former employee of The Israel Project, in Al Jazeera's censored investigative film, The Lobby — USA. | The Electronic Intifada is releasing segments it has obtained of the film: one shows Gallagher telling an undercover Al Jazeera reporter about Milstein's role and the other shows Milstein talking about the need to "investigate" and "expose" critics of Israel, who Milstein believes are not only anti-Semites, but also "anti-Christian" and "anti-freedom" activists who "terrorize us." | The film also reveals that Israel lobby operatives who rely on information provided by Canary Mission "coordinate" their activities with the…
mintpressnews.com/censored-film-names-ad…

Google, Facebook, and Twitter Are Censoring Iranians — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks Out
Ben Norton | mintpressnews.com | 2018-08-28
Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of real life Iranians who are falsely dubbed as "government trolls." Student journalist Sayed Mousavi warns "this is just the tip of an iceberg." | The post Google, Facebook, and Twitter Are Censoring Iranians — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks Out appeared first on MintPress News.
mintpressnews.com/censoring-iran/248344/

Here's What the Mainstream Media Keeps Getting Wrong About Politics
Scott Rasmussen, Creators.com | alternet.org | 2018-08-28
Fifty-four percent of Americans just don't fit into the usual narrative. | For many obsessed with politics, the upcoming midterm elections are perceived as a fight between good and evil that will determine the fate of the nation. In the narrative framed by true believers and much media coverage, it's a fight between those who are convinced that President Donald Trump can make America great and those who dream of a socialist future. Fif. . .
alternet.org/news-amp-politics/heres-wha…

Trump calls out Google for 'rigged' search results, 'illegal' censorship, vows to take action
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-28
President Donald Trump has accused search giant Google of deliberately highlighting negative news about his administration, and "controlling what we can and cannot see." Trump vowed that the situation "will be addressed."
rt.com/usa/437054-trump-google-censorshi…

World's Leading Human Rights Groups Tell Google to Cancel Its China Censorship Plan
Ryan Gallagher | theintercept.com | 2018-08-28
A blistering letter from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch calls a forthcoming search engine with blacklists "an alarming capitulation by Google on human rights." | The post World's Leading Human Rights Groups Tell Google to Cancel Its China Censorship Plan appeared first on The Intercept.
theintercept.com/2018/08/28/google-china…

Big Tech Corporations Are Now Banning Iranian Social Media Accounts — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks out
Ben Norton | grayzoneproject.com | 2018-08-24
Google, Facebook, and Twitter are removing social media accounts of real life Iranians who are falsely dubbed as "government trolls."… | The post Big Tech Corporations Are Now Banning Iranian Social Media Accounts — A Censored Student Journalist Speaks out appeared first on Grayzone Project.
grayzoneproject.com/2018/08/24/big-tech-…

The Baltimore Bureau Podcast Show: August 24, 2018
Hezvo Mpunga | therealnews.com | 2018-08-24
Eze, Dharna, Khalilah and guest host DDm (aka Secretary of Shade) discuss censoring on social media, Maryland environmentalists fighting a new fracked gas pipeline, national lead crises rivaling Flint's, the national prison strike, and more | The post The Baltimore Bureau Podcast Show: August 24, 2018 appeared first on The Real News…
therealnews.com/stories/the-baltimore-bu…

Weekend Read: From cable to the White House, the mainstreaming of white nationalism
splcenter.org | splcenter.org | 2018-08-24
It doesn't take the infiltration of a hate group meeting or a deep dive into extremist chat rooms to be exposed to white nationalist ideas.
splcenter.org/news/2018/08/24/weekend-re…

'It looks like spam': Facebook hit with more claims that it unfairly censors conservatives
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-24
As Facebook continues to be hit with claims of censorship from Donald Trump and other conservative voices, two more alleged cases have been added to the pile, with the social network claiming the posts "look like spam."
rt.com/usa/436787-facebook-censorship-co…

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to testify before House committee over 'shadow banning' & bias claims
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-24
Twitter's chief executive Jack Dorsey will appear before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Sept. 5 to testify about the company's algorithms that have repeatedly raised suspicions of judgment bias and stealth censorship.
rt.com/usa/436798-twitter-dorsey-testify…

Trump accuses social media giants of censorship, says 'millions' being silenced
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-24
US President Donald Trump has lashed out at tech companies for deplatforming "millions" of users, arguing that people must be allowed to decide for themselves what is true.
rt.com/usa/436739-trump-social-media-cen…

'Information ops': Secret meeting of social media & tech giants to tackle midterm elections
RT | rt.com | 2018-08-24
Representatives from America's tech giants are meeting in private to discuss strategies for countering "information operations" ahead of the midterm elections. The meeting comes amid growing concern over social media censorship.
rt.com/usa/436756-tech-giants-secret-mee…