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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

lunarchick - 05:55pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5819 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

In January, he obtained a copy of the memo in the course of his own research, but out of respect for Komisar chose not to write about it until she published her story in the U.S. After Kornbluh got a copy of the Kissinger book, he fired off a quick piece, comparing the official account of the Pinochet rendezvous with the sanitized account Kissinger offers in his book.

In his Nation piece of March 29, now out, Kornbluh writes that Kissinger’s account of the rendezvous was less than candid. In a new and unpublished piece, Komisar accuses Kissinger of presenting a "selective and distorted" version of the meeting; for example, she says, Kissinger describes Pinochet as exhibiting "no special warmth," while the memo describes the general as "grateful" to his U.S. visitors.

So now the story has made its way up the food chain to The Nation. But that’s still a far cry from the mainstream. As Kornbluh points out, just because editors might not have wanted to buy Komisar’s account, they don’t have an excuse for ignoring the story. "Any news editor worth his salt should have read that piece in the London Observer and tried to get the document and done a story on it," he says.

Meanwhile, the mainstream media have been laying wreaths at Kissinger’s feet. Years of Renewal was excerpted in the March 15 issue of Time, which declared the book "worth the wait." In her 60 Minutes interview with Kissinger that aired March 7, Lesley Stahl threw only softballs. But then again, in this age of access journalism, who wants to be a bomb-thrower? It doesn’t make you any friends. Back in 1976, when the Voice published the "Pike Papers," which were leaked documents from a congressional investigation of the CIA, Kissinger himself accused the Voice of distortion and of fomenting a "new" McCarthyism.

This time around, Kissinger did not return calls for comment.

lunarchick - 05:57pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5820 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

Seems the American readership are being short-changed by their own media!

lunarchick - 05:59pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5821 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

Begs the question :

Why - in the land of the FREE - are American Newspapers inhibited ?

Suggests there would be reprisals regarding their people, income, influence, or circulation.

rshowalter - 06:00pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5822 of 5846)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

The American media is very afraid -- and for some good reasons. You can't blame the people too much - but you CAN blame the system, and change it.

The patterns of "the culture of lying" were set up before World War I, and have been perfected, but have been solidified, since.

With internet usages, and the much lower cost of memory -- we can throw those usages away, and see that things are checked.

lunarchick - 06:01pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5823 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

Where would these reprisal threats eminate from?

Obviously a rich power source.

Obviously not the formal channels of government.

Obviously there have to be sinister factors denying 'freedom of the press' in the USA!

rshowalter - 06:02pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5824 of 5846)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I don't think reprisals are hard to find.

But the mechanics of those reprisals bear examination.

The press needs to take steps to get itself more independence.

Advertisers, by and large, would be glad to see it -- it hurts them to have the press so little respected. That lowers the value of adds.

lunarchick - 06:04pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5825 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

see 10

rshowalter - 06:08pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5826 of 5846)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

The internet, with its vastly increased memory, and interconnection to document complexity -- can help with the problems in "see 10" above -- that is, can supplement the effective intelligence of individuals and groups, and permit things to be checked.

lunarchick - 06:09pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5827 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

Kissenger-BOSNIA

lunarchick - 06:11pm Jun 22, 2001 EST (#5828 of 5846)
lunarchick@www.com

http://www.jps.net/drboylan/mj12org.htm

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