If there was ever a case of the pot calling the kettle black, it was in an email today from the MoveOn organization, attacking Fox News.
The Real Propaganda Machine
MoveOn is, in my opinion, a propaganda machine that has built a list and sends propaganda to that list each week.
Their aim today was to stop Fox News, the highest rating news service in the US, from getting the front seat in the White House briefing room. To do that, they repeatedly linked the Fox name with the phrase “propaganda machine.”
Like many in America these days, MoveOn likes to shut out any voice that disagrees with them or their idea of what things should be like. As a propaganda machine, they do a great job and they try to pretend they are just a small group of activists, but they are a lot more insidious.
Whatever happened to debate in this country? President Obama has talked about listening to “dissenting voices,” because, he said, the previous administration didn’t. And here is MoveOn blithely trying to shut down any discussion by demonizing anyone who disagrees with them. Perhaps they don’t believe what the president says.
MoveOn wants their followers to sign the petition to the board of the White House Correspondents’ Association. They favor NPR, itself a great news organization, but the way MoveOn goes about it is to demonize Fox.
They also want to make people believe that Fox is all propaganda. This has two effects. First, it makes their supporters think badly of Fox and anyone who watches Fox (not that some needed any more encouragement) and second, it makes some people who listen to Fox feel badly about themselves.
“Give Helen Thomas’ former briefing room seat to NPR, which has provided public interest coverage for decades – not Fox, which is a right-wing propaganda tool, not a legitimate news organization.”
MoveOn request
This week, the White House Correspondents’ Association is to decide which news organization is awarded the front-row center seat in the White House briefing room, vacated by Helen Thomas.
Up for consideration are Fox and Bloomberg News in the lead and possibly NPR.
MoveOn goes on to expand the demonization of Fox because they want to deny them access to that front-row seat in the whitehouse pressroom. The MoveOn attack extends past Fox News and touches anyone or any organization that doesn’t agree with MoveOn’s own view of the world.
The petition is likely to get short shrift from the Association, because it is more likely to be a committment to White House journalism that decides the winner. I expect there is a lot of jockeying for position going on right now.
I believe the email is more about MoveOn whipping up its base than anything serious.
A more interesting race, for association insiders is the “at large” seat, contested by Bloomberg reporter Hans Nichols, Wall Street Journal’s Laura Meckler and Politico’s Carol Lee. White House Correspondents Association’s Elections Getting Ugly
Whatever the White House Correspondents’ Association decides, I don’t expect it to have been swayed by the partisan attempts of the MoveOn propaganda machine to color the news and restrict access to the front of the White House briefing room.
