national

Nearly 200 pages of Drug Enforcement Administration contracts with producers were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. They show for the first time how the agency interacts with television and film productions.
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is quite active in the entertainment industry. It exercises stringent control over how the agency is represented in documentaries, reality shows, and dramas.

Do you trust the media? Most people don’t. A 2017 study of nine Western countries found that in not one did a majority of people think traditional news or social media sorted fact from fiction well.

Facebook has a longstanding tradition of stifling dissenting and alternative voices, including those of journalists. Now, artists’ careers are being hurt by the strongarm of the social media behemoth.
Earlier this month, artist Kate Kretz — who employs a multitude of techniques, including silverpoint, wood burning, drawing, painting, embroidery and sculpture — had her account disabled for posting images of her latest work.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has already made clear his soft spot for war criminals, having brought one – Elliot Abrams – into his administration. Then, earlier this month, Trump pardoned Army First Lieutenant Michael Behenna. Now, reports indicate Trump is just getting started.
And while Trump appears to be making moves to pardon more war criminals, those who have exposed war crimes, including whistleblower Chelsea Manning and journalist Julian Assange, are charged with contempt of court and espionage.

There’s an office that you go to to overthrow a government. CIA Whistleblower John Kiriakou stands in front of a packed house in the Chavez Room at the Venezuelan Embassy. A mural of Hugo Chavez looks on from the back wall. Bookcases stand empty, a fitting sign of the bumbling idiocy of empire. The lobby has been converted into a makeshift gallery: images of Maduro and Chavez flank the unused metal detector and security desk.

Julian Assange is a dick. It’s important you understand that.
Assange and WikiLeaks revealed the American military’s war crimes, the American government’s corruption and the American corporate media’s pathetic servile flattery to the power elite. So, if you’re a member of our ruling class, you would view those as textbook examples of dickery.
In a moment I’m going to list all the ways Julian Assange changed the world by being a dick.

NEW YORK — Journalist and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been hit with 17 Espionage Act charges by the United States. If convicted, Assange could be sentenced to up to 170 years in prison or even face the death penalty.
A conviction would also set a dangerous precedent for journalists in the U.S. who publish classified material. National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden wrote that “This case will decide the future of media.”

Earlier this month, tech giant Microsoft announced its solution to “protect” American elections from interference, which it has named “ElectionGuard.” The election technology is already set to be adopted by half of voting machine manufacturers and some state governments for the 2020 general election. Though it has been heavily promoted by the mainstream media in recent weeks, none of those reports have disclosed that ElectionGuard has several glaring conflicts of interest that greatly undermine its claim aimed at protecting U.S. democracy.

Earlier this month, I spent a day visiting Marseilles to videotape a documentary about recent American military history, specifically the ongoing wars that most of us prefer not to think about.
Lest there be any confusion, let me be more specific. I am not referring to Marseilles (mar-SAY), France, that nation’s largest port and second largest city with a population approaching 900,000. No, my destination was Marseilles (mar-SAYLZ), Illinois, a small prairie town with a population hovering around 5,000.

Every day, on page A2, the New York Times runs an excruciating feature called “Inside the Times,” wherein one of its reporters tells us (as the feature ought to be entitled) “What It’s Like to Be Me at the New York Times.” Such narcissistic burbling is so empty, and so much less enlightening than the news we should be getting from that skimpy propaganda rag, that this feature cannot possibly have been concocted in response to readership demand (unless those readers are the Times’ reporters’ mothers).