Censored 2006: The Top 25 Censored Stories

…from the corporate media, and from Project Censored. The team has delivered another volume of the most important stories of the year, which have been ignored or covered up by the mainstream media. In an insult to American traditions of a free press and an informed citizenry, the corporate news industry continues to suppress important stories about corporate hegemony; the errors and crimes of elected leaders (from the dominant party, that is); and most importantly, any story about the modern assault on participatory democracy from the wealthy elite. Uncovering these stories and describing their importance to regular citizens already makes the work of Project Censored incredibly important. However, I have been diligently reading these annual guides for nearly a decade, and this year’s edition continues the tendency of the books to undermine the importance of the uncovered news stories.

 

In this book Dahr Jamail records witnesses to the assault on Fallujah in late 2004 who describe U.S. troops killing civilians trying to swim across the Euphrates to escape the fighting, rolling tanks over wounded bodies, killing people waving white flags and invading homes and killing people when they didn’t respond to commands in English. At the Fallujah General hospital and a hospital ten miles away, U.S. forces engaged in a quite blatant violation of the Geneva Convention by invading the hospitals and making doctors and patients lie on the ground shackled, shooting out lights, firing at ambulances killing one drivers, shooting out doors, blocking access roads and access out of the hospital for ambulances and so on. Jamail records the feeling of people in the Al Dura region outside Baghdad who report U.S destruction of their wells and fields and records witnesses to the civilian deaths of U.S. bombs dropped on civilian areas. It is explained in the book that according to the Lancet/John Hopkins study which estimated 100,000 Iraqi civilians killed in the year after the March 2003 invasion as a result of that invasion, died for the most part not by direct killing by U.S. soldiers, but by rocket and missile attacks, unexploded cluster bombs, etc. He notes that while violent crimes against women averaged about once every several months under Saddam, this increased to several per week by July 2003 under the blessings of American occupation.

The Iraqi government commission on the media set up by Bremer has banned and threatened news outlets, which don't toe its line. The book has a section surveying abuses of freedom of speech and press in the world. In U.S. allies like Egypt and Morrocco, excuses are still found to jail journalists and send out masked men to beat them up. In Tunisia, the country's press association was expelled by the International Federation of Journalists after the former gave an award for press freedom to the country's virtual dictator President Ben Ali, a notorious persecutor of opposition journalists. In Afghanistan, journalists report that they heavily exercise self-censorship for fear of facing retaliation from the warlords, the real rulers of the country.

The book points out the deception behind the Oil for Food scandal uproar. It notes that it was not the demonized UN leadership but the U.S. and UK dominated the UN sanctions committee which approved all the Oil For Food Deals. U.S. allies Turkey and Jordan gained U.S. acquiescence in the billion dollar smuggling of Iraqi oil that went on over their borders. 80 percent of Iraqi oil during the sanctions period ended up in the hands of U.S. companies.

Another section deals with the situation in Haiti. The old barbaric military and police have regained power on behalf of the U.S. installed Latortue government and gone around beating up judges who try to prosecute them. Thousands are in jail w/o charge.. Rape has been a particular tool used by this regime.. Amnesty International has reported on the extreme violence of the new regime but the Bush administration, the Martin Government in Canada and the UN have engaged in lies and obfuscation about it. The leading Haitian human rights organization, like the rest of the groups in the "democratic uprising" was heavily subsidized by the U.S. prior to Aristide's overthrow, now refuses to go into the slums and villages where most Haitians live, to investigate abuses. Meanwhile in May 2005, the government of the Dominican Republic, began arbitrarily picking up Haitian migrant workers and refugees in the country and dumping them across the border into Haiti. More than a few of these tens of thousands dumped over the border appear to be poor dark skinned Dominicans arbitrarily classified as Haitians by the Dominican police.

Domestic related matters in this book include a report on how Gale Norton's Interior Department has been blocking inquiry into the royalty accounts of revenues gained from resource extraction by corporations on Native American land since 1887. An investigator appointed by a federal judge estimated that, while many Native Americans live in third world style poverty, the Government had robbed Native Americans of over 137 billion in revenues since 1887. The Bush administration successfully pressured that this investigator resign. Another article deals with the proposals for dealing with illegal immigrants and it points out that recent proposals such as those by Senators Kennedy and McCain, at best resemble the previous "guest worker" program, the Bracero program that lasted from 1942 to 1964. During the latter, the government often withheld money from workers on the ground that it wanted to ensure completion of work contract, but that money was never released to the workers.

An interesting article describes how the army of Ethiopia, ruled by virtual dictator Melas Zenawi, has engaged in a campaign of ethnic cleansing complete with the usual village burning, mass rapes, executions, etc. against the Anuak people in Ethiopia's Gambella region, in part by supporting the violence of other ethnic groups against the Anuak. The region is a major source of oil and other natural resources for U.S. corporations. The Ethiopian Government receives major military aid and training from the Bush administration. The author of the "update" section of this article makes a few questionable assertions but his overall point is fair enough.

Other interesting items discussed include: Video and Audio propaganda produced by the White House and corporations that pass as real news on TV and radio stations and lack of safety against terror attacks at chemical plants. Two articles seem to be centerpieces of the book. The first laboriously tries to prove that the Republicans stole the White House in 2004. The second points out problems with the official story about 9-11 and implies some conclusions that I think are unwarranted at this point.. Greg Palast in the last article discusses the Bush draft dodging/Dan Rather buffoonery.

 

Since the right-wing owned corporate mainstream media sides with corporations (who own them) and their agenda, we must turn to alternative source of information in order to learn what is going on around us.