Thought Control and Media

my significant other has just discovered that a student has plagiarized her final paper in their ws class. oy-vey. the business of stealing one's words and thoughts continues in higher education. it puts professors in tangled positions not knowing whether to simply fail the student on the assignment, or for the entire class, or to take a drastic measure and send them to the conduct board. it's one of the definite unpleasantries of being an educator.

speaking of thoughts and the ownership thereof, our dear old president (will we ever tire of hating and criticizing him?) has given some one-one-one interviews to journalists (well, at least 1) and has even taken some questions after prepared remarks. remember, he has been doing some speaking engagements this week to gain more support for this dangerously stupid war he started in 2003. yesterday, after speaking in phillie, he surprised everyone by taking questions. many things struck me while watching this.

1. i'm cynical when it comes to bush answering reporters seemingly "off the cuff" questions. i'm sure they, like most other reporter's questions during his presidency, have been staged. even though the questions in phillie were about the number of dead iraqi civilians, i'm certain the question and the response were both agreed to beforehand.

2. it seemed fresh and new to have a president wind up a formal speech agreeing to take questions from the press. then i realized that former presidents did this all the time. it used to be procedure before the bush administration. used to be. now it seems like a relaxed moment with bush bonding with "the american people" - getting real, and answering tough questions. if only.

3. g.w.'s attempts this week to gain support for his war also brought up the media thought control that has increased and become par for the course during his presidency. we all know how our "news" journalists ( and the spineless democratic party) gave bush and co. all the support they needed to invade iraq in 2003. critiquing the administration back then was equivalent to saying "i'm glad the awful terrorists drove our planes into the twin towers." it took hurricane katrina, the obliteration of the gulf coast, and the bush administration's awful neglect of this disaster to open the doors for critique of his administration and their violent policies. finally.

yet we still have a media controlled by the right wing, and a president who is protected by it. and, imho, the critiques that have been issued (by media and members of the democratic party) are weak, and don't go nearly far enough in calling this man what he is: a war criminal.

this brings me, finally, to my purpose with this blog entry. last night i saw an ad in Clamor magazine about a media collective that exists to "circumvent the corporate media" by organizing speakers and films to bring to college campuses and towns throughout the country. they sound really cool and so important in this time of censorship. they are called Evil Twin Booking. check out their site at:
www. eviltwinbooking.com

later,

JB

p.s. the answer to my question about whether we will ever tire of hating and criticizing george w. bush is a definite NO. in fact, i consider it a duty of citizenship.