Imperfect Leaders
That's not to say that these targeted leaders were or are perfect. They are often far from it. But the essence of propaganda is to apply selective outrage and exaggeration to the leader that is marked for removal. Similar treatment does not apply to U.S.-favored leaders.
The pattern of the Times and Post is also to engage in ridicule when someone in a targeted country actually perceives what is going on. The correct perception is then dismissed as some sort of paranoid conspiracy theory.
Take, for example, the Times' MacFarquhar describing a pamphlet and speeches from Nikolai Merkushkin, the governor of Russian region of Samara, that MacFarquhar says "cast the blame for Russia's economic woes not on economic mismanagement or Western sanctions after the annexation of Crimea but on a plot by President Obama and the C.I.A. to undermine Russia."
The Times article continues: "Opposition candidates are a fifth column on the payroll of the State Department and part of the scheme, the pamphlet said, along with the collapse in oil prices and the emergence of the Islamic State. Mr. Putin is on the case, not least by rebuilding the military, the pamphlet said, noting that 'our country forces others to take it seriously and this is something that American politicians don't like very much.'"
Yet, despite the Times' mocking tone, the pamphlet's perceptions are largely accurate. There can be little doubt that the U.S. government through funding of anti-Putin groups inside Russia and organizing punishing sanctions against Russia, is trying to make the Russian economy scream, destabilize the Russian government and encourage a "regime change" in Moscow.
Further, President Obama has personally bristled at Russia's attempts to reassert itself as an important world player, demeaning the former Cold War superpower as only a "regional power." The U.S. government has even tread on that "regional" status by helping to orchestrate the 2014 putsch that overthrew Ukraine's elected President Yanukovych on Russia's border.
After quickly calling the coup regime "legitimate," the U.S. government supported attempts to crush resistance in the south and east which were Yanukovych's political strongholds. Crimea's overwhelming decision to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia was deemed by The New York Times a Russian "invasion" although the Russian troops that helped protect Crimea's referendum were already inside Crimea as part of the Sevastopol basing agreement.
The U.S.-backed Kiev regime's attempt to annihilate resistance from ethnic Russians in the east -- through what was called an "Anti-Terrorism Operation" that has slaughtered thousands of eastern Ukrainians -- also had American backing. Russian assistance to these rebels is described in the mainstream U.S. media as Russian "aggression."
Oddly, U.S. news outlets find nothing objectionable about the U.S. government launching military strikes in countries halfway around the world, including the recent massacre of scores of Syrian soldiers, but are outraged that Russia provided military help to ethnic Russians being faced with annihilation on Russia's border.
Because of the Ukraine crisis, Hillary Clinton likened Vladimir Putin to Adolf Hitler.
Seeing No Coup
For its part, The New York Times concluded that there had been no coup in Ukraine -- by ignoring the evidence that there was one, including an intercepted pre-coup telephone call between U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt discussing who should be made the new leaders of Ukraine.
Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland, who pushed for the Ukraine coup and helped pick the post-coup leaders.
(Image by Global Research) Details DMCA
The evidence of a coup was so clear that George Friedman, founder of the global intelligence firm Stratfor, said in an interview that the overthrow of Yanukovych "really was the most blatant coup in history." But the Times put protecting the legitimacy of the post-coup regime ahead of its journalistic responsibilities to its readers, as it has done repeatedly regarding Ukraine.
Another stunning case of double standards has been the mainstream U.S. media's apoplexy about alleged Russian hacking into emails of prominent Americans and then making them public. These blame-Russia articles have failed to present any solid evidence that the Russians were responsible and also fail to note that the United States leads the world in using electronic means to vacuum up personal secrets about foreign leaders as well as average citizens.
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