Mass media

Not-so-magnificent 7: Nations Named & Shamed in CIA torture report
Fifty-four countries were named in the Senate report into US terror activities around the world. Here are seven governments whose leaders will be having sleepless nights trying to come up with excuses to explain their actions. [...]
Save
Foreigners “like seeing our children die”, can’t help with Mid-East, says Erdogan
Muslim countries are able to solve their problems on their own, the Turkish president believes. He says far from offering help, the West is actually exploiting "conflicts in the Middle East" and only cares about the region's riches. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has urged Islamic countries to unite in order to solve “the biggest humanitarian and political crisis in their history,” according to AFP, [...]
Save
“Turn off the lights during sex”: German govt on web crusade to save climate
Out with boring public information leaflets and in with flashy TV ads. The German Ministry of Environment has come up with a series of commercials on the problems of climate change, featuring sex and zombies in the message. The scene: A young girl arrives home late one night and is confronted with the awkward situation of finding her parents engaged in the act inside a brightly lit room. After [...]
Save
“We didn’t block EU creation, but they’re blocking us” – Russian lawmaker
CIS countries should unite in order to resist the vast media and sanction pressure from the West, which is aimed at hampering the integration in Eurasia, a Russian senator says. “Today the area of totalitarian manipulation of the media extends to the Eurasian integration. [...]
Save
Quarter century after fall, Berlin Wall-like division flourishes again
Twenty-five years after that embodiment of the Cold War, the Berlin Wall, was torn down by ecstatic Germans, the world observes the anniversary as it rushes headlong towards a new confrontation. As the celebration unfolds in Berlin to rejoice in a unified country – and to some extent a unified world – some of the people who shaped the events two-and-a-half decades ago approach the date in a [...]
Save
‘Win ugly or lose pretty’: “Dr. Evil” lobbyist teaches US oil and gas execs to play dirty
A top US political consultant, dubbed "Dr. Evil", has been caught on tape at an industry conference, advising oil and gas execs to regard public policy as "endless war" and to play on people's fear and greed to lobby their interests. Richard Berman's speech, which he gave in June in Colorado Springs, was leaked to The New York Times by one of the participant's at the conference who said: "It ju [...]
Save
FT cannot muster political will to publish Russian Ambassador’s letter on Ukraine
Since 3 October the Russian Embassy in the UK has been waiting for a positive response from the Financial Times on publishing a letter from Ambassador Yakovenko's as part of the debate on Ukraine. We have only heard that it is under consideration. So, we have decided to publish the text of this letter on our website for the British public to see for themselves that there is nothing subversive, [...]
Save
Cops caught using millions in seized assets on surveillance gear, weapons and clowns
An investigation concerning the use of federal civil forfeiture law by local law enforcement agencies across the United States has exposed problems with a routine but rarely discussed police tactic. After obtaining 43,000 reports from agencies across the United States, journalists at the Washington Post wrote over the weekend that the budgets of police departments and drug task forces are being [...]
Save
A journalist’s duty is to inform. Have western press forgotten this in Ukraine?
Whenever the public right to know comes under attack, a heavy responsibility falls on the journalist. When I was 17, my teacher told the class this salient information. Did the Western mainstream media learn it too or have they simply forgotten it? “News is what someone wants to stop (you) from printing; all the rest is ads.”- William Randolph Hearst. [...]
Save
Germany’s largest public broadcaster admits “too little Russian interests” in Ukraine coverage
The chief director of ARD, Germany's largest public TV broadcaster, responded to viewers' criticism and the supervisory committee over its coverage of the Ukraine crisis. He said it conveyed Russian interests "too little" and could question NATO more. [...]
Save
“Free speech clampdown”: New Australian law sees journalists facing 10yrs in prison
Australia's lower house of parliament has passed the first in a series of counter-terrorism amendments toughening the country's national security law. The new legislation could see journalists jailed for reporting on related matters. National Security Amendments Bill (No. 1), passed by Australia’s House of Representatives on Wednesday, says a person who discloses information relating to a spe [...]
Save
Assange sneaks into US conference… as full-body 3D hologram! (VIDEO)
ulian Assange has transcended the confinement of his Ecuadorian embassy asylum to attend the 2014 Nantucket Project – as a hologram. In his ghostly entirety Assange was speaking about censorship, control and manipulation of history. Speaking with filmmaker Eugene Jarecki, Assange closed the 2014 event, sharing his thoughts on importance of research and free access to information, and risks of [...]
Save
“Death threats on Facebook, Twitter for my reports” – RT journalist
RT correspondent Paula Slier faced strong anti-Russian bias during an OSCE panel on the freedom of journalism. She was invited to speak about her experience as a reporter while covering the situation in the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine. Slier was attending a panel entitled ‘Professional Journalist: How to escape a deadly danger’ inWarsaw, Polandon Thursday, where she wanted to share her [...]
Save
Thousands demand vote recount in Scottish – indyref
More than 90,000 people have signed an online petition calling for last weeks’ Scottish Independence vote to be recounted, backing accusations that the referendum was marred by vote-rigging. “We the undersigned demand a re-vote of the Scottish referendum, counted by impartial international parties,” the petition reads. [...]
Save
ISIS tells Obama ‘fighting has just begun,’ claims recruiting boost
Islamic State responded in a video to US President Barack Obama's vow to "ultimately destroy" it, promising to kill any American ground forces deployed. The extremist group has gained recruits since Obama's declaration, according to observers in Syria. The 52-second clip, released late Tuesday as a preview for a longer video, uses quick edits and high-resolution images to depict besieged Americ [...]
Save
Governments spy on journalists with weaponized malware – WikiLeaks
Journalists and dissidents are under the microscope of intelligence agencies, Wikileaks revealed in its fourth SpyFiles series. A German software company that produces computer intrusion systems has supplied many secret agencies worldwide. The weaponized surveillance malware, popular among intelligence agencies for spying on “journalists, activists and political dissidents,” is produced by [...]
Save
Power play: UK leaders pledge further devolution if Scots vote “No”™
Westminster party leaders have signed a joint pledge promising “extensive new powers” for the Scottish parliament if voters reject independence in Thursday’s referendum. Prime Minister David Cameron, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Labour party leader Ed Miliband offered their pledge in a letter published on the front page of Scotland’s Daily Record newspaper on Tuesday. [...]
Save
“Stick your license fee up your a***!” Pro-indy Scots denounce “liar” BBC journo in protest
Pro-independence Scots rallied outside the BBC's Glasgow headquarters on Sunday to protest the public broadcaster's pro-union "bias" and demand the resignation of political editor Nick Robinson. Waving Scottish flags and “Yes Scotland” banners, protesters chanted, “You can stick your license fee up your a***!” while banners read “Auntie Beeb, anti-democracy, anti-truth”. [...]
Save
Exodus 10 (Scottish version)
London - Friday 19 September 2014, the morning after Scotland votes for independence from the UK. And David Cameron said to Alastair Darling, “Stretch out your hand over Scotland so that locusts swarm over the land and devour everything growing in the fields, everything left by the hail.” So Darling stretched out his staff over Scotland, and Cameron made an east wind blow across the land al [...]
Save