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https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-propaganda-ban-spreads-government-made-news-to-americans/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-prop

https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-propaganda-ban-spreads-government-made-news-to-americans/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-propaganda-... ...oops, the law preventing that was amended under obama, to allow it. Drat. (cf. the original Smith-Mundt act preventing it, and the Modernization Act of 2012 allowing it again. The original, of course, created because law makers were terrified of what would happen if this was turned inward.)

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
Did you know we also have NPR and PBS? A literal public-TV censorship board? Also, we’re talking about the CIA. Your conspiracy theory has them waiting for a law to be repealed before acting? Do you think a single DOGE bro hired a lawyer before acting? > because law makers were terrified of what would happen if this was turned inward What nonsense. Where did you read this? We had a massive and celebrated domestic propaganda board during the Great Depression and WWII.
- mjburgess 2y ago
  You can just read the wikipedia on it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act#Congressional_concerns https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act#Congre... And note the FBI's concerns there at the end too. This isnt about NPR. It's about The State Department and the intelligence services which were localised under the department at the time. Let's just be very simple about this though. We have in 2012 a repeal of a law which existed to ban the state department ("the war office" in old-speak) from propagandizing US citizens. And as the 2010s progress, gov. officials demanding social media companies censor americans. We have NGOs created with USAID and DARPA funding to enable mass censorship and profiling. And we have, during the pandemic, the deployment of all of this machinery at once. Now, this is the indisputable, publicly obvious, everyone-can-see it layer. Now imagine one layer deeper: how does this actually play out in terms of executive action? I am, fyi, not right wing; and not pro-trump.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > You can just read the wikipedia on it Smith-Mundt was a restriction on State. It did nothing to restrict the CIA, or USAID for that matter. It was also motivated by concerns that State harboured communist sympathies. Saying the Act was motivated by concerns around "what would happen if [American propaganda] was turned inward" is factually false, unsupported by contemporaneous accounts of the bill's backers. > I am, fyi, not right wing; and not pro-trump Didn't think you were (and neither am I). Deep State comes in two flavours. One is the lizard-man crap that appeals to people who can't handle uncertainty. The other is a hypothesis about power in America. The section of the latter that overlaps with the left is based on a sub-hypothesis: that money buying messaging equals power. The problem with this linkage is it's empirically false. Jeb Bush outspent Trump. Harris outspent Trump. Cambridge Analytica was 2016's AI scare (and Democrats' turn at election denial). Money buys power, but through direct messaging, the acquisition of proximity and--sometimes--bribes. > we have, during the pandemic, the deployment of all of this machinery at once And? Nothing happened. People who dissented had the space in which to dissent. They did so openly, peacefully and in spaces old and new. To put it bluntly, we don't give our adversaries abroad that room. To the extent DOGE might help America, it's in showing us what a real deep state looks like. I'm hoping it doesn't come to it. But someone's e.g. Social Security or government-contract payments failing after an offensive tweet, not due to civic action or private citizens' actions, but due to a Kafkaesque arm of the state--that is the power of the deep state.
    - mjburgess 2y ago
      It's not in my interest to discuss the actions of the intelligence system in the US/UK, so I wont. I'm inclined never to address the subject again, to be honest. Tulsi Gabbard's hearing may be a tiny bit illuminating. The DOGE wrecking ball might lead to a new Church-committe-style hearing, there's already hearings in the house on the "censorship-industrial complex" but they're too naive at the moment. DOGE still think the "DEI" funding of USAID has something to do with being leftwing (rather than, say, the funding counter-government movements). Meh. In many ways, it's all too late now. "How should the intelligence services conduct themselves?" has never been a question open to democratic debate, nor one any mass media outlet would dream of posing. Today, esp. it isnt one we citizens should raise -- leave it to whomever is able to roll the dice "at the top".

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

Did you know we also have NPR and PBS? A literal public-TV censorship board? Also, we’re talking about the CIA. Your conspiracy theory has them waiting for a law to be repealed before acting? Do you think a single DOGE bro hired a lawyer before acting? > because law makers were terrified of what would happen if this was turned inward What nonsense. Where did you read this? We had a massive and celebrated domestic propaganda board during the Great Depression and WWII.

mjburgess 2y ago
You can just read the wikipedia on it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act#Congressional_concerns https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act#Congre... And note the FBI's concerns there at the end too. This isnt about NPR. It's about The State Department and the intelligence services which were localised under the department at the time. Let's just be very simple about this though. We have in 2012 a repeal of a law which existed to ban the state department ("the war office" in old-speak) from propagandizing US citizens. And as the 2010s progress, gov. officials demanding social media companies censor americans. We have NGOs created with USAID and DARPA funding to enable mass censorship and profiling. And we have, during the pandemic, the deployment of all of this machinery at once. Now, this is the indisputable, publicly obvious, everyone-can-see it layer. Now imagine one layer deeper: how does this actually play out in terms of executive action? I am, fyi, not right wing; and not pro-trump.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > You can just read the wikipedia on it Smith-Mundt was a restriction on State. It did nothing to restrict the CIA, or USAID for that matter. It was also motivated by concerns that State harboured communist sympathies. Saying the Act was motivated by concerns around "what would happen if [American propaganda] was turned inward" is factually false, unsupported by contemporaneous accounts of the bill's backers. > I am, fyi, not right wing; and not pro-trump Didn't think you were (and neither am I). Deep State comes in two flavours. One is the lizard-man crap that appeals to people who can't handle uncertainty. The other is a hypothesis about power in America. The section of the latter that overlaps with the left is based on a sub-hypothesis: that money buying messaging equals power. The problem with this linkage is it's empirically false. Jeb Bush outspent Trump. Harris outspent Trump. Cambridge Analytica was 2016's AI scare (and Democrats' turn at election denial). Money buys power, but through direct messaging, the acquisition of proximity and--sometimes--bribes. > we have, during the pandemic, the deployment of all of this machinery at once And? Nothing happened. People who dissented had the space in which to dissent. They did so openly, peacefully and in spaces old and new. To put it bluntly, we don't give our adversaries abroad that room. To the extent DOGE might help America, it's in showing us what a real deep state looks like. I'm hoping it doesn't come to it. But someone's e.g. Social Security or government-contract payments failing after an offensive tweet, not due to civic action or private citizens' actions, but due to a Kafkaesque arm of the state--that is the power of the deep state.
  - mjburgess 2y ago
    It's not in my interest to discuss the actions of the intelligence system in the US/UK, so I wont. I'm inclined never to address the subject again, to be honest. Tulsi Gabbard's hearing may be a tiny bit illuminating. The DOGE wrecking ball might lead to a new Church-committe-style hearing, there's already hearings in the house on the "censorship-industrial complex" but they're too naive at the moment. DOGE still think the "DEI" funding of USAID has something to do with being leftwing (rather than, say, the funding counter-government movements). Meh. In many ways, it's all too late now. "How should the intelligence services conduct themselves?" has never been a question open to democratic debate, nor one any mass media outlet would dream of posing. Today, esp. it isnt one we citizens should raise -- leave it to whomever is able to roll the dice "at the top".