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Another anti-war protest, another fake news story ...

Posted by Joshua Holland at 6:40 AM on March 19, 2007.


Joshua Holland: Give 'em points for consistency.
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I've been to dozens of anti-war demos, and as far as counter-protesters go, I've never seen more than a hundred or so of these guys together at any one event ...

cletus

So it was with quite a bit of skepticism that I greeted yesterday's Washington Post and New York Times reports of huge counter-demonstrations greeting anti-war activists in DC over the weekend.

I spent some time laying out a post about the coverage of the protests, and then I wandered over to Sadly, No! and saw that the always-insightful Gavin M. had beaten me to the punch with an excellent piece on the subject, to which I now direct your attention. [NOTE: Sadly, No! is undergoing a DOS attack. If the link doesn't work, try it again in a few hours.]

Gavin ...

Anatomy Of A Con Job

As we know, opinion against the war in Iraq, and against President Bush, now stands at between 60 and 70 percent in America. If you're a right-wing authoritarian follower, how do you continue to prop up the necessary belief that you represent a silent majority of downtrodden patriots, and that someday a real rain will come and wash the scum off the streets?

Luckily, there are people out there to do that thinking for you.

Read the rest ...

Digg!

Tagged as: counterprotests, iraq, protests

Joshua Holland is a staff writer at Alternet and a regular contributor to The Gadflyer.


Return to PEEK  » Post Tools: email EMAIL print PRINT 31 COMMENTS PERMALINK
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Comments Turn comments off sitewide Give us feedback »
Comments closed.
The comments for this story have been closed. Thank you to everyone who participated. 		View:
Josh-- Good job
[Report this comment]
Posted by: citizenjoe on Mar 19, 2007 7:53 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
We must make crystal clear the dedication of mass-media corporations, even those often considered above suspicion, to outright lying in service of state authority.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

dude, what is the real story?....
[Report this comment]
Posted by: andrewstromotich on Mar 19, 2007 8:05 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
up here in dee northern extremes (vancouver) we got nuthin.
the CBC, our national reporter, said there were hundreds of protesters, and split that up between an evenly matched pro and con crowd...
when i marched in dc on sept 24 o5, cbc also reported i as minimal, but i was there and know the truth, but i got nuthin on this one...

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: dude, what is the real story?.... Posted by: Joshua Holland
Even NPR
[Report this comment]
Posted by: antoniomo on Mar 19, 2007 8:10 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Even NPR this weekend led off with soundbites from two pro-war demonstrators, none from the antiwar crowd. Later in the hour they did interview some antiwar protestors, but even then I came away with no knowledge of the relative number of the two opposing groups. It was as if they were equal in number. Four years into this mess and NPR is still afraid to report the news.

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The March
[Report this comment]
Posted by: progressiveview on Mar 19, 2007 8:57 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
First, the links to the other article do not work.

I was at the March, as well as the January 27th March and Rally. While it is true that there were more counter demonstrators than usual, there were also a lot of people planning on attending that did not make it due to the N'oreaster snowstorm that went up the east coast Friday. At least 60 buses were cancelled.

The MSM always underreports these events, as we have known for year. The Washington Post said that the organizers estimated the crowd at 15,000 to 30,000. It was kind of hard to estimate from the ground.

We need to keep bodies on the street and take direct action to end the war. Cynthia McKinney's talk was right on the money and it you did not hear it, you can catch at at www.democracynow.org. Tim Berg and all the other speakers were excellent.

The most important point is that the Democrats have joined in supporting the war effort. If they are not cutting off the funding they are supporting the war. They cannot say they are against the war and continue to fund it, as they are complicit in not taking the action the American people elected them to do.

Now inform your members of congress, there will be NO VOTES for anyone who continues to fund the war machine.

Peace,

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: The March Posted by: Joshua Holland
frank67
[Report this comment]
Posted by: frank67 on Mar 19, 2007 8:57 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I've had only one bumpersticker on any car I've ever owned. My current bumpersticker reads: "I DON'T TRUST THE CORPORATE MEDIA." For me, that includes both PBS and especially NPR. You want truth? I suggest "altenate" press and/or internet. Peace.

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Cannot find this article. Could it have gone missing?
[Report this comment]
Posted by: mcduff on Mar 19, 2007 9:02 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I cannot find the article Anatomy of a Con Job. I would like to read it.

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Sadly, No! under attack
[Report this comment]
Posted by: Joshua Holland on Mar 19, 2007 9:18 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The linked article is to a blog that's currently under a DOS attack (they piss off right-wingers and are frequent targets).

The URL's good -- try back later.

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I saw a story
[Report this comment]
Posted by: badkitty on Mar 19, 2007 9:54 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I saw a story on NBC Nightly News where the reporter said the police were no longer counting the number of demonstrators...

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» No surprise... Posted by: JoshuaLudd
NPR as tentative about Iraq?
[Report this comment]
Posted by: rileycase on Mar 19, 2007 10:48 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I lisented for a while to NPR this morning and was dismayed (as I often am) by their liberal bias. Now we have people on this blog that imply that NPR and the New York Times are somehow under-reporting the anit-war demonstrations! I don't recall a time when either NPR or the New York Times has been other than on the left when it comes to presenting news (which is often little more than liberal opinion pieces). Whether "demonstrating" for or against the war, or for or against anything, why is it so important to get a liberal or conservative spin. I fear for a nation where policies are determined, or even influenced, by the number of people a cause can bring to the streets. We would be better off as a nation if the media would basically ignore the significance of these. Demogogues can whip crowds into a frenzy but I would rather not be ruled by demogogues.

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» In other words ... Posted by: Joshua Holland
» RE: In other words ... Posted by: HeroesAll
» RE: In other words ... Posted by: peacefullaim
Gathering of Eagles says...
[Report this comment]
Posted by: jcutler9 on Mar 19, 2007 3:43 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Sorry, I have not been able to read this article yet, but I did check out Gathering of Eagles site (the anti-peace activists). They too are complaining about MSM coverage--they say the media overplay the anti-war protesters' numbers, and underplay the anti-peace protesters' numbers. They are gloating that although the anti-war faction was boastfully expecting 100,000, only 5-10,000 showed up, whereas anti-peace demonstrators numbered 30,000!!

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CSPAN covered a pro war rally in D.C. once...
[Report this comment]
Posted by: lessbread on Mar 19, 2007 7:34 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
There were maybe 500 people in attendance. It was funny and sad all at the same time. Anyway, whenever I hear talk about protesters throwing bags of piss I know some one's throwing a bag of bullshit at me. This AP photo sums up the reality of Saturday's march on the Pentagon. It shows thousands of anti-war protesters marching across the Memorial Bridge with maybe 100 pro-war counter demonstrators with their banner reading "Go to hell traitors. You dishonor our dead on hallowed ground." It appears that those yahoos think US flags, peace flags and "no war" banners are some how unacceptable to the dead. I'm reminded of Joe Dante's Homecoming. If they could speak, I bet those dead soldiers would have something to say about the Bush administration's shredding of the Constitution and evisceration of the preparedness of the Army and National Guard.

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» photo label Posted by: andrewstromotich
» Interesting observation Posted by: lessbread
Under reporting anti-war marches is nothing new.
[Report this comment]
Posted by: johngary66 on Mar 19, 2007 9:53 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The Saturday following the Kent State massacre of students by the Ohio National Guard, I was part of a ten mile march, in pouring rain, from the U of M campus to the Minnesota State Capitol. When marchers reached a point where they could see the huge crowd already gathered at the Capitol, a rolling cheer went up. People not yet at that spot, wondered why. It was obvious there were a lot of people. Some estimates of the crowd were of over 100,000 people and of course the police estimate was 10,000 people. Fast forward to the same setting the day after the Minnesota twins first won the world series. All estimates were over 100,000 people. I saw both. The anti war crowd was much larger! I think we should march to large stadiums where they can't under estimate crowd size.

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MORE protests
[Report this comment]
Posted by: fedupw/bush on Mar 27, 2007 4:24 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
They are going to do everything possible to NOT let everyone else know that there are many ,many people out there protesting. WHAT we must do is get as many people as possible ,out in the streets as often as possible . Take our own pictures and get them on the internet. Have the reporting done by small papers that aren't owned by these bastards !

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