Back in early 2002, some may remember the Pentagon announcing plans for a "Office of Strategic Influence" who's task it was to "plant propaganda and misleading stories in the international media."

You will also remember then just several weeks after the inital announcement, the Pentagon announced it was closing the 'Office of Strategic Influence', due in part to public backlash

well wouldn't you know it...
The Complete thing is a lie -> The "Office of Strategic Influence" has been shut down in name only - and is infact doing its job - to disinform the people into thinking it was shut down...
A Propoganda warfare campaign waged against the American people themselves...

Wow... imagine that..
The Pentagon feeding disinformation to the American people.

Key words here are "Foriegn Media". The ones that have been cheerleading for the Taliban and Saddam Hussien.
Personally I would prefer to send a cruise missles into their office buildings. But sometimes these hostile newsmedia are based in nuetral or otherwise friendly nations. So we gotta use less than lethal methods to mess them up.

Sixgun, it is unbelievable the amount of trust you place in your government, particularlu when it has just been shown beyond doubt that they kept the thing operating but told the American people it had been shut down. They've lied to you already.

They got burned on the Jessica Lych story. That sort of thing does not get past the BS meter and the truth will come out as it did.

Alot of the foriegn media are another matter entirely. There has been alot of cheerleading for Al Qaida, the Taliban, and Osama bin Ladin. Al Jazeera is pretty notorious and much of the Leftist European newsmedia is not much better. Objectively they are enemy propagandists in a war against my country and my people. As strong as my desire is to just kill the bastards, such actions would be counterproductive as they are usually based in nuetral or otherwise friendly nations. So more subtle methods of warfare must be used on these enemies.

Patriotism is not the same thing as blind faith.

Actually Patriotism doesn't even have anything to do with the government or your mistrust of it. But back on topic...Propaganda has been a component of warfare since there was such a thing as warfare. To believe that the current conflicts would be any different is naive. As long as their efforts are directed at foreign media outlets I really can't see the harm.

Curious,.. you believe the "efforts" are directed at foreign media outlets, while at the same time acknowledging you've been lied to from the start.

Hence the point, their not just focusing on "foreign" media outlets, as you've already been 'disinformed' concerning the existance of the 'OSI'.

I would think it does actually...

Is is not the Government which expresses the "interests" of your nation?

Actually, I never specified where their efforts were aimed. I only commented that as long as they were directed outside our borders I didn't see a problem with it.

I didn't quite acknowledge that I had been lied to from the start. I only commented that propaganda has always been a component of warfare.
I really have a hard time believing in the current climate that the media in this country are so easily swayed as to constitute a disinformation machine for some spooky agency.

While we are on the subject of disinformed....

How are you to know that the agency ever existed? Its rumored existence could have in fact been disinformation from some other dark and evil agency.

That's always been the bad thing about conspiracy theories and alternate realities. They have a tendency to be self replicating.

So you do believe that to be partriotic you have to like the government????

I think we are agreeing here, perhaps I just wasn't clear enough originally.

The whole point of my thread was that,
Disinformation and Propoganda is coming out of America - this is fact.

Who produces it, as to which agency... dosen't really concern me, and I'm not that fazed..

I suppose ultimately...
I'm sick of naive ' Patriotic' Americans, who believe every single word of their gov't in blind faith, and 'nationalistic' pride.

The Bush Administration has lied.
In particular Rumsfeld has.

Maybe its time to heed the words of Hermann Goering...

Agreed, there is disinformation coming out of America at the moment. The degree and exact nature of this propaganda is probably out of the scope of the current discussion and ultimately doesn't really matter if we aren't *fazed* by it.
You can also take the blind faith to the opposite extreme though. If you go so far as to refuse to believe anything you are really not any better than those that question nothing.

This is where your getting me wrong...
Who produces the propoganda and disinformation, while dosen't particularly dosn't 'faze' me..
the fact that a (apparent) "DEMOCRATIC" country is producing this, DOES.

Dosen't it worry you..
Now that we know that Rumsfeld is a liar..
what other Bullshit stories he's spinning, to further HIS OWN POLITICAL AGENDA?

thats bullshit.
Because I question Authority,... your claiming that I'm no better, than a devoted (possibly fanatical) Nationalist ?
How do you equate 2 opposite extreme's to be the same ?

I believe that Theodore Roosevelt put it best concerning Authority...

going back though to Rumsfeld and his lying...
he reminds me (in part) of Joseph Goebbels...

Joseph Goebbels - "If you tell a lie big enough...people will come to believe it"
Rumsfeld - "We shut down the OSI.."

While it might worry me it doesn't really cause me much concern. Expecting total honesty out of members of a political system, or most other humans, is asking a lot.

Someone lying or misrepresenting the facts to push their own political agenda is also rather par for the course from all involved, not just the ones you don't like.
I didn't state you yourself were no better, I only stated that someone that refuses to believe anything was no better.

Person A. Questions authority to the extreme that they refuse to believe anything coming from a person of authority simply because the speaker is a person of authority.

Person B. Is taken with authority to the extreme that they will belive anything coming from a person of authority simply because the speaking is a person of authority.

Both Person A and B will have world views just as divergent from anything resembling the facts of the matter. That is how I equate the two.

I have always liked that quote as well. Question authority all you like, I do. However, I do believe that it can be taken to extremes.


And the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.

Someone's been watching to many hollywood films...

I'm not really that big on films. You were throwing a lot of quotes and that was the only disinformation style quote that occured to me at the time. Where did it originate anyway?

Thanks for the info.