The Propaganda of Charles Krauthammer

Posted by hypnos1 on July 4, 2010

krauthammer_owned
With his usual precision and sharpness, Glenn Greenwald has dissected the latest disinformation coming out of the Washington Post’s editorial pages. This time its Charles Krauthammer, back with more of his indignant flavored right-wing talking points. Krauthammer has again misled his readers by hiding the root causes of terrorism and instead makes an effort to whip up anti-Muslim sentiment. From Salon.com:

It’s anything but news that Charles Kruathammer is a rank propagandist, but his column today is particularly egregious, though quite illustrative of how these issues are discussed. He lambastes the Obama administration for what he calls its “absurd and embarrassing refusal . . . to acknowledge who out there is trying to kill Americans and why.” Krauthammer — needless to say and for reasons too obvious to require explanation — wants to claim that the True Cause of Terrorism is “radical Islam” by itself, and thus accuses the administration of dishonesty because it “has banned from its official vocabulary the terms jihadist, Islamist and Islamic terrorism.” His primary evidence is this recent statement of Faisal Shazhad, when he pleaded guilty to attempting the Times Square bombing: “I consider myself a mujahid, a Muslim soldier.” See, Krauthammer argues, even Shazhad admits it was Islam that caused his Terrorism, so why can’t Obama admit it, too?

Except to make this accusation against Obama and Islam, Krauthammer hides from his readers what Shazhad actually said, because it completely negates his claim…

[continues at Salon.com]

Posted in: Media, Propaganda, War On Terror

Sanger

Im sorry if I come across as hateful, but I wait impatiently for this disgusting 'human being' to die a horrible death. Watching him pontificate his Neocon worldview is equally as painful as watching him breathe.
chonus

I must agree…
Hadrian999

honestly i can't see how people like that aren't “shouting fire in a crowded theater”
people like him should be considered accomplices in every attack on muslim americans,
every war crime committed over zealous soldiers, every bit of discrimination against middle easterners.
people lik that know full well what they are doing and they do it for money.
5by5

My simple question is this: Why would ANYONE listen to these Neocons, who've literally gotten EVERYTHING wrong?

I mean, if ANY of their policy ideas had been good for America, I might see why someone would still consult them, but these douchebags are so consistently wrong, such total losers, that they make the Washington Generals look like a winning team.
Tuna Ghost

Chomsky made a good point about this. You take a large group of people, people who have legitimate grievances (the economy, unemployment), and they want answers. The right-wing gives them answers. Terrible answers, but they do have an internal logic. Granted that logic disintegrates as soon as you look at the outside world, but what are they hearing from the left? Chomsky notes a passing similarity between present day America and late Weimar germany, but then again he would, wouldn't he.
Cerebralcaustic

Gee, I wonder why anyone might be wary of Muslims?

“The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies—civilians and military—is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque from their grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of Islam, defeated and unable to threaten any Muslim. “

Osama bin Laden, “Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders”
Sanger

Gee, after meddling in their affairs, manipulating their coups, supporting draconian monarchs, invading their countries, using Egypt as a rendition torture nation, controlling all opium production in Afghanistan and thereby supplying the world with Heroin, torturing and degrading their brothers and sisters in Abu Ghraib/Baghram, supplying Despots with Chemical weapons, establishing permanent bases in their holiest of places, turning children and innocents into tiny meat chunks on a daily basis, blockading the most basic of supplies to get to their people, lying to the world in all their diplomacy (the native americans know how this works). Its no wonder they have a negative attitude toward American citizens. I would too if an invading force were doing these things to the U.S.

Mind you, this is all about Energy, stable Markets (which are clearly rigged) and Globalism. What do we have to offer them? Shitty Hollywood movies, GMO McDonalds garbage, debased culture. Basically a homogeneous highway town. If they didnt have resources that the world needed, we wouldnt give a flying fuck how they handled themselves

Not to mention, that the CIA asset, Bin Laden, is long dead. Therefore, the whole GWOT is a fraud.

I wish the politicians would be honest and say what it truly is all about (they actually have in the think tanks but that takes reading). I might actually support it. Instead its bullshit propaganda about freedom and democracy.
Cerebralcaustic

>Not to mention, that the CIA asset, Bin Laden, is long dead. Therefore, the whole GWOT is a fraud.

Claims that Osama bin Laden was a CIA asset are disputed and far from conclusive:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_CIA...

Ditto claims of his death.

The remainder of your post has some valid points, I'll agree. But it seems to me that you're overlooking a few things that the Western culture has to offer Muslims. Such as not being stoned to death in public for adultery.
Cerebralcaustic

the top 200 Chomsky lies:

http://www.paulbogdanor.com/200chomskylies.pdf
Cerebralcaustic

>My simple question is this: Why would ANYONE listen to these Neocons, who've literally gotten EVERYTHING wrong?

Care to amend this sentence? Because as it stands, you're pro-genocide and anti-welfare.

The neoconservative movement began as a strongly anti-Stalinist movement, and Stalin committed genocide against the Ukrainians:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

The neocons are also distinguished from other right-wing movements by not necessarily being opposed to welfare programs.

You might want to be careful about sweeping generalizations. Even someone like Karl Marx, who was wrong about almost everything, was correct about a few points.
Cerebralcaustic

>Im [sic] sorry if I come across as hateful, [no you're not sorry] but I wait impatiently for this disgusting 'human being' to die a horrible death. Watching him pontificate his Neocon worldview is equally as painful as watching him breathe.

“Krauthammer is generally considered a conservative;[26] he has also been called a neoconservative.[27] However, on domestic issues, Krauthammer is a supporter of legalized abortion;[28][29][30] an opponent of the death penalty;[31][32][33][34] an intelligent design critic and an advocate for the scientific consensus on evolution, calling the religion-science controversy a “false conflict;”[35][36] a supporter of embryonic stem cell research using embryos discarded by fertility clinics with restrictions in its applications;[37][38][39] and a longtime advocate of radically higher energy taxes to induce conservation.[40][41][42][43] Meg Greenfield, editorial page editor for The Washington Post who edited Krauthammer's columns for 15 years, called his weekly column “independent and hard to peg politically. It's a very tough column. There's no 'trendy' in it. You never know what is going to happen next.”[3]“

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Krauthamme...
Sanger

Sure, like so many, we need to have empirical proof that he is dead. I realize it is allegation. But when the CIA admits to faking videos (http://blog.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/2010/05...), it tells me he is not available, unless its close to an election and we need to release the boogeyman again.

There were also stories of him being surrounded in Tora Bora but the word from the higher ups was to open an escape route for his return to Pakistan via Sy Hersh. Also Foreign Policy (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/12/1...).

So yeah, he isnt officially dead. But he certainly is useful. But then again, he doesn't matter according to GW Bush.

I would agree that Western Culture has plenty to offer the Arabs and Persians. All that Im telling you is that if they didnt have energy, We wouldnt care one bit (diplomatically) if it were a million 8 year old girls being buried to their chests and stoned to death for showing their ankles. That was the problem in Rwanda. If they had gold, diamonds, uranium, oil, drugs, et. al. we would have been screaming at the top of our lungs about the atrocities and they would have used the word 'Genocide' in the UN security council. Unfortunately, they had nothing to offer but poor black people. Therefore, they were allowed to get hacked to pieces.

Likewise for Sudan. But thats all about Oil and China. China is allowing that Genocide to go on (with their despot in power) and were allowing it because China is there.

Get off your humanity high horse. Dont listen to the bullshit propaganda about human rights (China trade, Mariannas Tom Delay/Abramoff). All they care about is Power. If that dollar (soon to be SDR) is worth it. But, I will tell you, they will bring whatever emotional heart wrenching human tragedy out to sell it. To paint the enemy as heartless. They will even lie (Iraq soldiers unplugging baby incubaters in Kuwait).

Its funny, here in the U.S., We used to hang human beings from trees. We used to enslave people (we actually stll do through usuary and corporate prisons) To this day, homosexuals are mistreated and abused and given no rights. Granted its not State Sponsored but in a way it is culturally. Have you ever been to Flint, or Detroit? There you will see the by-product of Capitalism. Essentially, it is a long and painful death. To me, that is equally as vile as stoning people. This system cares nothing for human beings. They think were Serfs.
Tuna Ghost

Yeah, jackass, I've seen that and I got through about the first 20 or so, which were all purposeful misinterpretations or outright idiocy, and gave up on the rest. At any rate, since that has nothing to do with the points I was making, feel free to fuck off any time now.
Tuna Ghost

I like how you pick one extreme Jihadist as your representation of Islam…that's not ignorant at ALL, or imflammatory, or completely retarded.

Oh, wait.
hypnos

So you're using wikipedia to try to create some kind of link between todays Republican Neoconservatives and a political movement against genocide in Stalinist USSR?

You must be laughing your ass off behind your computer screen. That, or you're completely insane.
Anonymous

Its almost as if he didn’t read the article, in which Greenwald outs Krauthammer for almost identical propaganda.
hypnos

Its almost as if he didn't read the article, in which Greenwald outs Krauthammer for almost identical propaganda.
GrimJerr

Come on I know it’s been 60+years but haven’t we learned, You can’t trust a Kraut !

Yeah I went there, Nazi !

The Propaganda of Charles Krauthammer

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