The US Ministry of Story Telling??

 

Following the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, Hitler established a Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda headed by Joseph Goebbels. The Ministry’s aim was to ensure that the Nazi message was successfully communicated through art, music, theater, films, books, radio, educational materials, and the press.

While nobody that I am aware of is making the case that the United States Government has a “Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda”, many people from both the political left and from the political right acknowledge that on average Hollywood leans decisively to the left. Progressives in music and entertainment routinely support a collectivist point of view. In fact, unless you are already a huge star, holding conservative points of view will get you fired. Furthermore, late last year Chucky Schumer and Lindsey Graham proposed their “Free Flow of Information Act” which recently passed the Senate Judiciary Committee. Looking at the title of the bill it looks great. Who couldn’t be for the “Free Flow of information” after all?

Of course, as with most things emanating from Washington D.C. one must be very careful about what is in the fine print. What elitist progressive political types like Chucky Shumer and Lindsey Graham, who co-authored the bill don’t want Americans to realize is that they are not really all that interested in the free flow in information. What they are keenly interested in is the ability to say who might be anointed to watch over them and report on their activity. It is, after all, really inconvenient to have real investigative reporting about the epic failures they call policy; or have their self-involved, corruption brought to light by heroes like Michelle Maulkin, or Dana Loesh.

 

 

 

 

Senators Schumer and Graham’s bill, if approved will exempt anyone who is considered a “covered journalist” from subpoenas and other legal efforts to require that they expose their confidential sources. For anyone supporting freedom of press, protecting whistle blowers is a good thing, but sadly it is far outweighed by the idea that government is the entity that decides who is an “approved” journalist. How convenient is that? If government officials don’t want to have their corruption exposed by an aggressive investigative reporter all they have to do is designate or license who can be a journalist in the first place.

After the February 1933 Reichstag Fire, Hitler eviscerated freedom of the press, requiring all news to be approved by Joseph Goebbels’ Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Surprisingly, today’s mainstream press seem to have no issue with this bill, but my question for them or for any American for that matter who claims to support freedom is this. How is government having approval authority over who can be a journalist any different than actually having approval authority over a news story that journalist might write. Goebbels required that anyone involved in media sign loyalty oaths to the Nazi Party. If you didn’t care for these restrictions you could be imprisoned or executed.

While in today’s world the progressive movement is smart enough not to actually require loyalty oaths, do you notice how quickly the progressive thought police turn on anyone who dares to state an independent opinion. Juan Williams was a senior news analyst for NPR until he stepped outside of progressive orthodoxy in October of 2010 for his comments on Muslims. Regardless of consistently supporting progressive positions, the man was unceremoniously fired for not adhering to progressives fascist talking points. Similarly, just this week there is a controversy involving Juan Williams’ son, Raffi Williams. In this case, Raffi Williams, who is a conservative, was vilified because he dared to have a conservative point of view as a black man.   Similarly, Dr. Ben Carson was also excommunicated by progressives in February of 2013 for daring to politely and respectfully disagreeing with President Obama’s policies.

My point here is that it isn’t necessary to have a mustache twirling Snidely Whiplash type of character like Joseph Goebbels approving stories. All progressive elitists require is to set up a process that achieves the same result. Republican Senator, John Cornyn told Breitbart News “They want to pick and choose which journalists are covered. In other words, if you’re a blogger they might not cover you, but if you work for the New York Times they might. Given the changes in the way we get information and the way we consume news, that really smacks to me in essence of government licensing who’s an official ‘journalist’ for the purposes of a shield law and who’s not. If there is one thing I can glean from the First Amendment, it is that government should not be in the business of licensing the news media.”

Bloggers are a existential threat to progressive control over the narrative that the general public is presented. Progressives are far from stupid. The new media is quickly supplanting the old centralized model of network television news. If progressives wish to retain control over the conversation they must eliminate dissenters.

Additional Resources:

The Phoenix Republic, The Lone Star Gambit

http://personalliberty.com/2014/03/28/bill-authorizing-government-to-define-legitimate-journalism-a-political-albatross-for-rinos-democrats/

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/03/26/Exclusive-Cornyn-Rips-Schumer-s-Media-Shield-Law

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005202

 

 

The Birth of a Police State

Photo Credit: George Roelofson

When nations are faced with the ramifications of catastrophic economic collapse, things can become dicey for citizens.  Let’s face it, life today is pretty hectic.  Typically, both parents in a family have to work full time to make ends meet, and that is assuming there are two parents and not only one.  In our routine day to day lives, we have kids and their school activities, social obligations, and of course family who require out attention.  It is easy to get lost in the day to day and not have the time or energy to take a step back to see the macro view of our lives.  It is easy to just accept the cliff-notes view that is handed to us by the mass-media.

Consider, if you will, a nation that has out-of-control spending and ever-increasing regulation.  This nation had suffered a financial collapse with ever-increasing unemployment, and as a result, it repeatedly attempted to use “shovel ready” public projects to get its citizens working again.  A recovery could not be achieved, so this nation’s leaders felt they had no choice but to begin printing more and more currency to artificially prop up the financial system.  As always occurs, this led to unprecedented levels of inflation.

This scenario above depicts a nation experiencing a catastrophic economic collapse.  Human beings being human beings responded by demanding security.  Leaders being leaders responded by seizing power and taking steps to control the situation.  Unfortunately the situation was uncontrollable.  As things became dire, this nation’s citizens were willing to grasp at any straw as long as someone would make their lives work again.  They were willing to accept almost any degradation.

The nation, vulnerable and financially bankrupt, was a fertile field for an opportunist to take advantage of.  This opportunist represented a party that was willing to make one segment of the population a scapegoat for the economic hardships that citizens were experiencing.  In effect, this leader blamed the rich.  As you might guess the strategy was fantastically successful.  The only problem was that the nation’s constitution guaranteed rights that were a problem for these parties’ plans.  The solution was to ignore those constitutional guarantees.

By now you have likely guessed what nation I am referring to.  What is frightening is that when we see today’s news, how much of what happened then is taking place now.  I noticed on this week, on the first Friday of the New Year, a judge ruled that the majority of Americans were now subject to search and seizure of their electronic devices like laptops and iPhones.  That’s right.  If you live and work within 100 miles of the coast or a international border, this ruling says law enforcement can go through your belongings on a whim – no search warrant needed.  In similar fashion, earlier last week, Americas witnessed citizens lining up in Connecticut to register their weapons and ammunition.  This is another key step that earlier regime took.  I have noted other examples in earlier posts, but you get the point.  My thought is that it is our duty as American citizens to keep our eyes open and take note of the news items we see, not as an individual incident, but as a puzzle piece in a larger picture.  It is incumbent on each of us to resist the loss of freedom lest we find ourselves going down the same path that German citizens did in the 1930’s.  There is a threat out there from terrorism, but my question to you is this.  Are the government over-reaches and their ignoring our constitution really making us any safer?  I can only speak for myself, but I am much, much more afraid of unaccountable government thugs than I am of terrorists.  If nothing else, there are many more government thugs, who while ‘just following orders,’ who can ruin a person’s life than there are terrorists in America.

The reason I wrote Phoenix Republic was and is to get Americans to wake up to the big picture.  We all have things we believe in and we should all do what we can to win hearts and minds with regard to achieving the best for our country.  My point is that there is a bigger picture than left vs. right politics.  We do not all have to agree on individual policies but it is imperative that we all agree on defending freedom.

Additional Resources:

First hand accounts:

The first of these, a woman named Irma from Massachusetts talks about the comparison between today’s America and what she experienced in Germany.  This is very compelling and I highly recommend listening to it.  The second link is another woman who lived under the Nazis.  Her presentation is 46 minutes long.  It is instructive and compares Germany to the US today – with excerpts of current events juxtaposed with the historic events she is speaking to.

 

Related news stories:

http://www.truthandaction.org/judge-reaffirms-constitution-free-zones-100-miles-inside-u-s-borders/

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/12/31/looks-like-weimar-germany-the-viral-photo-out-of-connecticut-thats-giving-some-gun-owners-chills/

http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/classes/33d/projects/1920s/Econ20s.htm