Eric Zuesse

During the days of the Soviet Union, and in all dictatorial countries, the ‘news’ media were and are actually propaganda-media, which filter out information that the aristocracy (the people holding the real power, which in the Soviet Union were the Communist Party bosses) don’t want the public to know. Is the United States like that now?

I first came to the conclusion that the U.S. is a dictatorship in 2002, when I found proof that George W. Bush was lying to claim that he possessed proof that Saddam Hussein was rebuilding his WMD (weapons of mass destruction) stockpiles, and when the U.S. and UK ’news’ media hid this crucial fact that their heads-of-state were lying. Bush and British Prime Minster Tony Blair were arguing in 2002 against sending IAEA inspectors back into Iraq in order to verify whether or not Saddam was rebuilding his WMD stockpiles; they alleged that they (Bush-Blair) already possessed proof that he was accumulating WMD.

Here is how I found out that they were lying about that: On Saturday 7 September 2002, the White House issued “Remarks by the President and Prime Minister Tony Blair in Photo Opportunity Camp David” (still googlable at here), with the following exchange between a journalist and Bush-Blair:

THE PRESIDENT: AP lady.

Q Mr. President, can you tell us what conclusive evidence of any nuclear -- new evidence you have of nuclear weapons capabilities of Saddam Hussein?

THE PRESIDENT: We just heard the Prime Minister talk about the new report. I would remind you that when the inspectors first went into Iraq and were denied -- finally denied access, a report came out of the Atomic -- the IAEA that they were six months away from developing a weapon. I don't know what more evidence we need.

PRIME MINISTER BLAIR: Absolutely right.

Then, as soon as the weekend was over, on Monday 9 September 2002, was issued by the IAEA the following: Related Coverage: Director General's statement on Iraq to the IAEA Board of Governors on 9 September 2002 [this being a republication of their notice three days earlier, on 6 Sep.].

Vienna, 06 September, 2002 - With reference to an article published today in the New York Times [which, as usual, stenographcally reported the Administration’s false allegations, which the IAEA was trying to correct in a way that would minimally offend the NYT and the U.S. President], the International Atomic Energy Agency would like to state that it has no new information on Iraq's nuclear programme since December 1998 when its inspectors left Iraq [and verified that no WMD remained there at that time]. Only through a resumption of inspections in accordance with Security Council Resolution 687 and other relevant resolutions can the Agency draw any conclusion with regard to Iraq's compliance with its obligations under the above resolutions relating to its nuclear activities.

Contact: Mark Gwozdecky, Tel: (+43 1) 2600-21270, e-mail: M.Gwozdecky@iaea.org.

It even linked to the following statement from the IAEA Director General amplifying it:

Since December 1998 when our inspectors left Iraq, we have no additional information that can be directly linked without inspection to Iraq’s nuclear activities. I should emphasize that it is only through resumption of inspections that the Agency can draw any conclusion or provide any assurance regarding Iraq’s compliance with its obligations under these resolutions.

So, this was proof of the falsehood of Bush’s and Blair’s reference to the IAEA, in which Bush-Blair were saying that, upon the authority of the IAEA itself, there was “the new report … a report came out of the Atomic -- the IAEA that they were six months away from developing a weapon. I don't know what more evidence we need.”

Bush invented “the new report”; it didn’t even exist, at all. And Blair, probably stunned that Bush possessed the gall to concoct things out of thin air that didn’t exist — and Blair also being Bush’s lapdog — confirmed Bush’s brazen lie, which Bush further brazenly alleged came originally from Blair. Bush’s entire brazenness likely shocked Blair. After all: Bush necessarily knew that his attributing his information “about the new report” from the IAEA, to Blair, as if Blair had read such an IAEA report (which was non-existent), was, itself, known by Blair to be false — he’s not so dumb. But Blair didn’t object to that, at all. He didn’t correct Bush; he didn’t even say (which would have been a tactful way to put it) “Well, perhaps I was misunderstood there by the President, but The New York Times does contain a rather alarming article about Iraq, which the President is referring to.”

Unfortunately, the American and British press simply ignored the IAEA’s contradiction of the U.S. President and of the British Prime Minister. (I deal in more detail on that in my 2004 IRAQ WAR: The Truth, pages 39-44.)

So: I knew, from this incident, that the U.S. and UK are dictatorships, and that the American and British publics were being lied into invading Iraq — into slaughtering and being slaughtered on the basis of dictators’ lies and aristocrats’ secret agendas. Though ultimately the inspectors did go back into Iraq, and they weren’t finding anything to indicate that Saddam had any new stockpiles, Bush-Blair alleged themselves to know better, and launched the 20 March 2003 invasion though the inspectors found no evidence to support the two leaders’ accusations.

Here are further documentations that the U.S. (and its lap-dog Britain) is a dictatorship, and that its (their) press is systematically controlled to block the public from knowing things that the aristocracy place their highest priority on keeping the public ignorant of:

“CNN Journalist ‘Governments Pay Us To Fake Stories’, Shocking Exposé”

"CNN News Stories Spoon Fed by the Gov’t"

"US Backs Honduras Death Squads”

"Leading German Journalist Admits CIA ‘Bribed’ Him and Other Leaders of the Western ‘Press’"

"The CIA and Other Government Agencies Have Long Used Propaganda Against the American People”

“How Reliable Is Reuters?”

"Western Media Blackout on the Reality in Ukraine"

"The Propaganda War About Ukraine”

“The Most-Censored News Story of 2014 Was ____(What?)_____.”

“Our ‘Enemies’ in Ukraine Speak"

“Even America’s ‘Media Watchdogs’ Hide U.S.’s Ukrainian Nazification & Ethnic Cleansing"

“NYT, Chrystia Freeland, on Ukraine: ‘This is not a civil war.’”

"Massive News-Suppression That’s Become History-Suppression"

And, finally, here is an article that I did for Huffington Post, and which they ‘published’ but buried so that virtually nobody saw it; and the reason why they ‘published’ it but hid it from the public is obvious, when you understand how this country’s dictatorship works:

"Hillary Clinton's Two Foreign-Policy Catastrophes"

Now that story became ‘old news,’ even though it never had really been reported to the public as being news — and, so, it still actually is news, though it’s about events that occurred in 2009-2012, and so it’s history that is also, tragically, still news (because it’s still hidden).

In conclusion, regarding the title-question here: any purported national-news medium in the United States makes a choice between honestly reporting the news and being and staying small and not getting the major financial backing from the American aristocracy that would enable them to grow large; or else to sell out to the aristocracy.

The present news-article, like all I do, is being submitted free-of-charge to virtually all U.S. & UK national news media, including to CNN, NYT, HuffPo and the others I’ve mentioned here, so that they will be able to indicate now a desire to open up to the public as is done in an authentic democracy, just by their giving the present article prominent position, and so documenting that though the U.S., at present, is not a democracy, they really do want it to become a democracy.

The American and UK ’news’ media were not held accountable for their having assisted their respective heads-of-state to deceive their public into supporting an invasion that would be based on lies, about Saddam Hussein and Iraq. Here, now, will be an opportunity for these media to turn the corner and choose to cease being ‘news’ (actually propaganda) media for a fascism, and for them to become instead news media for a democracy.

Because there really is a choice to make between fake ‘choices’ between Democratic and Republican politicians (or Labor and Tory politicians), versus real choices between democratic and fascist politicians; but there won’t be any democrat who can even possibly come to lead this country unless the aristocracy’s grip on the ‘news’ media becomes replaced by something else: control by the public. Because a government that’s answerable to the owners of the ‘news’ media, instead of to the public, might as well itself own all the ‘news’ media (especially in our post Citizens United world, where the Government is controlled by the aristocracy). It’s not an authentic democracy, at all. And neither control by the aristocracy who control the government, nor control by the government itself, will allow a democracy to exist. The third option — direct control of the news-media by the public, non-profit in a way that depends neither upon the aristocracy nor upon the government that the aristocrats control — is fundamental to the existence of any authentic democracy. How this can best be done is, of course, subject to debate. But that it must be done is a given for anyone who supports authentic democracy, because it’s essential to democracy, especially in a post-Citizens-United world.

And here is the bottom line on the current reality, to show that the United States, in particular, is, indeed, a dictatorship: “US Is an Oligarchy Not a Democracy, says Scientific Study.” So, if anyone tells you that the U.S. is a democracy, then just ask him or her to explain those findings. Because, now, you can explain them. Those findings have been explained, right here. All of the explanation is empirical; none of it is imaginary, at all. Everything does make sense. But it’s not necessarily the sense that has been publicized. On some matters, only the nonsense is being publicized. Because that’s far more profitable, to the people who hold the real power, in a dictatorship.

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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They're Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity .