September 15

"You are responsible for everything that goes on at the radio station. I don't know who they are, but I know who you are."

--Russian President Vladimir Putin, to the editor in chief of Echo Moskvy, the only national radio station that routinely broadcasts opposition voices

“Henceforth, I will be your censor.”

--Tsar Nicholas I to Pushkin

“We would even listen to Vatican radio, which would give you a good report on what was happening in the Soviet Union, and you didn’t care that the announcer would then add ‘God bless you.’”

--The historian Sergei Ivanov

Is America Equipped to Win a World-Wide Propaganda War? – Matt Armstrong, MountainRunner: "’Is America now equipped to win a world-wide propaganda war’" was the framing question for the interview debate on BBC's HARDtalk last week between Stephen Sackur and Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Jim Glassman. … Briefly, the opening question -- 'do you see yourself as America's Chief of Propaganda' -- gave the Under Secretary the chance to redefine his role and the mission of public diplomacy as distinct from past Under Secretary's. …The Under Secretary agreed that bad marketing doesn't work but disagreed that 'this' is a failed policy, which went to the essence of the responses in the debate. This represented a common underlying theme of the discussion as the interviewer frequently asked about the past and the present impact of past policies while the Under Secretary often responded with how America's policies have evolved.”

Wars of Ideas: the importance of Public Diplomacy – cwleonard, Globo Diplo: “What is public diplomacy? You may have never heard of the term, but its an important capital asset for a country, and, by definition, is different from simple public relations or propaganda. A new ambassador, James K. Glassman, may find the job to do U.S. public diplomacy as daunting as the last several have.”

Did Obama Try To Sabotage US Negotiations With Iraq For A SOFA Agreement? - Bart De Palma, Citizen Pamphleteer: "One must always take public statements of Iraq politicians with a grain of salt as they may be spreading disinformation to conduct public diplomacy with the US. However, I am unsure what Iraq would gain by making false and embarrassing claims about a US presidential candidate with a fair chance of ending up in the Oval Office."

Attempt to market America - fail92fail, Failures -- exposed, reflected upon, considered: Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Charlotte Beers' assignment was not to improve relations with other countries but rather to perform an overhaul of the American image abroad. The appointment of an inexperienced (in diplomacy and state politics) person to this post understandably raised some criticism, but the then Secretary of State Colin Powell shrugged it off. “There is nothing wrong with getting somebody who knows how to sell something. We are selling a product. We need someone who can rebrand American foreign policy, rebrand diplomacy.” “The whole idea of building a brand is to create a relationship between the product and its user,” she explained. “We’re going to have to communicate the intangible assets of the United States -- things like our belief system and our values.”

A Propaganda Model - Manufacturing Consent: A Propaganda Model excerpted from the book Manufacturing Consent by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky Pantheon Books, 1988 – Third World Traveler : Herman and Chomsky: “It should also be noted that in the case of the largesse of the Pentagon and the State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy, the subsidy is at the taxpayers' expense, so that, in effect, the citizenry pays to be propagandized in the interest of powerful groups such as military contractors and other sponsors of state terrorism."

Pourquoi les Latinos sortent de leurs gonds... - Paul Moreira, Premières Lignes – "Là où ça sent carrément le poisson c’est que, toujours selon le gars du Guardian, Carmona était en contact avec Otto Reich et Elliot Abrams. Inconnus du grand public, ces deux hommes sont des spécialistes des coups tordus. Ils commencent leur carrière dans les années 80 lors de la guerre contre un autre gouvernement démocratiquement élu. Celui du Nicaragua. Où l’on retrouve l’actuel président: Daniel Ortega (mais j’y reviens). Otto Reich s’occupait de la propagande. ' Office for Public Diplomacy.'"

RELATED ITEMS

Found and Lost [review of Who Owns Antiquity?: Museums and the Battle over Our Ancient Heritage by James Cuno] - Ingrid D. Rowland, The New Republic: Cuno demonstrates that antiquities laws as currently drawn impoverish rather than enrich the global level of culture. Cuno has scant patience for the single worldwide body that addresses cultural concerns, which is UNESCO.

An Open Letter To The Next President Of The United States - Bernard-Henri Lévy, Huffington Post: “Anti-Americanism, Mr. Future President, has become a new planetary religion. And unfortunately it will take more than four or even eight years to get rid of this kind of religion.”

A letter to America: You Cannot be Serious - Ian Bell, Sunday Herald/UK/Common Dreams: The American Century may well be at an end, with only the debts -- unfeasibly big debts -- to be settled.

Return to Sanity - Katrina vanden Heuvel, Nation: A purposeful opposition must form to rethink America's role in the world. There are large and fateful questions to confront: What kind of country does the US want to be in the 21st century? Republic or Empire? Global leader or global cop?

Religious comfort for bin Laden - James Carroll, Boston Globe: Beginning on Sept. 14, 2001, U.S. foreign policy was yoked to a certain brand of messianic fundamentalism. Although discussed openly in eschatologically-minded religious institutions, the link between state power and radical Christian fervor remained blurred both in Bush's mind and in political discussion, yet it was defining.

The World Isn’t So Dark: Ever since WWII, America has tended to make its strategic missteps by exaggerating dangers - Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek: We live in remarkably peaceful times. Rhetoric about transcendent threats and mortal dangers grips the imagination of the American people. But it also twists U.S. foreign policy in ways that can prove to be extremely costly to the country and the world.

A costly diversion: Our view: Pakistan is the wild card in the U.S. war on terror – Editorial, Baltimore Sun: Unless Pakistan is willing to devote a contingent of its military and intelligence forces to the fight, the next administration should slash the hundreds of millions in military aid going its way.

An existential crisis - Arnaud de Borchgrave, Washington Times: In Afghanistan, the future of the Atlantic alliance is at stake. In Pakistan, the state itself is at stake.

US forces the terror issue with Pakistan - Syed Saleem Shahzad, Asia Times: Clearly, Washington is frustrated with the situation in Afghanistan, and it no doubt rankles that the American "empire" is being thwarted by a bunch of "cave-dwellers.”

A Mideast Crisis to Avert - Dennis Ross, Washington Post: Lagging behind events has unfortunately been a hallmark of the Bush administration. If the administration is serious about trying to pass on to its successor an ongoing peace process in the Middle East, it had better focus not only on preserving the negotiating process but also making sure a Palestinian leadership crisis does not arrive just as our next president assumes office.

The Battle For Hope In Iraq - Fred Hiatt, Washington Post: A new conventional wisdom seems to be settling on Washington -- that the U.S. job in Iraq is nearing completion, and the time has come to move on to Afghanistan and other challenges. If, as seems likely, the celebration is premature and U.S. troops will be needed in Iraq for some time to come, we can hope that the next national security adviser again has the strength to resist the crowd and the deftness to steer the country in the right direction.

Bush's Lonely Decision - Review & Outlook, Wall Street Journal: The success of the surge in pacifying Iraq has been so swift and decisive that it's easy to forget how difficult it was to find the right general, choose the right strategy, and muster the political will to implement it.

Latin American saber-rattling: The U.S. should see bellicose talk from Venezuela and Bolivia for what it is -- regional politics – Editorial, Los Angeles Times: Neither Obama nor McCain has articulated a detailed policy on Latin America. It would be in the interest of both to craft one that dispenses with Cold War attitudes and focuses on relieving poverty through trade and assistance.

Russia Takes A Bite Out Of State Sovereignty: The real clash with Georgia is sovereignty vs. self-determination - Mackubin Thomas Owens, Christian Science Monitor: The tension between sovereignty and self-determination can also be seen as a clash between stability and justice. This polarity has always posed a dilemma for the United States. On the one hand, Americans have often provided support for oppressed peoples throughout the globe. On the other hand, American statesmen have recognized that the logic of secession leads to unending conflict.

The Russians want to explain - Adar Primor, Haaretz: Do the Russians not care a hoot about the world? They don't, according to some of the experts. Do they try to sway it? Yes, according to the other version.

Letter from Moscow: Echo in the Dark; A radio station strives to keep the airwaves free - David Remnick, New Yorker: In the authoritarian ecosystem of Vladimir Putin, the radio station Echo of Moscow is one of the last of an endangered species, a dodo that still roams the earth. “The problem is that official propaganda on television is extremely distracting -- it insures that people talk about the nonsense they are showing,” says Yulia Latynina, a well-known newspaper columnist and commentator on Echo of Moscow.

Did Saakashvili Lie? The West Begins to Doubt Georgian Leader – Spiegel: Five weeks after the war in the Caucasus the mood is shifting against Georgian President Saakashvili. Some Western intelligence reports have undermined Tbilisi's version of events, and there are now calls on both sides of the Atlantic for an independent investigation.

Georgian Artists Battle Moscow With Music - Jimsher Rekhviashvili - RFE/RL: The war in August between Tbilisi and Moscow over Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia was fought on more than the military front. In Georgia, artists and singers joined forces, producing songs and programs they said were meant to encourage the nation and demoralize the enemy.

Soviet propaganda shows gentle push into modernism - Ray Henry, Boston Globe: An exhibit of Soviet propaganda at Brown University challenges viewers who reflexively relegate Soviet propaganda to the artistic dustbin. For sure, there are predictable stock figures: rosy cheeked Soviet women, blond and robust Russian farmers and wiry, sinister-looking capitalist enemies. Yet interspersed are caricatures and posters that show wit, humor and play with modernist touches like cubism and utilize melted, warped figures like those from the noted surrealist Salvador Dali.

AMERICANA

Government Intelligence Is Way Behind - L. Gordon Crovitz, Wall Street Journal: Less than one-third of the FBI's national security branch agents and analysts have Internet access at their desks.

ANCIENT POMPEII

The love lives of the ancient Romans: From one-night stands to steamy encounters in the bathhouse, Pompeii was a society obsessed with sex - Mary Beard, The Times, London: “There are phalluses greeting you in doorways, phalluses above bread ovens, phalluses carved into the surface of the street and plenty more phalluses with bells on and wings. One of the most imaginative creations, which once jingled in the Pompeian breeze, is the lusty phallus-bird, a combination (I guess) of a joke and an unashamed celebration of the essential ingredient of manhood.”

GERMANY

After Beheading: Wax Hitler Returns to Berlin Looking More Dishevelled – Spiegel: Madame Tussauds has repaired its wax figure of Adolf Hitler and put him back on display in Berlin nine weeks after a visitor tore the dictator's head off. The new Hitler is protected by a thick wall and glass to prevent a new assassination attempt, and he looks more dishevelled than the original figure.