January 22

"If I were to write memoirs I would owe it to myself as a matter of integrity to tell the full truth. But were I to tell the full truth, I would injure a great many people including myself."

--Secretary of State George Marshall; cited in Dennis C. Jett, Why American Foreign Policy Fails: Unsafe at Home and Despised Abroad (2008), p. 50; image from

VIDEO

Jon Stewart blasts Congressman Steve Cohen for Nazi comparison - hotair.com: Stewart demolishes Cohen’s argument that lying somehow equates to Nazi propaganda, pointing out that lying isn’t what made the Nazis Nazis.

PUBLIC DIPLOMACY

China-US summit: Which country gained the most?‎ - Howard LaFranchi, Christian Science Monitor: "Before leaving Washington for a public-diplomacy tour in Chicago Friday, Chinese President Hu Jintao called for a 'win-win' relationship between the United States and China. While it may be too soon to gauge the full impact of Mr. Hu’s state visit on bilateral ties, it does seem that each country’s leader got a 'win'


from their meetings. President Obama came off as more assertive with a rising China – certainly more than he had during what some critics viewed as a weak performance when he visited Beijing in late 2009. Mr. Obama put human rights on the table, insisted on a two-way street between the two countries in terms of economic access, and apparently pressed successfully (though in private) for increased Chinese pressure on North Korea. For his part, Hu got all the pomp and stature of a state visit – very important to the Chinese. And he was seen as having enhanced his legacy as a pillar of China’s domestic economic transformation and its rise as a global power. Yet the tangible results of the visit were less certain." Image from

Hillary's Next Step: More Diplomacy or a Move to Defense? - Joe Klein, Times: "[A]s Secretary of State ... [sh]he began the assignment with some well-acknowledged skills. After her globe-trotting years as First Lady, she knew how to be an effective public diplomat. But she still had a lot to learn about diplomatic strategy and negotiation. She made mistakes and still does on occasion. ... But her confidence has grown, and her public statements are sharper. Indeed, she has — belatedly — emerged as the Obama Administration's leading voice on human rights." Via LB

China’s public diplomacy in the US: Hu Jintao’s state visit (1) - chinarelations: "Public diplomacy is an important part of the current visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao to the US. After a year in which China seemed no longer to care about its international image, the country realizes that it cannot continue to antagonize the world with its assertive behavior. Last year’s message – ‘you need to take us (China) and our core interests very seriously!’ – has been heard and understood. Now it is time to repair the damage that has been done to China’s image and so far this visit seems to contribute to that goal. Both sides have found the right tone again. Obama is tougher on China but careful to show China the respect it seeks; President Hu toned down China’s rhetoric, accepted Obama’s firm words about sensitive issues in the areas of human rights and trade, and made the economic and political gestures that Obama needs in order to address China critics in Congress and manage relations with China in a balanced way. The public diplomacy parts of this trip have been well thought out and well prepared." Via LB

Social Media Musings, Southeast Asian Edition - Kaisa Schreck, isnblog.ethz.ch: "As the highly contested treasure trove of the State Department WikiLeak just keeps giving and giving, an interesting and under reported cable came to light earlier this week. It had to do, quite unexpectedly, with the social media strategy of the US State Department and specifically, the US Embassy’s social media efforts in Jakarta, Indonesia. Jakarta? You ask. Yes, interestingly enough the US mission in the growing Southeast Asian archipelago nation is the most active of all in this ‘new’ and rapidly evolving field of public diplomacy. With more than 300,000 ‘Likers’ on Facebook at present and an impressive presence on Twitter and Youtube, the US mission in Jakarta was in a push to get a significantly bigger budget for its social media outreach in advance of President Obama’s November 2010 visit, the leaked cable reveals.


Although the cable reveals nothing particularly controversial, it gives interesting insights into the growing importance of social media in America’s outreach efforts in highly connected developing countries, particularly in Asia. ... And the strategy seems to be working- in less than a year, the number of Likers on their Facebook page has grown six-fold, from 50,000 to 300,000 and the number of Twitter followers from 1,000 to more than 16,000, with regular interaction from fans of both services. This development begs a lot of interesting questions about the future of public diplomacy: •Are other diplomatic missions, even just other US missions around the world, taking note of the Jakarta Embassy’s success? •Is there something unique and special about the Indonesian environment where social media-focused outreach efforts find particularly fertile ground beyond Obama’s personal connection to the country? •Is the ’soft power’ message that they are getting out uniquely suited to the kind of informal, multisensory interactivity that services such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube represent and do these provide a highly fertile new ground for such ‘persuasive’ activities and the building of soft power across the world? •Is social media changing the landscape of public diplomacy drastically and for good and what might its long terms effects be? •Does this finally bring foreign relations closer to the people and their concerns or is it simply a veil behind which business-as-usual continues (the highly fortified US embassy in Jakarta, seen above, is a powerful reminder of this metaphorical paradox)?" Image from article, with caption: Foreign policy: Still behind walls or more open to the people?

Readings from the Waiting Room - Shanghai Scrap: Observations on Asia and the world by Adam Minter, an American writer in Shanghai: "I found a February 2010 cable from the embassy in Jakarta ... to be particularly fascinating. In it, an FSO with near childlike enthusiasm 'requests $100,000 immediately in order to reach a goal of 1 million Facebook fans in just 30 days.' On the one hand, I’m thrilled to see this kind of public diplomacy happening (public diplomacy matters!); on the other hand, this cable stinks of somebody wanting to spend someone else’s money, profligately."

Show Takes Afghans "On the Road" to See Progress - Kelly Ramundo and Robert Sauers, press release, USAID: On the Road ... [is] Afghanistan's first travelogue and one of the country's most popular television programs. Sponsored by USAID, the show has just entered its second season. ... [It] is more than just a weekly fix of homegrown entertainment. Each week, ... 23-year-old [Mujeeb] Arez


takes viewers to one of the 34 provinces to show off Afghanistan and the progress the country has made. ... Jeremiah Carew was the deputy director of USAID/Afghanistan's infrastructure office and the project officer for On the Road during its first season, which began airing the first of 26 episodes in November 2009. One of the challenges of the project, he said, was to create something Afghans would want to watch but that also was able to convey the positive impact of USAID-sponsored development projects in the war-torn country. 'Our objective was to produce an entertaining TV show and stop around and see some development projects—just weave that in very naturally. I think if you do it right, and it's coming from the right place, with the right objectives, that's very honorable—and people respect that,' he said. Because maintaining credibility with the Afghan public was a crucial component to the program's success, branding proved a thorny issue, especially considering the show was being produced by Tolo TV, Afghanistan's largest private TV station. ... While highlighting development milestones, the show was also promoting national unity—not an easy feat in a country divided by decades of civil animosity between ethnic groups. ... 'The show is an attempt to introduce Afghans to their culture and country,' said Arez. And Carew thinks this chord can be amplified beyond Afghanistan. 'This format is pretty easy to produce because you only have one paid actor,' he said. 'I think that building national unity is something that you could do in a lot of places. Stopping by USAID projects along the way could be woven in very easily, as we have here. It's a public diplomacy tool as well.'" Image from article, with caption: On the Road host Mujeeb Arez works on location in Paktya province, Afghanistan.

Laughing in the Dark - Laura McGinnis, manIC: "Thursday night on The Daily Show, Jon Stewart interviews Kambiz Hosseini and Saman Arbabi of Parazit, a VOA-sponsored Iranian satirical news show. ... As a public diplomacy vehicle, VOA is regarded by some as propaganda and by others as legitimate journalism, but by other measure, the men behind Parazit have made major strides over the past two years -- and not just because they get free kebabs at restaurants now. They've attracted a diverse and growing audience and earned a reputation for even-handedness in their coverage of the news. As an August 2010 PBS interview of the duo reported, 'When audiences tune in, they understand that no one is beyond the reach of the show's biting wit.'"

VOA's "Parazit" has a great night on "The Daily Show." And a little "static" of my own - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting

Lee Bollinger again floats his American World Service proposal - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting: "Foreign Policy, 21 Jan 2011, Lee Bollinger: ... 'My current vote would be for augmenting the funding for NPR and PBS to take on a greater and greater international role, both in reporting to the world (in different languages) and reporting back to the United States about the world. We need an American World Service, with an American journalistic character but on a scale more like the BBC.'


[Elliott coment:] The prohibition on domestic dissemination was moot even back in the 1950s, when VOA's shortwave transmitters could easily be heard in the United States. It is less moot now that IP geoblocking is a common internet procedure. If there should be any will to observe the Smith-Mundt law, the VOA, RFE/RL, Radio Free Asia, and Radio/TV Martí websites would be made inaccessible to US IP addresses. Prospects for augmenting the funding of NPR and PBS seem dim now that many Republicans are dead serious about eliminating the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and any government support for public stations. In my Foreign Service Journal article (October 2010), I proposed instead a partnership between US international broadcasting and private US domestic broadcast news. In Britain, the main domestic broadcast news source is the public broadcaster BBC. In the United States, it is a combination of ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and Fox. They would have the wherewithal to assist US international broadcasting in newsgathering and programming, and they would benefit from the global resources and area knowledge of USIB. Image from

US focus on Africa to rise, but Agoa extension may hit resistance - Terence Creamer, Creamer Media's Engineering News: "President Barack Obama’s Administration remained 'profoundly committed to putting Africa back at the centre of US foreign policy' and there would be 'a greater emphasis on Africa in 2011 and 2012', Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of African Affairs Bruce Wharton said in Washington DC this week. But he also warned that it would require a concerted effort to convince Americans to extend the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa), which currently offers preferential market access on 7 000 African product lines. Agoa was due to come to an end in 2015, and many African countries are expected to call for the scheme to be rolled over."

Opinion: US-Iran rivalry a geopolitical paradox - digitaljournal.com: "Editorials and politicians constantly identify the need for the West to force the Iranian regime to definitively end its nuclear weapons programme.


But it is likely the Iranian regime would suffer its people’s displeasure should it be forced into acquiescence creating a position of even less flexibility. Strategy may be driven by paradoxical logic, but policy must reflect a shrewd assessment of reality in defining goals in order to produce sound strategy. The tactical approach the US employs toward Iran--at least on the public diplomacy side--under periods of crisis languishes in paradox with little evidence of any logical and realistic objective. Given the rhetorical exuberance of Iran‘s president, sizing up the two respective rivals’ policies boils essentially down to measuring the zero-sum of peripheral developments. Iran’s increasing regional influence through diplomatic successes--with Turkey for example—and global ties to states like China and Venezuela reflect a mismatch between US goals and its power to achieve them." Image from

21 Jan, 2011, Fri, SoS Clinton and Staff Schedule - Rush Limbaugh Report: US FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS JUDITH MCHALE 10:30 a.m. Under Secretary McHale meets with Ambassador to Qatar Joseph LeBaron, at the Department of State. (CLOSED PRESS COVERAGE)

Whither public diplomacy? - Matt Armstrong, MountainRunner.us: "[I]s the failure to ascribe Chinese activities – among others – to 'public diplomacy' in some way limiting to U.S. public diplomacy?


Or is it good to continue to separate our activities from those of a foreign government, much like how 'propaganda' label came to be used: 'they' did propaganda, we informed. But with the neutral – even positive – descriptions of Chinese activities in the media, are U.S. efforts abroad further sidelined?" Image: Whither now? Sign at the Pleasance Courtyard, Edinburgh

Hypothesis seriously considering bombing - Tadeo, czernik59.wordpress.com [Google translation from the Polish]: "In developed countries, international politics, public diplomacy tool use [public diplomacy - ed] - such as informing and influencing public opinion in other countries - mainly the so-called reaching. soft power [ang. soft power [English miękka siła - red.]. soft power - ed]. Jest to rodzaj władzy polegający na oddziaływaniu poprzez atrakcyjność. This is the kind of power involving interaction through the attraction. Gdy np. miliardy ludzi na świecie oglądają transmisję z ceremonii wręczenia Oscarów w Hollywood, a niektórzy nawet wstają w nocy, by to oglądać, świadczy to o sile atrakcyjności amerykańskiej kultury masowej. If, for instance billion people worldwide are watching coverage of the Oscars ceremony in Hollywood, and some even getting up at night to watch it, it indicates the strength of the attractiveness of American culture."

UN condemnation of settlements – an opportunity?, Dahlia Scheindlin -- + 972 Magazine, posted at Occupied Palestine: "The UN Security Council resolution that was introduced this week condemning Israeli settlement expansion is sure to provide more grist for Israel’s ‘de-legitimization’ mill. Increasingly paranoid commentators will lump the resolution together with all critique they don’t like as undermining the Israel’s right to exist.


If so, they will implicitly contribute to an absurd notion that the legitimacy of Israel rests on the right to settlement expansion. ... In my dreams, Israeli leaders will think long term, strategically ... . In my predictions, readers will say I’ve totally lost touch with reality. And when the resolution passes (or even if not) Israel will wave it around as proof that brave hasbara (public diplomacy/propaganda) efforts are rendered helpless against the great juggernaut of political delegitimization. And settlement growth will march along inexorably, plunging the region into doom." Image from

"Democratization" in Russia? - Yelena Osipova, Global Chaos: "After all, as Russia's international broadcaster, RT [Russia Today] represents the Russian perspective in the international media space, frames the stories in favorable light, argues Russia's case, and thus, supposedly, implements a substantial part of its public diplomacy."

China launches China International Broadcasting Network and even more inexplicable Global Broadcasting Media Group - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting

Shark-Fin Public Diplomacy - Colin Alexander, Newswire – CPD Blog, USC Center on Public Diplomacy: "Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay’s recent documentary about trade in shark-fins focused on Costa Rica and the pariah state of Taiwan. While filming he was reportedly threatened at gunpoint and covered in petrol by those who took exception to his presence. While this undoubtedly made for compelling television viewing on the UK’s Channel 4 TV station on Sunday January 16 (soon to be aired in the USA),


for analysts of public diplomacy and soft power, the incident demonstrates a number of underlying truths. ... [T]his report by Ramsay will only serve to harm the image of Costa Rica as an eco-paradise. ... Furthermore, Taiwan will be compared to China whether it likes it or not. Indeed, Taiwan’s soft power since the mid 90's has largely come from adhering to internationally agreed norms of behaviour – open and largely un-corrupt democracy, unrestricted media, and respect for human rights. Basically, doing the opposite of China." Image from

2010 'a wasted year' for Karabakh resolution - News.Az: "Gerard Libaridian News interviews Prof. Gerard Libaridian, director of the Armenian Studies Program at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. ... Do you believe in the success of public diplomacy between Azerbaijan and Armenia? Public diplomacy, citizen diplomacy and other such endeavours are extremely important. First because they build confidence; second because they are an obstacle to the process of dehumanization of the 'other' that is taking place on all sides. Third because they legitimize the possibility of a peaceful resolution and create a peace environment. Moreover, such efforts may yield new ideas and approaches which governments may want to incorporate in their negotiating positions, although this particular seems unlikely at this point. Most importantly, such contacts disprove any contention that the two nations cannot coexist."

Boy Abunda says PNoy Him did not appoint ambassadors for the arts, he was invited by the NCCA - William R. Reyes, telebisyon.net [Google translation:] "In the new government of President Noynoy Aquino was appointed Ambassador for the Arts, the talent manager and TV host


Boy Abunda. ... In his speech, the launching of the National Arts Month ('Yield of Art'), re-emphasized by his Boy's election, or now holding the title of Ambassador for the Arts. ... 'I gave students the Public Diplomacy pong and I always say in my meetings with NCCA that culture is 'a way of life,' ' continued Boy in his speech." Boy Abunda image from article

Thoughts on reading Matthew Battle's "Library" - Thoughts About K4D: "I have just finished reading Library: An Unquiet History by Matthew Battle. The author is a special collections librarian at Harvard, and has written a book that is part memoir, part 'literature', and part historical account. ... Today we have a flood of book born information filling library shelves and slaking the thirst for knowledge of billions of readers. We now see libraries of many sorts, from those serving educational facilities (from K-12 to graduate schools), to religious libraries, to those abroad supported by governments as part of their 'public diplomacy', to corporate professional libraries, to community libraries."

RELATED ITEMS

A Newly Cooperative China - Editorial, New York Times: After months of rancor, China is suddenly talking up cooperation on North Korea, the economy, and other difficult issues. There are several possible explanations for the change in tone — and, we hope — substance. Below image from


Channeling China - President Hu Jintao of China left Washington on Friday, having done little to assuage the growing fear among Americans that his country has the United States over a barrel, economically. Washington needs to defend its interests more deftly, with a clear-eyed view of the power balance.

Chinese media censor coverage of President Hu's visit to the USA, especially the human rights bits - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting

Afghan peace dialogue talk "propaganda of occupation forces": Taliban commander - sify.com: In the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan, 'dialogue for peace' with the Taliban is baseless and nothing more than propaganda, Taliban commander Maulavi Abdul Kabir has said. 'As far as Afghanistan's current circumstances are concerned, peace process will only be possible if it results in the guaranteed expulsion of occupation forces and paves the way for the establishment of Islamic State. Any such process seems to be unachievable in the presence of occupation forces,' Kabir said in an interview with the Taliban news website.

Exploring Anti Israel Rhetoric, Radical Islamic Propaganda and Anti Semitism - bigpeace.com: Giyus.org: How are these emotions against Israel as a Jewish state expressed? Professor Porat: These strong emotions against Israel as a Jewish state are expressed through chants in protests and countless caricatures. Young people are looking for a symbol. Let’s look at Israel’s image – the main claim against Israel is the fact that Israel is an occupying force, controlling millions of Palestinians. Israel was originally founded as a safe haven for Holocaust surviving Jews. Nowadays, world opinion claims Israel has played the “victim” card for too long while actually becoming an occupier evil force. We are seeing a reversal effect in which the victim is becoming the abuser.


The Jews, the main victims of the Nazis, have turned into the “Nazis” and the Palestinians are now the victims. There is also a religious angle. In Christianity, redemption is achieved through suffering. But the Jews cannot bring the redemption. Thus the Jews cannot remain the “victims” and that role must be passed on to the Palestinians. Once the reversal is complete, and one views Israel as a Nazi country, then questioning its right to exist is the next logical step. After all, the Nazis have no rights for a state. Islamic propaganda knowingly makes use of Christian religious and traditional symbols to attribute to Israel’s image as a Nazi state and turn the Palestinians into the ultimate victims, those whose suffering may bring redemption to this world. Image from article

Remembering Zorro's Vietnam Legacy - Don North, consortiumnews.com: Barry Zorthian, who died last month at the age of 90, was one of the last surviving U.S government officials who shaped America’s role in the Vietnam War, a man who also stood at the shadowy intersection between press management and psychological warfare. Typically, Zorthian would maneuver in the gray area between divulging what was really going on and not leaking genuine secrets.


Although untrained in the art of psychological operations, Zorthian was responsible for coordinating these tactics designed to erode the morale of the enemy and win the allegiance of the Vietnamese people through “hearts and minds” programs. Zorthian invested in excess of $10 million a year in dropping tons of leaflets; staging plays in which the Viet Cong were always the villains; and rounding up peasants at gunpoint for propaganda lectures. Image from article: Barry Zorthian (right) with Gen. William Westmoreland. Via

V for Victory - A New Campaign - Levi Stearns, The V campaign is sweeping the internet telling American citizens to “be the resistance,” speaking mostly to the DHS (Department of Homeland Security) whose main objective is to keep Americans dependent on “big brother”. It is truly disturbing to think of the different societies that have thought exactly the same as America is now. Try Hitler era Germany or Stalin era Russia.


They, too, fed their people stories about a common enemy that will destroy their way of life and ran mass propaganda campaigns revolving round terror. What these “terror” campaigns did is convince the mass public to fear this common threat so vehemently that they would turn on each other, hoping to eradicate the perceived “enemy of the common good.” Image from article

We, The Spiteful - Mark Ames, exiledonline.com: Put your ear to the ground in this country, and you’ll hear the toxic spite churning. It’s partly the result of commercial propaganda and sexual desperation–a desperation far more common than is admitted. If you didn’t know anything about how America’s propaganda worked, you’d think that every citizen here experienced four-dimensional multiple orgasms with beautiful, creative, equally satisfied partners, morning, noon and night. So-called “Reality TV” makes life seem so much more interesting and epic and dramatic than it really is for the overwhelming majority—whose misery and malice only grow worse when they compare their own lonely, boner-killing reality to the “reality” on their TVs. “No wonder my reality has never been filmed—I’m not even real in this culture.” From that follows a nagging fear that others might discover just how unfilmable their reality worlds are–and spite towards anyone whose reality is filmable. The flat truth however is that despite all of our desperate attempts to convince ourselves otherwise, America is an erogenous no man’s land. Most white males here (at least the straight ones) have either dismal sex lives or no sex lives at all.

Bernays' Ideas on Propaganda Continue to Haunt Americans - Raven Clabough, thenewamerican.com: When Americans see the bizarre responses of the mainstream media and the progressive politicians to tragedies such as the Tucson shootings — for instance, the proposal to ban rhetoric or symbols perceived to be violent — many wonder how the country has come to this strange place where elitists are moving to gain control at the expense of individual liberties.


Today’s politicians and progressives seem to have taken some notes right out of the works of Edward Bernays. The author of books such as Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923) and Propaganda (1928) — both of which were heavily utilized by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels — Bernays has been accredited with manipulating public opinion about such varied subjects as World War I, smoking, and even bacon. He has been dubbed the “Father of Spin” and the “Godfather of modern public relations” because of his extraordinary ability to alter public opinion. The key to Bernays’ ideas on propaganda is the notion that the masses must never know that they are being manipulated. Instead, they must believe that they themselves have conceived the ideas or have come to the very conclusions to which they were actually led by the leaders. Bernays image from article

Yardley reviews "Passport to Peking" [by Patrick Wright] - Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post: In September 1954, Patrick Wright reports, "several planeloads of Britons gathered in from various sometimes very loosely defined positions on the left of the political spectrum" flew from England to China, "where they would take part, as invited guests of the Chinese government, in the celebrations marking the fifth anniversary of Mao Tse-tung's Proclamation of the People's Republic of China on 1 October 1949." For all the Chinese leadership's rhetoric about friendship and peace, the invitations clearly were issued with propaganda in mind, and in the short run they paid offin that regard. In the long run, though, the results were decidedly mixed, due not so much to changes in the Britons' politics as to their (and the world's) revulsion "as Mao and his fellow Communists proceeded to convert China into a nuclear-armed, fully industrialized, and totalitarian superpower."

[Exhibit] Rodchenko and his Circle: Constructing the Future through Photography - Trained eyes on the Soviet machine - Sue Steward, thisislondon.co.uk: Stark red-lettered slogans hang around the gallery walls, propaganda statements from the early Soviet era and directives to the photographers whose black-and-white pictures are exhibited here.


Many are previously unseen, brought from Alexander Rodchenko's archives and created during the Twenties Constructivist art revolution and the Thirties Stalinist clampdowns on individualism. Rodchenko's photographs helped transform the medium's vocabulary to fit the Soviet propaganda machine but the 680 prints on show also include his circle's diverse interpretations of the era. They open to Twenties salon-like scenes where Rodchenko and his artist wife Varvara Stepanova, poet Mayakovsky and his lover/muse Lilia Brik, are relaxing or working in studios or on Moscow's streets; life is still relatively easy. Image from article: Georgi Petrusov with the mass parades at Red Square

Myth and propaganda: Stacy Schiff's 'Cleopatra: A Life'‎ - Reed Jackson, Al-Masry Al-Youm - How to treat a figure swaddled in 2,000 years’ worth of infamy? Stacy Schiff, who has written fine accounts of Vera Nabakov and Antoine de Saint-Exupery, two elusive figures in their own right, admirably acknowledges the challenges.


“To restore Cleopatra is as much to salvage the few facts as to peel away the encrusted myth and hoary propaganda,” she writes, in her new biography of the ancient queen, “Cleopatra: A Life.” Ultimately, Schiff’s portrayal of the queen as a shrewd, wily player who made a bad gamble on a man, and who deftly bested a sea of hostile circumstances until she didn’t, is plausible, if a bit hollow. But, considering the brutal and alien character of the times in which Cleopatra lived, perhaps it’s best to let the myth-makers have their way.

War of the future: Brian Moore's WWIII propaganda posters - Guardian: Inspired by the 2009 Iran election protest and activism and censorship therein,


these third world war propaganda posters were conceived by Milwaukee-born designer Brian Moore. They are a playful statement on wartime, citizen journalism, censorship, and the advent of the internet. Image from article

RUSSICA

Hot Russian spy Anna Chapman to host TV show on weird mysteries - Xeni Jardin, Boing Boing: A real-life X-Files: Anna Chapman,


the sexy Russkie ginger-spook kicked out of the US last summer, tonight debuts as host of a new mystery show for the commercial Russian television network Ren TV.