July 25

"[N]othing suits me so well in America as leaving it."

--Blogger extraordinaire Paul Rockower; image from

VIDEOS

Propaganda from North Korea - frasertalk.blogspot.com

Gaddafi Propaganda Song (2) - tobbe.co.cc

PUBLIC DIPLOMACY

Mrs. Obama to carry Message of Fitness, Public Diplomacy - Jennifer Epstein, politico.com [scroll down page for item]: “‘Leading our nation's delegation and traveling to London is truly a dream come true. If anybody had asked me when I was 10 or 11 or 20 or actually 40, whether I would be doing this, I would have bet not,’ she [Mrs. Obama] said [Monday] on a call with reporters previewing her trip. ‘Some of my fondest memories when I was young and not so young involve watching the Olympics on TV and cheering on Team U.S.A.’ [Mrs.] Obama will greet members of the U.S. team on Friday morning before moving on to the U.S. Ambassador's Residence, where she will host a Let's Move! event for 1,000 American and British kids. … On Friday night, she will attend Queen Elizabeth II's reception for delegation leaders before leading American athletes at the Opening Ceremony. On Saturday, she

will meet with Samantha Cameron, the wife of British Prime Minister David Cameron, and will then spend the day cheering on American athletes. After hosting a brunch at the Ambassador's residence on Sunday morning, she will greet members of the armed forces and their families before returning home. Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser for strategic communications, [said:] ‘While this visit is about the Olympics, it's also about advancing the close ties between the U.S. and the United Kingdom’ … It gives [the first lady] a chance to reinforce the ‘close cooperation between our government,’ to maintain ‘the deep ties between our people’ and to reach out to the British public.” Mrs. Obama image from

Public Schedule for July 25, 2012 - U.S. Department of State: "UNDER SECRETARY FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS TARA SONENSHINE 1:00 p.m. Under Secretary Sonenshine delivers remarks at the Secretary’s Second Annual Global Diaspora Forum, at the Department of State. Please click here for more information. (OPEN PRESS COVERAGE) Pre-set time for video cameras: 12:10 p.m. from the 23rd Street entrance lobby. Final access time for journalists and still photographers: 12:45 p.m. from the 23rd Street entrance lobby. 6:00 p.m. Under Secretary Sonenshine delivers remarks and participates in the signing of the Science, Technology and Innovation Expert Partnership Memorandum of Understanding, at the Great Hall of the National Academy of Sciences, 2101 C Street, NW. This ceremony is associated with the Secretary’s Second Annual Global Diaspora Forum. Please click here for more information. (OPEN PRESS COVERAGE) Please contact Wendy Nassmacher at NassmacherWL@state.gov to attend."

J-Conference 2012 - uscenterforcitizendiplomacy.org: “Join the USCCD J-Center in welcoming national and regional leaders on September 10 and 11, 2012 in Des Moines, Iowa, for a working conference focused on maximizing opportunities to strengthen U.S.-Japan relations. The J-Center brings together leaders from Japan and the United States dedicated to developing the best Japan-focused programs and curriculum for communities and classrooms in the American Midwest.  The J-Conference will highlight current critical thinking in four key sectors and help shape the future of relations between organizations, institutions, individuals, and corporate citizens in the American Midwest and Japan. Keynote speeches include remarks from Tara Sonenshine, the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. For more information on the work of the conference, the individuals leading breakout sessions, and a detailed program schedule, please visit the Conference page of the J-Center website.”

Broadcasting Board of Governors – Messages - The Federalist, USG Broadcasts/BBG Watch: "EVERYONE [senior agency officials] on the Third Floor of the [VOA] Cohen Building is tainted by the still-unfolding debacle they have perpetrated with their ironclad commitment to demolishing US international broadcasting with their 'flim flam strategic plan.'”

Commentator on the "fundamental difference" between BBC and US 24/7 news networks - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting

No more "Alyona Show" - Yelena Osipova, Global Chaos: "According to the latest info, Alyona Minkovski, the host of 'The Alyona Show' on RT, will be joining the HuffPost Live online video service. Alyona's official RT profile suggests that she was born in Moscow, raised in California, and attended UC Santa Cruz, majoring in Political Science and minoring in Film and Digital Media.

Her show is (should I say, 'was'?) certainly controversial, if not outright outrageous (just as RT's 'public diplomacy' itself). The description states: Based out of RT's Washington D.C. Bureau, The Alyona Show is what you wish you could see on mainstream television. Alyona Minkovski offers a fresh perspective on U.S. and world politics by covering bold and daring stories no one else dares to touch. It's an hour you'll never forget. The question now is whether Alyona will adopt a similar line and tone with the HuffPost Live, or part with her over-dramatic conspiratorial drive." Image from entry

Pew study shows RT (Russia Today) videos dominate on YouTube - Kim Andrew Elliott reporting on International Broadcasting:

Image from entry

Pox Indica - Kanwal Sibal, blog.vifindia.org: "A word of caution: Shashi Tharoor’s new book, 'Pax Indica', is not about India dominating the 21st century world; it is about the less imperial exercise of India helping to write the rules, defining the norms of the new networked world of tomorrow and having a voice in their application. But then rising India should attain such influence normally in time because of its large landmass, population, economy, technological base and armed forces. The book covers India’s foreign policy widely: relations with Pakistan, other neighbours, China, the Arab world, various Asian countries, the US, Europe, Africa and Latin America. Given his UN passage, de rigueur chapters on Soft Power and Public Diplomacy and India and the UN find place. The impressive breadth of coverage should enhance an ordinary reader’s understanding of India’s foreign policy, but not in any depth, as several aspects are skimpily treated. Tharoor says the book is a work of reflection, not scholarship. Many specialists will find several of his reflections jarring."

Guest Post: Can Sport Really Change The World? (Part II) - Kelsey Suemnicht, medalheads.wordpress.com: "The Olympic city showcases it’s [sic] own art but also plays host to visiting artists from around the world. The cultural diplomacy surrounding the games can be ad hoc, when visiting fans feel compelled to play their music on a street corner or it can also be organized based on significant partnerships. ... In many ways, the arts provide a stronger experience of a foreign culture in a way that is more potent than any sport could ever be. By incorporating cultural diplomacy within the games, the Olympics provides an excellent example of a well-rounded public diplomacy campaign."

For the Fans - Sulagna Misra, PD News–CPD Blog, USC Center on Public Diplomacy: "The most constant part of the Olympics is the fans. ... As a Master’s of Public Diplomacy student at the University of Southern California, these are the people that are of most interest to me. I want to see the people who want to be mired in the exhilaration of the Games. Before entering my degree program, I was already vaguely

interested in the Olympics, but through my studies, specifically in cultural diplomacy, I focused my perspective on the Games as an international diplomatic event that has several combating schemas with everyone in the world potentially watching. To take a closer look at the Olympics as a tool of cultural diplomacy, I am making a documentary focusing on the motivations and desires of these fans." Image from

Pirates-held hostages finally come home - Young, beijingshots.com: "Somali pirates can stay out at sea for long periods, with captured merchant vessels as mother ships, and have been using Yemen’s remote island of Socotra as a refueling hub. Small fishing boats, without fixed routes, are hard to trace, and captives from different regions or countries can slow mediation efforts, said Zhou Qing’an, an expert on public diplomacy with Tsinghua University in Beijing."

Coneflower - winnowingfan.org: "[W]hen a few quiet souls in the public diplomacy community intentionally strip away the theoretical curliques embroidered on common terms over the past decade to speak plainly about our shared focus, my first response is ‘Orwell, be praised!’ There is beauty in plain speaking. It is as welcome as the rain in my July garden. Amy Zalman's article, How Power Really Works in the 21st Century: Beyond Soft, Hard and Smart [JB note: unfortunately the link cited leads to 'shower' rather than the cited article, as of 1:32 pm July 25], published by the Globalist online on July 17, 2012, went quickly viral. Tweeted by many, emailed my others and the subject of a blog post by mutual Public Diplomacy Council colleague Brian Carlson, Amy's article seemed to quench a thirst. In response, she earned an acknowledgement/dismissal from @Joe_Nye himself:  'Interesting but she hasn't read/understood #The Future of Power' Sigh. So, life is a fountain? Wouldn't it be a lot more fun if the story ended like this: A person travels for many days to the Himalayas to seek the word of an Indian holy man meditating in an isolated cave. Tired from his journey, but eager and expectant that his quest is about to reach fulfillment, he asks the sage, ‘What is the meaning of life?’ After a long pause, the sage opens his eyes and says, ‘Life is a fountain.’ ‘What do you mean life is a fountain?’ barks the questioner. ‘I have just traveled thousands of miles to hear your words, and all you have to tell me is that? That’s ridiculous.’ The sage then looks up from the floor of the cave and says, ‘So, it's not a fountain?' Amy isn't seeking the meaning of power, she operating in the world where she is trying to get something done. When the focus is on doing it, rather than theorizing about it, you tend to get practical as any gardener knows. The frustration I read in her lament lies in the translation of the hyphenated power concepts into the oranizational ways of doing by those who actually conduct foreign policy. The key point in Amy's article is: 'To address the hard problems that confront us globally, we should resist the temptation to put exercises of power into any pre-labeled boxes. ' Before asking what to call them, we should figure out what they can achieve — and under what circumstances. These pre-labled conceptual boxes become organizational charts in no time at all and bind the exercise of power by tendrils rooted in turf. Bureaucratic turf matters profoundly in the actual conduct of foreign affairs as anyone who has done it knows. And, at the core of the organizations engaged is a conception of the international environment. Robin Brown, a second quiet soul in the PD community begins there to build a framework for comparative government external communications research. In a paper, The Four Paradigms of Public Diplomacy,  presented to the International Studies Association Convention in April 2012, the British scholar offers a jargon free framework for examining how countries actually communicate abroad. Robin assumes that the communication is purposeful and that over time national approaches have solidified organizationally. Uncomfortable with the term public diplomacy because of its accretions in meaning and association with soft power [distinguished from the term strategic communication associated with hard power] he defines PD's purpose simply as, ' to engage publics who are relevant to the foreign policy purposes of the state. ' He posits that there are four recurring sets of ideas about the nature and purpose of this activity evident in the external communication approaches taken by nation states: 'as an extension of diplomacy, as an instrument of cultural relations, as an instrument of conflict, and as a tool of national image construction.' The value of this approach is that it is clarifying. While I have some differences in interpretation on the American experience based on my own service, I learned from Robin's insights and look forward to the book he promises. I  do agree that the cultural context matters. The political culture of the state drives how it sees the international environment and what and how it communicates externally. Robin makes that quite clear as he unpacks the four national approaches in his case studies. Carrying the comparison beyond Western nations will deepen the insight.”

On The Register - Daniela Swider, tukytam.blogspot.com: “(warning: this post is a little technical and may be a little dry for you if you are not interested in the Foreign Service) Yes, a little more than a year after I took the Foreign Service Officer Test (FSOT), I made it to The Register! For those of you outside the Foreign Service or new to this blog, The Register is the list to which you get added at the end of the process of becoming a Foreign Service Officer (FSO). It’s the list from which the State Department hires new diplomats. There are actually five registers – one for each of the five tracks of the Foreign Service (Political, Public Diplomacy, Economic, Management and Consular).”

RELATED ITEMS

Obama and Terror: The Hovering Questions - David Cole, New York Review of Books: While Obama has continued to employ tactics traditionally associated with war—military detention, killing, and war crimes trials—he has sought to reconcile those practices with the rule of law that Bush rejected. Where he has fallen short is not in fighting al-Qaeda, but in fighting his critics at home, and in failing to embrace the obligations of transparency and accountability so central to democratic legitimacy. And nowhere is the latter failing more evident than with respect to his aggressive but secretive exercise of the power to target and kill our “enemies.”

Unlike his predecessor, he has steered clear of the politics of fear, he has also steered clear of the politics of defending our ideals. Like many Democrats, he seems afraid of being painted as soft on terrorism if he advocates for respecting the rights of others. We can only hope that in a second term, with more confidence and an eye on his legacy rather than short-term polls, he will take on the defense of American ideals that he let pressure from the security bureaucracy and political caution stop him from pursuing in the first. Image from article, with caption: A Predator drone, armed with Hellfire missiles under each wing, flying a combat mission over southern Afghanistan, 2009

Syria Is Iraq - Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times: The kind of low-cost, remote-control, U.S./NATO midwifery that ousted Qaddafi and gave birth to a new Libya is not likely to be repeated in Syria.

Syria is harder. Syria is Iraq. And Iraq was such a bitter experience for America that we prefer never to speak of it again. But Iraq is relevant here. The only reason Iraq has any chance for a decent outcome today is because America was on the ground with tens of thousands of troops to act as that well-armed midwife, reasonably trusted and certainly feared by all sides, to manage Iraq’s transition to more consensual politics. Syria will require the same to have the same chance. Image from

Corruption Still Imperils Afghan Future—and U.S. Interests - Ben W. Heineman, Jr.: Power and Policy: The recurrent riddle of Afghanistan is that an effective Afghan Army and security effort depends on development of a legitimate Afghan state that can somehow command the allegiance of the disparate ethnic groups, develop accountable institutions and nurture an economy that does not depend on opium and can help government pay its bills without significant foreign aid. Yet that goal seems as much a chimera today as it did ten years ago when the U.S. began its Afghan misadventure.

What Iran Sanctions Can and Can't Do: Sanctions may not bring the mullahs to heel on nuclear arms, but they can help topple the regime - Emanuele Ottolenghi, Wall Street Journal: The West should finally abandon its hesitation and more openly and aggressively support efforts by Iran's opposition to bring about change inside their country. The sooner Iran's regime collapses, the better. The better-prepared Western powers are when that happens, the less likely a transition is to result in chaos and create a breeding ground for extremism.

Russian doctor declares war on McDonald’s ‘gamburgers’ - Kathy Lally, Washington Post: Until this week, Russians blissfully chomped away on their two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame-seed bun as if it were part of their birthright. The McDonald’s restaurants here always seem to be overflowing with young and old, Beeg Mak and Koka-Kola blissfully in hand. You could say they were lovin’ it.

Then, on Monday, Russia’s chief sanitary doctor and head of consumer protection offered a chilling warning, telling Russians to stop eating what they call gamburgers. “This is not our food,” declared the doctor, Gennady Onishchenko. Image from article, with caption: Since the first McDonald's opened in Moscow in 1990, Russians have grown to love their “gamburgers” and inexpensive drinks.

China censors coverage of deadly Beijing floods - AFP: Beijing authorities have reportedly ordered Chinese media to stick to positive news about record weekend floods, after the death of at least 37 people sparked fierce criticism of the government. Censors also deleted microblog posts criticising the official response to the disaster in China's rapidly modernising capital, which came at a time of heightened political sensitivity ahead of a 10-yearly handover of power.

City propaganda chief Lu Wei told media outlets to stick to stories of "achievements worthy of praise and tears", the Beijing Times daily reported, as authorities tried to stem a tide of accusations that they failed to do enough. Image from article

Hong Kong schools get mainland propaganda - Cyril Pereira, asiasentinel.com: On July 29, dismayed parents and students in Hong Kong’s public schools intend to march on the city’s government offices to protest a plan quietly hatched by the administration of former Hong Kong Chief executive Donald Tsang to launch a controversial “patriotic education” program for schools extolling the virtues of the mainland.

The government has quietly provided HK$13 million taxpayer dollars to the Hong Kong Patriotic Education Services Centre to produce a 34-page booklet titled ‘Chinese Model National Conditions Teaching Manual’ for Hong Kong schools. How this came to be without proper public consultation, professional vetting or Legislative Council debate, remains yet another mystery in misgovernance. Image from article, with caption: Look for the Little Red Book

Hollywood’s War on American Youth: “Dark Knight”, Aurora, Colorado, and America’s Culture of Violence - John Reimann, weknowwhatsup.blogspot.com: A film that set a record $160 million in earnings in its first week in US theaters cannot be ignored. Especially when a gunman interrupted it in Aurora, Colorado, shooting 70 people and killing twelve. But The Dark Knight Rises is nothing but crude Corporate America propaganda, and its success is the result of media propaganda plus the longer term affects of Corporate America’s propaganda war on American youth. In fact, this film exemplifies this propaganda war on several levels, one of which is absolutely blatant.

The Aurora Massacre and the 'Propaganda of the Deed' - William Norman Grigg, lewrockwell.com: The Dark Knight Rises is the capstone to the highly acclaimed trilogy that resurrected the Batman film franchise. Director Christopher Nolan, widely regarded as a gifted and provocative filmmaker, has described the film as a "war movie," one that unabashedly addresses class conflict and institutional corruption. Partisan pundits have attempted to shoehorn the movie into the pre-fabricated categories that have been superimposed on contemporary politics. Noting the incidental similarity between the villain’s name and Mitt Romney’s Bain venture capitalist firm, Rush Limbaugh denounced Nolan for creating a Democratic Party agitprop film. Salon critic Andrew O’Hehir manages to outbid Limbaugh’s foolishness by describing the movie as an "evil" and "fascistic" masterpiece. The enigmatic, hyper-violent criminal named Bane assault on Gotham was an cinematic example of "The Propaganda of the Deed" – a conspicuous act of violence used as a "sudden, violent shock" to shatter the status quo and catalyze revolutionary change. Immediately after demolishing much of Gotham City, Bane – backed by a mercenary army – imposes martial law and revolutionary "justice" in terms very familiar to collectivist "people’s revolutions" from Jacobin France to Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge.

Here’s What Apple Propoganda [sic] Looked Like In The ’90’s [Gallery] - Buster Heine, cultofmac.com: It’s hard to believe that Apple ever faced a time where most consumers thought Macs are underpowered, pricey heaps of junk.

But back in 1997 things were not looking good for Apple and it was hard to convince people that buying a Mac was worth it. The answer? Create a CD full of Apple propaganda that fans can use to convince their friends to buy a Mac. Image from entry

AMERICANA

Buyers flock to gun stores in Colorado after rampage - Douglas Stanglin, USA Today:  Background checks -- the first step toward the purchase of a gun in Colorado -- jumped 43% in the aftermath of a shooting rampage in Aurora that killed 12 people last Friday, The Denver Post reports. Firearms instructors also note increased interest in the training required for obtaining a concealed-carry permit.

Why we no longer feel rested after taking a vacation - Jayne Clark, USA Today: If it seems like vacations aren't as rejuvenating as they used to be, maybe it's because more people are spending more time working when they're off the clock. Or so say a couple of new polls. Almost 60% of respondents to a survey out today say taking a vacation doesn't relieve their stress. And more than a quarter say they're even more stressed when they return to work after taking time off. The survey of 1,000 workers (both bosses and underlings) in a range of professions was conducted by Fierce, Inc., a leadership development and training company. The findings are in line with a related survey reported in Talent Management Magazine earlier this month that says more than half of U.S. employees say they will work during their summer vacation. The majority of the 2,000-plus workers queried said they'd be reading e-mails, taking phone calls and various other work-related tasks while on vacation. That's up 6% from a similar survey last year by the Harris Poll/Adweek.

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