Nexus - 0601 - New Times Magazine-pages

Page Content (OCR)

tral bank. First of all, they had seen how the privately owned British central bank, the Bank of England, had run up the British national debt to such an extent that Parliament had been forced to place unfair taxes on the American colonies. In fact, Ben Franklin claimed that this was the real cause of the American Revolution. Most of the founding fathers realised the potential dangers of banking and feared bankers’ accumulation of wealth and power. Thomas Jefferson put it this way: I sincerely believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a money aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs. in less than twenty-four hours. The man who would be so foolish as to write his honest opinion would soon be on the streets in search of another job. It is the duty of a New York journalist to lie, to distort, to revile, to toady at the feet of Mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread—or, what amounts to the same thing, his salary. We are the tools and the vassals of the rich behind the scenes. We are marionettes. These men pull the strings and we dance. Our time, our talents, our lives, our capacities are all the property of these men. We are intellectual prostitutes. (Quoted by T. St John Gaffney in Breaking The Silence, p. 4.) to to the people to whom it properly belongs. That was the US press in 1953. It is the mass media of America today. Press control and, later, electronic media (radio and TV) Jefferson's succinct statement is in fact the solution to most of control were seized in carefully planned steps, yielding the pre- our economic problems today. sent situation in which all major mass media and the critically James Madison, the main author of the Constitution, agreed. It important major reporting services, which are the source of most is interesting that he called those behind the central bank scheme news stories, are controlled by the Money Changers. ‘the Money Changers’. Madison strongly criticised their actions: Representative Callaway discussed some of this press control in History records that the Money Changers have used every form the Congressional Record (vol. 54, 9 February 1917, p. 2947): of abuse, intrigue, deceit and violent means possible to main - In March 1915, the J. P. Morgan interests, the steel, shipbuild - tain their control over governments by controlling money and ing and powder interests and their subsidiary organizations, its issuance. got together 12 men high up in the newspaper world and employed The battle over who gets to issue | The battle over who gets to issue them to select the most influential our money has been the pivotal issue newspapers in the United States, through the history of the United our money has been the pivotal and sufficient number of them to States. Wars have been fought over issue through the history... control generally the policy of the it. Depressions have been caused to daily press... acquire it. And yet, after World War They found it was only neces - I this battle was rarely mentioned in Wars have been fought over it. wk to purchase the conirol of 25 newspapers or history books. q of the greatest papers... An agree - Depressions have been caused ment was reached; the policy of Media Complicity ire i the papers was bought, to be paid By World War I, the Money to acqu e t. for by the month; an editor was Changers with their dominant wealth furnished for each paper to prop - had seized control of most of the US erly supervize and edit informa - press. tion regarding the questions of preparedness, militarism, finan - In a 1912 Senate Privileges and Elections Committee hearing, a cial policies, and other things of national and international letter was introduced to the Committee, written n by Representative nature considered vital to the interests of the purchasers. Tacanh Cihlay (DAV a Dao ta Tahn 1 Wars have been fought over it. Depressions have been caused aa to acquire it. press. In a 1912 Senate Privileges and Elections Committee hearing, a letter was introduced to the Committee, written by Representative Joseph Sibley (PA), a Rockefeller agent in Congress, to John D. Archbold, a Standard Oil employee of Rockefeller. It read in norte A few years ago, three-quarters of the majority stockholders of ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN were banks—such as Chase Manhattan Corp., Citibank, Morgan Guaranty Trust and Bank of America. Ten such corporations controlled 59 magazines (includ- ing Time and Newsweek), 58 newspapers (including the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal), and var- ious motion-picture companies, giving the major Wall Street banks virtually total ownership of the mass media with few excep- tions (such as Disney's purchase of ABC). Only 50 cities in America now have more than one daily paper, and they are often owned by the same group. Only about 25 per cent of the nation's 1,500 daily papers are independently owned. This concentration has been rapidly accelerating in recent years and ownership is nearly monolithic now, reflecting the identical control described above. Of course, much care is taken to fool the public with the appearance of competition by maintaining differ- ent corporate logos, anchorpersons and other trivia, projecting a sense of objectivity that belies the uniform underlying bank own- ership and editorial control. This accounts for the total blackout on news coverage and investigative reporting on banker control of the country. part: An efficient literary bureau is needed, not for a day or a crisis but a permanent healthy control of the Associated Press and kindred avenues. It will cost money but will be cheapest in the end. John Swinton, the former Chief of Staff of the New York Times, called by his peers "the Dean of his profession", was asked in 1953 to give a toast before the New York Press Club. He responded with the following statement: There is no such thing as an independent press in America, if we except that of little country towns. You know this and I know it. Not a man among you dares to utter his honest opin - ion. Were you to utter it, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. Tam paid one hundred and fifty dollars a week so that I may keep my honest opinion out of the newspaper for which I write. You, too, are paid similar salaries for similar services. Were I to permit that a single edition of my newspaper contained an honest opinion, my occupation—like Othello's—would be gone NEXUS - 13 DECEMBER 1998 - JANUARY 1999