“Disinformation” and the mainstream media

In the political realm, all sides are guilty of promoting disinformation. It really is a “reader beware” situation in that the intelligent consumer of news should assess information critically and sensibly. Not trusting in news reports simply because they come from “their side.”
So, while I have been critical of “our” mainstream media, in this respect, I must acknowledge there are rare examples where it will allow the truth to break through. Ironically, I see the video above from the New York Times as the exception proving the rule.
The video shows burning of “aid” trucks on the Venezuelan-Columbian border – widely reported by “our” media and politicians as an act of infamy by the Venezuelan side. Readers of alternative media know better having already seen videos showing use of Molotov cocktails by anti-Venezuelan protesters. But now, the New York Times, shows “our” mainstream media and politicians were wrong. And this disinformation, together with its multiplication by prominent USA politicians, had serious consequences. Not only in spreading more anti-Venezuelan propaganda, but in the US imposing even more sanctions on that suffering country.

Sources our mainstream media uses to promote their narrative about Syria

No, I haven’t gone to the dark side.

But I do find this video interesting. The interviewer is Bilal Abdul Kareem who claims to be from On the Ground News. He is one of the sources used extensively by the western Mainstream media in their reporting of the battle for Aleppo, and of Syrian war in general. He allies himself with the “terrorists”/”rebels” and obviously has strong ideological commitments to them.

The guy he is interviewing is the “rebel”/”terrorist” leader of the jihadists in east Aleppo before it was liberated – Abu Abd.

Of course, one must take with many grains of salt talk about “liberation”, “freedom” and sympathy for “human rights” from such people. But they certainly make no secret of the funding and other support they were getting from external patron countries – and their bitterness they didn’t get more – or more foreign mercenary fighters. The interview also makes clear what a shambles these groups were in, which gives credence to frequent reports of “rebel”/terrorist” groups in Syria regularly getting into internal armed conflicts.

Incidentally,  the western mainstream media did often use Bilal Abdul Kareem as a source in their reporting of the Aleppo battle (recall how they are always attributing their information to “activists”) and they still use him.  That media used his “last” video message from east Aleppo as the jihadists there surrendered. But they did not use all his material.

This is one video the mainstream media refused – showing how the jihadists in east Aleppo refused humanitarian and prevented it getting into their area. Just didn’t  fit with their narrative of blaming Syria and the Russian Federation for the inability of aid organisations to get humanitarian aid into the area.

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