Umm, the entire system is propaganda. The president has a bully pulpit and that drives the news.
Meanwhile, from your selective editing (nice bit of propaganda, yourself!) Russert is asking the exact questions that needed to be asked at that time.
Still, no journalist was going to be able to dispute a deceptive administration on the WMDs. Their only hope was to question the evidence. And Russert did exactly that.
What did you want from him? To call Cheney a liar to his face? Based on what? As it is, he was incredulous at the aluminum tubes.
My edits crossed your post. I pointed out the parts that are clearly propaganda techniques. It isn't propaganda for me to quote him like this. I just located the examples of subtle propaganda.
See, the entire system isn't supposed to be propaganda. Thats why we have a first amendment. To prevent exactly that. It's not a defense of Tim.
Russert pretended to question them to help Dick Cheney lay out his case. That's his role. This is not actual questioning. That's the message control his press person testified about Russert giving. Look at the subtle linguistic structure of what he's saying. Propaganda.
I wanted him to not ask questions that subtly presuppose the exact things Dick Cheney is trying to deceive the ameriacn people into believing. I wanted him not to work off the record with Cheney's press people before the interviews. I wanted him to tell us when a powerful corrupt person slips instead of later taking it off the record (this is not about the live interviews, but the stuff on background and stuff like that).
How could you possibly know he was "pretending"? I suppose he was faking the incredulity at the aluminum tubes too?
Journalists cover the news. They don't make it. Unfortunately, the system is unable to ferret out truth, no matter how much you'd like to believe otherwise. We were failed by a good many journalists who failed to ask the right questions. Russert wasn't one of them. The transcript shows exactly that.
Better, what's one question he didn't ask that he should have in that interview? Name one.
If people are debating whether or not Hussein is obtaining aluminum tubes for his WMDs (the ones he has "too") the propagandist wins. When Russert postures like this, he's miming the false dichotomy the propagandist wants people to be arguing. The question being debated covertly contains the information the propagandist wants to convey (the propagandist doesn't care about the thing being debated). In this way, the fact the propagandist wants to convey sinks into both sides of the superficial argument. Russert's skepticism of these tubes is a textbook example of this mode of propaganda.
"Hussein has the tubes for his WMD program." "There is no evidence he has tubes for his WMD program." People here "WMD program" 20 times. Who cares about the tubes, that's where the propaganda is working.
I don't think he was evil. I think he got in over his head and then was so interested in keeping his power and access he let himself be available to be manipulated.
I would of wanted him to ask about the way Cheney's press office handled the run up to the interview, and what he knew about the way his press office was setting up his interviews.
"I would of wanted him to ask about the way Cheney's press office handled the run up to the interview, and what he knew about the way his press office was setting up his interviews."
Wow, that would have been insightful.
Meanwhile, you're naive if you think the President (and VP) doesn't set the national agenda. The problem is not enough journalists questioned that agenda. Russert wasn't one of them.
Russert asked the questions. That's more than 99% of the journalists did at the same time. I simply don't see how you can blame him because the answers were deceptive. He was never going to be in a position to prove the administration wrong (nor any journalist).
I don't think the presidents prerogative to set the agenda extends to colluding with a supposedly free press to deceive the american public. The way Russert questioned the VP was part of that collusion.
(Hey, I noticed you're a neuroscientist. If we're going to be typing back and forth, I'd rather be picking your brain about that then spending one more second of my life thinking about Tim Russert.)
Your evidence of "collusion" is your ability to read between the lines of linguistic cues? I'm shocked, shocked!, you're not a journalist with those investigative skills.
I wouldn't have engaged you on this topic if I didn't find your comments so distasteful and dirty. I had hoped to find a rational perspective behind that emotion. Clearly, it's all emotion.
My evidence of collusion includes the quotes by Tim and Cheney's press person at the Scooter Libby trial, and these quotes. These are not little linguistic tics, but well documented propaganda techniques.
What you find dirty and distasteful is the fact that you are going to inevitably die, and could drop dead any second like Tim did, not my comments. Confronted by the sudden death of someone you liked, and attacks on him, you attack back, as if by refuting the attacks on him you can fight back against the inevitability of death.
Because I don't care about the fact I'm dying, I do not let death cloud my judgement of the recently dead. This gives me a freedom to objectively judge them and the impact they have had on the world. Not respecting the taboo on death makes groups that are obsessively afraid of death not like me very much.
This is the first time in my life I've been called too emotional and not rational enough. I'll take it as a compliment, I guess. Most people tell me I don't seem like I have emotions. I get vulcan a lot. Never too emotional. So, thanks!
It's easier to think some guy you talked to online is an ass (which I am. don't care) then admit you've been fooled by a propagandist for 5 years, especially right after a shocking death. I don't expect to change your mind. I'm sorry for your sense of loss, and hope you'll eventually reconsider in light of what will be revealed about this time over the next few years.
Russert, no matter how much you may personally dislike him, did his job and did it well. The wide-spread reaction to his death show better the role he played in an industry that is far from perfect.
As for "this time", the evidence has already been made obvious. The administration gamed the case for war. No journalist was going to prove them wrong then. Russert asked the questions that needed to be asked. If only half of his peers did the same, we may have been in a different world today.
LPTS -- I haven't had a lot to say to you on this thread. I think you're sadly off in your own world somewhere, but hey, we all have to live somewhere. I just didn't see the point of trying to chase you down over HN. Logic and language games are always fun -- another reason I like politics so much.
Part of this comment, however, deserves a reply. I can see where people think you're not very emotional and you would feel complimented by being called emotional. I would ask you to honestly consider that all people are emotional creatures. The more you've heard in your life how logical you are, the more you've probably bought into it. It's a lie.
Rule #1: People believe what they want to believe and use their mind and reasoning capability to justify it.
Rule #2: This is always easy to see in other people but tough as heck to see in yourself.
I post this because HN is full of bright, ambitious people. We're just the type of people to be logical, analytical, cold, etc. The sooner we all realize that introspection is more valuable than argument, the sooner we can work more effectively as a team. You see, good teams are full of these broken mammals called humans, each looking out after the other guy's blind spots. It's not a Vulcan debating society.
I'm not emotional. You are wrong that everyone is emotional to some degree. Your rules are also wrong in certain cases. I would say more in email. Too far off topic here.
I'm looking out for the blind spots of all my teammates who are deluded into lionizing a propagandist because they thought he was entertaining on TV or have problems relating to death. I love my teammates so much that I'm willing to do this even though their pain around death and stupid conventions make them not like it. Like some sort of 21rst century Bodhisattva, I'm sacrificing my accumulated karma points to help all beings on hacker news. :)
When I worked with people on hospice, my clients seemed to really like me because most people treated them like they were dying or already dead and I naturally treated them like they were still alive. So my atypical reaction to the taboo about death isn't all bad. Dying people really liked that I wasn't emotionally affected by their death (they know their dying, they don't want everyone to be constantly reminding them of that by the way they act, because then their death costs them the rest of their human interaction too). But the survivors and mourners of dead people? Not so much into my attitude (except the ones that saw me work with their loved ones, and the nurses).
Meanwhile, from your selective editing (nice bit of propaganda, yourself!) Russert is asking the exact questions that needed to be asked at that time.
Still, no journalist was going to be able to dispute a deceptive administration on the WMDs. Their only hope was to question the evidence. And Russert did exactly that.
What did you want from him? To call Cheney a liar to his face? Based on what? As it is, he was incredulous at the aluminum tubes.