Julian Assange Talk Show on RT channel
assange.rt.com
assange.rt.com
Once they report about Russia, it snaps to "Putin is God, anyone not agreeing with him should be put to jail" mode.
And the US, sometimes. It seems that "sticking it to America" is the main reason RT was created in the first place, so it shows in some of their US coverage.
Nevertheless, we don't live in an ideal world and I think it's good to have both RT and Western media, and all those news sources in between.
This has also been my experience with Al Jazeera English. This sort of thing makes me wonder what other sorts of things are not as portrayed to us in the 'free' world.
I know such stories are probably handled by a different bureau, and that pretty much every major news organization is bad at understanding/presenting the internet (especially as of several years ago). But it makes me wonder what else might be off in their coverage of topics I don't know as well.
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[0] Sorry, I cannot readily find a link, so this is just my personal libel for now.
Nobody is perfect I suppose. I mostly stick to getting world news from AJE/BBC type sources and try to get closer to the horses mouth for anything tech related in the slightest.
A pretty clear example of this was the time leading up to the latest invasion of Iraq. At the time, a majority of Americans seemed to literally believe that Iraq was a threat to the US. I remember a survey at the time saying that the majority of the population in every other country in the world was opposed to the invasion. The US was going to war based on the claim that Iraq was a threat to US, which most commentators in my end of the world doubted. A different picture was apparently presented to US audiences.
But I'd much rather see what both sides have to say about the war then just believe the US lies or half-truths. Perspective is good. People should be able to tell if it was the US that caused the war or UK, and how it all came to be.
Now, the US-UK war scenario may be very unlikely, but you can replace UK with any Middle East country, and I believe the same is true.
It is hard not to believe the popular charges against RT after this.
Only the rules of validity that restrict all statements, such as the law of non-contradiction. Individuals such as yourself are the only agent of restriction for all sources of news.
You might enjoy the interviews of Jan Helfeld, who attempts to hold journalists and foreign policy officials to the law of noncontradiction: http://www.youtube.com/user/janhelfeld
I consider The Economist to be a perfect example of this. They are quite openly biased to supporting the virtues of free trade and free markets. No one thinks this is a bad thing and allows them to present that position quite freely. We all have biases and pretending that you can report on news impartially is silly and deceptive.
However, the next few episodes are quite nuanced, so that's fine. I am still quite unsure what to think about him being on Russia Today, though
Full Analysis and links: http://www.salon.com/2012/04/18/attacks_on_rt_and_assange_re...
What's missing from the analysis is degrees of imperfection. RT will tout the Kremlin line even to the point of being comical. Even if Assange's show doesn't contribute to this, he still serves to legitimise the rest of the channel. He is extremely naive if he doesn't think he's going to be a cog in RT and Putin spinning itself and Russia as a home to disenfranchised and persecuted western intellectuals - while conveniently not mentioning the fact that disenfranchised Russian intellectuals, especially of the journalist variety, have a nasty habit of dying young - which is very unlike their western counterparts.
You might feel that the viewpoint of RT is no less objectionable than the viewpoints of the other news organizations you mention. Others disagree.
Btw, our real democracy harasses people who are critical of the US gov. E.g., see David House.
So yeah, the US is a _real_ democracy _if_ you happen to be a rich white man. Not unlike Russia.
US politicians are passing voter repression laws in states with the specific aim of making it harder for voters to vote. Not to mention the gerrymandering of districts.
In the US people are assassinated and jailed for being against the government. Anwar Al-Awlaki and Tarek Mehanna.
As for being against USA government, obviously Amazon, Visa and Mastercard's suddenly decided to stop Wikileaks was due to their own decision, not by a visiting congressman?
Unfamiliar with RT? Watch Live and decide for yourself:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/02/22/unrelea... An ex-wikileaks member disagreed with wikileaks and 'destroyed' information by destroying the keys. Wikileaks said BoA documents were part of them.