The War on Propaganda

“The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it.” Joseph Goebbels

There is no shame in artists receiving monetary compensation to sell ideas, products or a presidential agenda. When everything is transparent and contracted aboveboard, this is called advertising. When this process is whispered into being, strategized and set into motion from the shadows of government and from behind closed doors, it is propaganda.

From Sun Tzu to Psy Ops, propaganda has won wars, toppled cultures and changed civilizations. As a self-identified enlightened and educated culture, we  thought ourselves beyond such base manipulation. We were wrong.

Where were the voices of dissent on the NEA conference call when so called “artists” were asked to further the President’s agenda?

I have danced ballets and I have done commercials; one side art, the other side business. What side were the NEA recipients on? (more…)

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Tags: 9/12 DC rally, Constitution Revolution, Goebbels, hate speech, Hitler
Posted Oct 5th 2009 at 6:46 am in Entertainment, Politics | 23500294 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/cburgard/2009/10/05/the-war-on-propaganda/The+War+on+Propaganda+2009-10-05+13%3A46%3A35Chris+Burgard

Message Overdrive in ObamaWorld

According to a new study from Accuracy in Media, the Obama administration spends $100,000 per week on message control.  It seems in ObamaWorld, a picture is worth a thousand paychecks — $5 million a year distributed in salaries alone.  Everyone from ethnocentric Message Coordinators to Town Hall Organizers to Speechwriters will divvy it all up.

One of the little secrets in ObamaWorld is that, while the President made good on his promise not to raise salaries, he quietly added more high paid staff. Lots more. Hence, an army of image makers are paid by taxpayers to ensure the president’s message saturates the daytime airwaves, grocery aisle rags, demographically desirable blogs and that twitters are at full tilt.  Or, is that twit? (more…)

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Tags: Accuracy in Media, bush, communication, Goebbels, Obama
Posted Jul 10th 2009 at 7:04 am in Politics | 178990109 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jmeath/2009/07/10/message-overdrive-in-obamaworld/Message+Overdrive+in+ObamaWorld2009-07-10+14%3A04%3A23Jason+Killian+Meath

On the Record, Off the QT and Not Very Hush-Hush

Dear Big Hollywood readers, it gives me great satisfaction to report to you that BH has been out on point not only on compelling film industry issues, which will never be covered in promo rags like Variety and the Hollywood Reporter (but then again, AMPAS and the studios aren’t buying us off), but on many controversial issues being played out in America and the greater world at large as well.

I know this to be true. Being a news junkie myself, I have found time after time as I was reading about a supposedly breaking subject, like ABC’s recent coverage of the targeted LGBT murders in Iraq, that it had already been on display for all to see in Big Hollywood posts for months.

Not to toot my own horn, but…well, okay, I’m tooting my own horn. And those of Andy Breitbart and John Nolte, who have given I, and so many other wonderful and insightful Hollywood right-wing fringe types, a magnificent bullhorn we otherwise would not have. We appear to be doing the dirty jobs our media just refuses to do. It’s a labor Hercules would completely sympathize with. (more…)

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Tags: abc, Academy of Motion Picture arts and Sciences, Adrianne Curry, Ali al-Sistani, AMPAS
Posted Jun 3rd 2009 at 5:20 pm in Entertainment, Politics | 1476823 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jtsimpson/2009/06/03/on-the-record-off-the-qt-and-not-very-hush-hush/On+the+Record%2C+Off+the+QT+and+Not+Very+Hush-Hush2009-06-04+00%3A20%3A57John+T.+Simpson

From Fourth Estate to Fourth Branch of Government

I remember when the term investigative journalism used to mean something. My first introduction to it was through Peter Maas’ seminal classic The Valachi Papers at the tender age of eleven. Hooked me right away. A year later, at the age of twelve,  I devoured William L. Shirer’s monumental and award-winning ‘Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany.’ A very heady 1250 pages of fine print in paperback, and I do mean fine print. Worth its weight in gold.

From that point on, I was addicted. I couldn’t get enough of Peter Maas, Robin Moore, Woodward and Bernstein, Nick Pileggi, Ovid Demaris, James Bamford, James Michener, Cornelius Ryan, anything from the Ballantine Espionage/Intelligence Library, and too many others to list here.

I only recently read Michener’s The Bridge at Andau, an account of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising based on hundreds of eyewitness accounts, written in novelized form to protect identities at the time. It takes you right into the chaotic and revolutionary Bupapest of the day as though you were there. (more…)

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Tags: abc, Albert Speer, Arthur Sulzberger, Ballantine Espionage/Intelligence Library, cbs
Posted Apr 27th 2009 at 8:40 am in Media Criticism, Politics | 1147024 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jtsimpson/2009/04/27/from-fourth-estate-to-fourth-branch-of-government/From+Fourth+Estate+to+Fourth+Branch+of+Government2009-04-27+15%3A40%3A43John+T.+Simpson