Oh yes, the mainstream media is a psy-op. Read the European media, or media elsewhere, I�m fairly certain that there is a concerted effort to keep the American people in the dark. This may or may not be news to you, it probably shouldn�t be to anyone, but if Americans are preoccupied with bread and circuses -- like American Idol and lost teenage schoolgirls -- and can�t even point to the next locale that they are going to bomb on an atlas or a map; then the powers that be have been successful.

For anyone who didn�t get the lost schoolgirl reference, I heard a comparison who recently related the Natalie Holloway coverage to that of the current oil spill. The Holloway coverage, of course, dwarfed the coverage of the Gulf of Mexico environmental disaster, and it reminded me of what the �big� story was before 9/11; which was, of course, Chandra Levy. Chandra Levy was not a teenage schoolgirl, but she was a young woman.

The media loves to cover the story of some slasher, presumably lurking, omnipresent, out there in the woods. The slasher that takes your investments and life�s savings, and leaves you living in your vehicle isn�t the corporate media�s slasher du jour. This sort of slasher may exist on Wall Street, or in corporate board rooms, and may impose countless more destruction of human lives -- and probably even spills two to three times as much blood -- but the corporate media, would rather cover the other variety of inhuman sociopathic misanthrope. The kind that they take greater purpose and initiative and joie de vivre in reporting on.

Sometimes the corporate MSM are browbeaten into covering the Ken Lays, or other corporate miscreants of the world, but these sorts of slashers are apparently not the equivalent to their understanding of WMD. They are more aptly categorized as the conventional, run of the mill variety of serial mass murderers. This slasher is more like a tire slasher than the kind of slasher that disappears and does all manner of sordid and reprehensible things to its prey.

I like to observe, from a distance, how the MSM is trying to warp minds, and to watch these �sage� know-nothings that they absurdly refer to as pundits. It�s sad, ultimately, because I think that they are an extraordinary success. They are successful at imposing a straitjacket on what is �acceptable� for the national political discussion and policy �debate.� A debate that excludes a rigorous critique of all the principles and everything addressing anything other than Band-Aid solutions for what ails this world.

But that�s all the news that�s fit to print -- or broadcast -- apparently, when the goal is not to inform, but produce a finished product that is amenable. Amenable to an agenda for the few at the expense of the vast majority of the people; an agenda that blankets the AM radio airwaves and at least some of the cable �news� channels. The rest of the �mainstream� media are no shrinking violet from this sort of message either, they just gift wrap it better, and engage in much more of a soft sell. They are like referees for power, who are taking bets on the games. The Chicago Black Sox of radio, television, and newspapers; X-ing off, what�s �off the reservation� and adding highlighter marks to what charms the bourgeoisie.

And ultimately, just as the bourgeoisie controls the means of production, they control the means of propaganda too. Who ever thought that the media could take shape any differently? That they could stick to facts and uncover the hard truths and stand up to the powerful conglomerations? That was just, undoubtedly, some wild-eyed dreamer�s long since forgotten view of what the fourth estate could actually be about. Now it�s just another docile, subservient arm of the corporatocracy -- and capable of a radical disinformation effort unlike that of which the world has ever seen before.