This is an excellent new article just submitted by OIC Chairman James Norwood concerning the birth of modern political propaganda in the United States, and it includes references to the JFK assassination.
George Creel, the “Four-Minute Men,” and the Birth of American Propaganda
by James Norwood
Submitted to the Members of OIC
by James Norwood
Submitted to the Members of OIC
Introduction
It is difficult for the general public to grasp the concept of President Kennedy’s death as the result of a coup d’état and how the assassination could have been covered up through the efforts of such a revered national figure as J. Edgar Hoover and a blue-ribbon panel of men who comprised the Warren Commission.
One way to understand our history is through the lens of propaganda. As any student of the JFK assassination knows, the mainstream media has failed to inform the American public about the true story of the assassination. To the present day, the media remains blind to the overwhelming evidence that reveals the truth of this historical event.
The purpose of this commentary is to explore the birth of modern propaganda in America. The numbing of the American mind has been a slow, steady process over the past century. The pivotal juncture was the period of the United States’ participation in World War I. This was the crucible of our nation’s entrance onto the world’s stage as a power broker, and it marked the birth of modern propaganda in America.
What is Propaganda?
The word propaganda is derived from the Latin propagare, meaning “to spread.” The first great wave of literary propaganda was in the area of religious ideology, as expressed in the tracts of the sixteenth century. These writings were literally intended to spread or “to propagate” the faith.
The Protestant Reformation might not have occurred without the invention of moveable type and the new medium of printing. Martin Luther’s magnificent translation of the New Testament into German in 1522 and his subsequent German translation of the Old Testament in 1534 were enormously influential in the new religious reform movement. But Luther also published pamphlets, treatises, hymns, and sermons, setting in motion an event that he had never imagined—a full break with the Church of Rome. Between 1520 and 1526, six thousand different religious pamphlets were published in the German-speaking world, of which 1,700 were different editions of more than a dozen works of Luther.
The propaganda of the Reformation era sought to promote a single religious point of view at the exclusion of all others. There was no concept of tolerance or diversity. From the monomaniacal position of the authors of the religious tracts, the predictable result was sustained war within Christendom. The Thirty Years War (1618-48) took the lives of millions, reducing the region of Germany to a waste land. The conflicts that fired the zeal of the religious factions were inflamed by religious propaganda.
In understanding the true nature of propaganda, the operative word is “one” point of view. Any dissenting perspectives will be forced to remain outside the circle of accepted discourse.
The Far-Reaching Influence of World War I
The diplomat George F. Kennan called the First World War “the great seminal catastrophe.” This was the first occasion when the reach of American foreign policy extended to a foreign war on a vast scale. The event set America on a course that would culminate in our nation’s self-appointed role as policeman of the world.
Modern American political propaganda was born during the presidency of Woodrow Wilson, who needed popular opinion on his side in order to sell the nation on the importance of a massive commitment to foreign war. It was in the area of propaganda that Wilson sought to promote his idea of a “crusade for democracy.” During Wilson’s second term in office, a concerted effort was made to inculcate the American people in the nation’s new international role through the uses of propaganda on a grand scale.
By the time Wilson was preparing his Fourteen Points as a blueprint for world peace at the close of the Great War, a new governmental committee had been formed, which was known as “the Inquiry.” Ostensibly functioning as an advisory group, the Inquiry was a secret council—a “think tank” that would shape policy. When Wilson set sail for Europe on December 4, 1918, to attend the Paris peace talks, the Inquiry was already becoming a Frankenstein. According to historian A. Scott Berg, “this secret council on foreign affairs had, as the times suddenly demanded, become the nation’s first central intelligence agency.”
Who was George Creel?
Born the son of an alcoholic father in 1876, George Edward Creel grew up in Missouri. Through the influence of his mother, Creel cultivated a love of history and literature. He began to work as a journalist, writing satirical jokes for publications of both William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer in New York. He returned to the Midwest, starting his own newspaper, The Kansas City Independent, in 1899.
After establishing his reputation as an investigative journalist, Creel was appointed head of the U.S. Committee on Public Information (CPI) in 1917. Established by President Wilson, the CPI’s goal was to rally popular support for the war and to spread the “Gospel of Americanism” throughout the world. In his memoir, How We Advertised America, Creel wrote that “the trial of strength was not only between massed bodies of armed men, but between opposed ideals, and moral verdicts took on all the value of military decision.”
CPI booklets were published singing the praises of different aspects of the American Dream. With a personnel of 150,000, the CPI blanketed the nation with publications supporting the war effort. Another team of writers prepared a daily newspaper. In the area of international relations, Creel hired Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud, to head the foreign branch of the CPI. Drawing upon the psychological theories of his famous uncle, Bernays focused his foreign campaign on a strong appeal to human emotion. Small CPI offices were opened in major international capitals. For Creel, “every conceivable means was used to reach the foreign mind with America’s message.”
Who were the “Four-Minute Men”?
Thousands upon thousands of amateur orators were enlisted for appearances in public gatherings, especially movie theaters. In the age of pre-electronic media, the goal was direct contact with large groups of people. The speakers were called the “Four-Minute Men” due to the brief yet gripping experience of their short speeches. As America was about to enter the war, it is estimated that in eighteen months, a million oratorical performances were heard by 400 million spectators in the United States. The number includes people who heard the talks many times over. The topics included such themes as “Maintaining Morals and Morale,” food conservation, and Liberty Loans. Creel’s goal was for the speeches to have the effect of “shrapnel” on audiences. The intended result was nothing less than the acceptance of a new “war culture” in America.
In the CPI guidelines, speakers were told the following:
--“The speech must not be longer than four minutes, which means there is no time for a single wasted word.”
It is difficult for the general public to grasp the concept of President Kennedy’s death as the result of a coup d’état and how the assassination could have been covered up through the efforts of such a revered national figure as J. Edgar Hoover and a blue-ribbon panel of men who comprised the Warren Commission.
One way to understand our history is through the lens of propaganda. As any student of the JFK assassination knows, the mainstream media has failed to inform the American public about the true story of the assassination. To the present day, the media remains blind to the overwhelming evidence that reveals the truth of this historical event.
The purpose of this commentary is to explore the birth of modern propaganda in America. The numbing of the American mind has been a slow, steady process over the past century. The pivotal juncture was the period of the United States’ participation in World War I. This was the crucible of our nation’s entrance onto the world’s stage as a power broker, and it marked the birth of modern propaganda in America.
What is Propaganda?
The word propaganda is derived from the Latin propagare, meaning “to spread.” The first great wave of literary propaganda was in the area of religious ideology, as expressed in the tracts of the sixteenth century. These writings were literally intended to spread or “to propagate” the faith.
The Protestant Reformation might not have occurred without the invention of moveable type and the new medium of printing. Martin Luther’s magnificent translation of the New Testament into German in 1522 and his subsequent German translation of the Old Testament in 1534 were enormously influential in the new religious reform movement. But Luther also published pamphlets, treatises, hymns, and sermons, setting in motion an event that he had never imagined—a full break with the Church of Rome. Between 1520 and 1526, six thousand different religious pamphlets were published in the German-speaking world, of which 1,700 were different editions of more than a dozen works of Luther.
The propaganda of the Reformation era sought to promote a single religious point of view at the exclusion of all others. There was no concept of tolerance or diversity. From the monomaniacal position of the authors of the religious tracts, the predictable result was sustained war within Christendom. The Thirty Years War (1618-48) took the lives of millions, reducing the region of Germany to a waste land. The conflicts that fired the zeal of the religious factions were inflamed by religious propaganda.
In understanding the true nature of propaganda, the operative word is “one” point of view. Any dissenting perspectives will be forced to remain outside the circle of accepted discourse.
The Far-Reaching Influence of World War I
The diplomat George F. Kennan called the First World War “the great seminal catastrophe.” This was the first occasion when the reach of American foreign policy extended to a foreign war on a vast scale. The event set America on a course that would culminate in our nation’s self-appointed role as policeman of the world.
Modern American political propaganda was born during the presidency of Woodrow Wilson, who needed popular opinion on his side in order to sell the nation on the importance of a massive commitment to foreign war. It was in the area of propaganda that Wilson sought to promote his idea of a “crusade for democracy.” During Wilson’s second term in office, a concerted effort was made to inculcate the American people in the nation’s new international role through the uses of propaganda on a grand scale.
By the time Wilson was preparing his Fourteen Points as a blueprint for world peace at the close of the Great War, a new governmental committee had been formed, which was known as “the Inquiry.” Ostensibly functioning as an advisory group, the Inquiry was a secret council—a “think tank” that would shape policy. When Wilson set sail for Europe on December 4, 1918, to attend the Paris peace talks, the Inquiry was already becoming a Frankenstein. According to historian A. Scott Berg, “this secret council on foreign affairs had, as the times suddenly demanded, become the nation’s first central intelligence agency.”
Who was George Creel?
Born the son of an alcoholic father in 1876, George Edward Creel grew up in Missouri. Through the influence of his mother, Creel cultivated a love of history and literature. He began to work as a journalist, writing satirical jokes for publications of both William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer in New York. He returned to the Midwest, starting his own newspaper, The Kansas City Independent, in 1899.
After establishing his reputation as an investigative journalist, Creel was appointed head of the U.S. Committee on Public Information (CPI) in 1917. Established by President Wilson, the CPI’s goal was to rally popular support for the war and to spread the “Gospel of Americanism” throughout the world. In his memoir, How We Advertised America, Creel wrote that “the trial of strength was not only between massed bodies of armed men, but between opposed ideals, and moral verdicts took on all the value of military decision.”
CPI booklets were published singing the praises of different aspects of the American Dream. With a personnel of 150,000, the CPI blanketed the nation with publications supporting the war effort. Another team of writers prepared a daily newspaper. In the area of international relations, Creel hired Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud, to head the foreign branch of the CPI. Drawing upon the psychological theories of his famous uncle, Bernays focused his foreign campaign on a strong appeal to human emotion. Small CPI offices were opened in major international capitals. For Creel, “every conceivable means was used to reach the foreign mind with America’s message.”
Who were the “Four-Minute Men”?
Thousands upon thousands of amateur orators were enlisted for appearances in public gatherings, especially movie theaters. In the age of pre-electronic media, the goal was direct contact with large groups of people. The speakers were called the “Four-Minute Men” due to the brief yet gripping experience of their short speeches. As America was about to enter the war, it is estimated that in eighteen months, a million oratorical performances were heard by 400 million spectators in the United States. The number includes people who heard the talks many times over. The topics included such themes as “Maintaining Morals and Morale,” food conservation, and Liberty Loans. Creel’s goal was for the speeches to have the effect of “shrapnel” on audiences. The intended result was nothing less than the acceptance of a new “war culture” in America.
In the CPI guidelines, speakers were told the following:
--“The speech must not be longer than four minutes, which means there is no time for a single wasted word.”
--“Speakers should go over their speech time and time again until the ideas are firmly fixed in their mind and can not be forgotten….. If you come across a new slogan, or a new argument, or a new story, or a new illustration, don’t fail to send it to the Committee. We need your help to make the Four-Minute Men the mightiest force for arousing patriotism in the United States.”
Some examples from the texts of the four-minute speeches include the following:
--“Ladies and Gentlemen: I have just received the information that there is a German spy among us—a German spy watching us.”
--“I am everywhere helping to win this greatest of wars and to save the world for God and man.
I am here to stay on duty until the fight is won.
I am the Four Minute Man.”
I am here to stay on duty until the fight is won.
I am the Four Minute Man.”
--“And I have only memories of my brave boy, so dear,
I’d rather have it so, my boy, and you know bravely died
Than have a living coward sit supinely by my side.
To save the world from sin, my boy, God gave his only son--
He’s asking for My boy, to-day, and may His will be done.”
I’d rather have it so, my boy, and you know bravely died
Than have a living coward sit supinely by my side.
To save the world from sin, my boy, God gave his only son--
He’s asking for My boy, to-day, and may His will be done.”
--“Your Uncle Sam, the dear old man who’s been so good to you,
is needing help and watching now to see what you will do.
Your Uncle’s in the great world war and since he’s entered in
it’s up to every one of us to see that he shall win.”
is needing help and watching now to see what you will do.
Your Uncle’s in the great world war and since he’s entered in
it’s up to every one of us to see that he shall win.”
While these speeches may seem comical today, at the time they were first read publicly during World War I, the audience response would have taken on the solemnity of a church service.
More Wartime Propaganda
On another front, American universities began a new curriculum of “War and Peace” courses designed to teach the values of “western civilization” that were at the heart of Wilson’s crusade for democracy. As part of this effort, German language courses were dropped at some universities.
The word “liberty” came into excessive use through substitution in such phrases as “liberty sandwich” (hamburger), “liberty cabbage” (sauerkraut), and “liberty measles” (German measles). People with German sounding last names changed them. The large, traditional German-American population came under attack with the message of “100 percent Americanism.”
A byproduct of this intensive propaganda campaign was the Espionage Act, passed by the Sixty-fifth Congress on June 15, 1917. For historian A. Scott Berg, this legislation represented “the greatest possible expression of patriotism and the suppression of free speech” in American history. One section of the Act prohibited any “attempt to cause disaffection in the military” and another permitted the Postmaster General to determine which writings were of a “treasonable or anarchistic” nature and subject to repression.
As a whole, the efforts of the CPI, the Four Minute Men, and the Espionage Act challenged the very notion of a free society. The paternalistic justification for these measures was one that became the watchword in future generations: national security.
J. Edgar Hoover
Coinciding with the early developments in American propaganda was the shaping the mind of a young man who would be influential in the uses of propaganda throughout his decades-long career in the FBI: J. Edgar Hoover. The formative years of Hoover occurred during this period of World War I, wherein he learned the uses of propaganda. He also began the maintenance of confidential files, which consisted primarily of sex dossiers used to blackmail members of Congress and other elected officials.
Hoover made a science of gathering information on individual Americans for the purpose of discrediting them or even ruining their lives. Over multiple generations, he zealously pursued civil rights leaders, such as Marcus Garvey, Paul Robeson, and Martin Luther King. And he gained leverage in keeping his powerful position through the use of compromising material he possessed on American presidents.
The #3 man at the FBI behind Hoover at the time of the JFK assassination was William Sullivan. In a preliminary interview with the HSCA, Sullivan observed the following about his boss:
“If Hoover decided there were documents that he didn’t want to come to the light of the public, then those documents would be destroyed and the truth would never be known.”
More Wartime Propaganda
On another front, American universities began a new curriculum of “War and Peace” courses designed to teach the values of “western civilization” that were at the heart of Wilson’s crusade for democracy. As part of this effort, German language courses were dropped at some universities.
The word “liberty” came into excessive use through substitution in such phrases as “liberty sandwich” (hamburger), “liberty cabbage” (sauerkraut), and “liberty measles” (German measles). People with German sounding last names changed them. The large, traditional German-American population came under attack with the message of “100 percent Americanism.”
A byproduct of this intensive propaganda campaign was the Espionage Act, passed by the Sixty-fifth Congress on June 15, 1917. For historian A. Scott Berg, this legislation represented “the greatest possible expression of patriotism and the suppression of free speech” in American history. One section of the Act prohibited any “attempt to cause disaffection in the military” and another permitted the Postmaster General to determine which writings were of a “treasonable or anarchistic” nature and subject to repression.
As a whole, the efforts of the CPI, the Four Minute Men, and the Espionage Act challenged the very notion of a free society. The paternalistic justification for these measures was one that became the watchword in future generations: national security.
J. Edgar Hoover
Coinciding with the early developments in American propaganda was the shaping the mind of a young man who would be influential in the uses of propaganda throughout his decades-long career in the FBI: J. Edgar Hoover. The formative years of Hoover occurred during this period of World War I, wherein he learned the uses of propaganda. He also began the maintenance of confidential files, which consisted primarily of sex dossiers used to blackmail members of Congress and other elected officials.
Hoover made a science of gathering information on individual Americans for the purpose of discrediting them or even ruining their lives. Over multiple generations, he zealously pursued civil rights leaders, such as Marcus Garvey, Paul Robeson, and Martin Luther King. And he gained leverage in keeping his powerful position through the use of compromising material he possessed on American presidents.
The #3 man at the FBI behind Hoover at the time of the JFK assassination was William Sullivan. In a preliminary interview with the HSCA, Sullivan observed the following about his boss:
“If Hoover decided there were documents that he didn’t want to come to the light of the public, then those documents would be destroyed and the truth would never be known.”
Days before his official testimony before the HSCA, William Sullivan died when he was shot by a high-powered rifle near his home in New Hampshire. The shooter was allegedly a hunter who claimed to have mistaken Sullivan for a deer. The man was charged with a misdemeanor offense - "shooting a human being by accident" - and released into the custody of his father, a state policeman. The shooter was fined $500 and had his hunting license revoked for ten years. There was no further investigation of Sullivan's death. Sullivan was one of six current or former FBI officials who died during a six-month period in 1977, before they were to testify to the House Select Committee. Each of these men was scheduled to give testimony about FBI and its propagation of information related to the death of President Kennedy.
Due to the efforts of Hoover, two days after the assassination, a front page article in the New York Times by Gladwin Hill was entitled, "Evidence Against Oswald Described as Conclusive." The “story” of Oswald as presidential assassin was now flooding the media, and Hoover was the key official providing the incriminating evidence while suppressing alternative scenarios. The editing by the FBI of Connie Kritzberg's first-day story about the wounding of JFK due to a shot from the front was accomplished in less than twenty-four hours. The suppression of Kritzberg's story was a textbook example of the sophisticated propaganda efforts of Hoover.
Ronald Reagan and the Propaganda Films of World War II
During World War II, actor Ronald Reagan was instrumental in producing short propaganda films after he was rejected for active duty due to poor eyesight. As a key figure in the First Motion Picture Unit (FMPU) based in Los Angeles, Reagan honed his skills as a military propagandist. During Reagan’s time spent at Fort Roach, the FMPU would produce some 225 films. Reagan acted in and narrated many of these films. It was during this period that Reagan began to cultivate his lifelong hatred of communism and his “black-and-white” vision of the world as a cosmic struggle between good and evil. One of the most popular of the Reagan war films was Rear Gunner (1943) directed by Ray Enright. One of Reagan’s lines was, “the film is about creating a modern knight of fire.” The role of rear gunner served as “a passport into the vistas of victory” and “a rear gunner knows that the fire from your guns is the fire of freedom.” In Reagan’s homespun, Midwest humor, he stated that “it is shooting like this that will knock them on their Axis.”
Reagan narrated the film Tokyo Target (1942), which was a glorification of the B-29 aircraft designed to bomb the islands of Japan. Reagan indicated that the efforts of the Japanese to thwart these formidable bombers would be “as hopeless as trying to stop the flow of water at Niagara Falls.” Of course, the Enola Gay was the B-29 bomber that ended the war with the dropping of the first atomic bomb over Hiroshima.
The Modern Talking Head: Walter Cronkite
The concept of the four-minute speech as a habitual practice in public places during World War I evolved into “talking heads” in the new medium of television. There is no better example of the trusted American newscaster than Walter Cronkite. As influential as any single broadcaster, Cronkite presented the official story of the JFK assassination to the American people, and he reinforced it over the decades in the production of CBS news specials on the assassination, drilling the lone-assassin and the single-bullet theory into the hearts and minds of Americans.
In 2014, researcher Larry Rivera and I interviewed Toni Glover, who was an eleven-year-old eyewitness to the assassination, standing on the pedestal at the corner of Houston and Elm. Today, Toni is a tenured English Professor at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania.
Ronald Reagan and the Propaganda Films of World War II
During World War II, actor Ronald Reagan was instrumental in producing short propaganda films after he was rejected for active duty due to poor eyesight. As a key figure in the First Motion Picture Unit (FMPU) based in Los Angeles, Reagan honed his skills as a military propagandist. During Reagan’s time spent at Fort Roach, the FMPU would produce some 225 films. Reagan acted in and narrated many of these films. It was during this period that Reagan began to cultivate his lifelong hatred of communism and his “black-and-white” vision of the world as a cosmic struggle between good and evil. One of the most popular of the Reagan war films was Rear Gunner (1943) directed by Ray Enright. One of Reagan’s lines was, “the film is about creating a modern knight of fire.” The role of rear gunner served as “a passport into the vistas of victory” and “a rear gunner knows that the fire from your guns is the fire of freedom.” In Reagan’s homespun, Midwest humor, he stated that “it is shooting like this that will knock them on their Axis.”
Reagan narrated the film Tokyo Target (1942), which was a glorification of the B-29 aircraft designed to bomb the islands of Japan. Reagan indicated that the efforts of the Japanese to thwart these formidable bombers would be “as hopeless as trying to stop the flow of water at Niagara Falls.” Of course, the Enola Gay was the B-29 bomber that ended the war with the dropping of the first atomic bomb over Hiroshima.
The Modern Talking Head: Walter Cronkite
The concept of the four-minute speech as a habitual practice in public places during World War I evolved into “talking heads” in the new medium of television. There is no better example of the trusted American newscaster than Walter Cronkite. As influential as any single broadcaster, Cronkite presented the official story of the JFK assassination to the American people, and he reinforced it over the decades in the production of CBS news specials on the assassination, drilling the lone-assassin and the single-bullet theory into the hearts and minds of Americans.
In 2014, researcher Larry Rivera and I interviewed Toni Glover, who was an eleven-year-old eyewitness to the assassination, standing on the pedestal at the corner of Houston and Elm. Today, Toni is a tenured English Professor at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania.
During the interview, Toni made a comment that reveals how the media implanted the official “story” in the mind of a little girl. Toni informed us that as a bystander, it was impossible for her to discern the number of gunshots because of the noise of the Harley-Davidson motorcycles. But after she returned home from Dealey Plaza with her mom and heard Walter Cronkite on television, the concept of "three shots" was embedded in her mind as "history.” Toni told us the following:
"Look, I'm going on history. When we drove home, Walter Cronkite said, 'He was gunned down by three shots in Dealey Plaza.' Once you hear that, it's glued, you know."
Invariably, accounts of the JFK assassination will begin with the phrase, “in Dallas, three shots rang out.” In the example of Toni Glover, an eyewitness claimed that the sounds of the motorcycle were so deafening in Dealey Plaza that it was impossible to discern the number of shots. So, how could a broadcaster sitting in a New York studio be certain that three shots were fired? And how are historians able to conclude with great confidence today that the number of shots fired at the motorcade was three?
"Look, I'm going on history. When we drove home, Walter Cronkite said, 'He was gunned down by three shots in Dealey Plaza.' Once you hear that, it's glued, you know."
Invariably, accounts of the JFK assassination will begin with the phrase, “in Dallas, three shots rang out.” In the example of Toni Glover, an eyewitness claimed that the sounds of the motorcycle were so deafening in Dealey Plaza that it was impossible to discern the number of shots. So, how could a broadcaster sitting in a New York studio be certain that three shots were fired? And how are historians able to conclude with great confidence today that the number of shots fired at the motorcade was three?
The answers to those questions have to do with the process of having an idea “glued” to one’s mind through the uses of propaganda. In the official story, the number of shots could not exceed three. If there were more than three shots, there would have been more than one shooter in Dealey Plaza that fateful day. .
Summary
At the heart of literary propaganda is the skillful use of words to instill in the human psyche a single point of view, perspective, or belief system. The German philologist Victor Klemperer studied how the distortion of language was one of the keys to the rise to power of the Third Reich. The Nazis had cleverly twisted the meanings of words and phrases to their goals in social and political ideology. The widespread acceptance of the new meanings of the words served in facilitating the agenda of the Third Reich. Sonderbehandlung (“special treatment”) came to denote murder. Der Fanatismus (“fanaticism”) was turned into a slogan for the official party line. Verschärfte Vernehmung (“intensified interrogation”) was used as a shorthand definition of torture. Evakuierung (“evacuation”) was a euphemism for deportation.
A similar lexicon has become entrenched in the language used to respond to serious researchers of the JFK assassination. One of the motifs of Vincent Bugliosi’s Reclaiming History is the use of the term “conspiracy buff” for anyone challenging the conclusions of the Warren Commission. John McAdams has popularized the term “factoid” as a point of trivia whenever he tries to refute legitimate evidence. Scenarios other than the Warren Report are described in the catchall phrase of “conspiracy theories that have never been proven.” Even the use of the name “grassy knoll” is used pejoratively to denote a “wild” conspiracy theory. Today, those who challenge the official story of the assassination of President Kennedy may be immediately dismissed through the use of propaganda in a single sentence: “Theories of the grassy knoll have never been proven by conspiracy buffs.”
In his novel 1984, George Orwell coined a set of words that convey the essence of state-sponsored propaganda: doublethink, Big Brother, oldthink, facecrime, and thoughtcrime, among others. A perceptive journalist and an astute student of the early Cold War era, Orwell recognized the power of words in shaping and controlling a nation and a civilization even to the degree of dictating what people may think.
An understanding of the uses of propaganda is essential for coming to terms with the degree to which the public has been conditioned to accept a single perspective about a lone gunman responsible for the death of President John F. Kennedy.
Conclusion
One truth about propaganda is that those who craft the ideology come to accept it as reality. In the final days of the Third Reich, the Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, was awaiting the end in his bunker in Berlin. He had become such a devotee of his own propaganda that he was now apparently conceiving his final triumph: a documentary film with the real leaders playing themselves in the act of going down in defeat. His concept for the film was on the scale of a Wagnerian opera that would depict the crowning moment of glory for the Third Reich. By this time, Goebbels was a disillusioned actor who had come to believe his own scripted lies and now sought to validate them in a grandiose curtain call of propaganda.
When Western journalists visited the Soviet Union in the era of Josef Stalin, they were told explicitly, “you cannot write that because it is true.” In good journalism, the writer typically will not write something if it is false. But in the uses of state-controlled propaganda, the reverse is the case. The essence of successful propaganda is the widespread dissemination of a single point of view to the exclusion of all others. Truth does not matter in the paternalistic goal of the state imposing upon its will on the people. This was the guiding principle of the “mono myth” of the Warren Report. Due to the efforts of Hoover and the Warren Commission, a single version of the story of the JFK assassination was etched in stone in 1964, and for over a half century, the mainstream media has been perpetuating the original propaganda.
Afterword
There is a lesson to be learned from the powers implicit in the brief, four-minute speeches of the American orators of World War I. The “Four-Minute Men” demonstrated how effective a short and well-crafted presentation may be. The best way to combat propaganda is through a collective and sustained effort to resist and respond to the propaganda. OIC members Ralph Cinque and Peter Janney have successfully produced concise videos that have reached thousands of internet viewers. This is the kind of educational program that will change minds about the JFK assignation. And there is a difference between their presentations and those of the “Four-Minute Men”: instead of presenting propaganda, they are simply telling the truth.
Sources
• For the three-minute videos of Ralph Cinque, see:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1almyq3wGM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uba12kBuvo
• For the five-minute video of Peter Janney, “The JFK Assassination Explained in 5 Minutes,” see:
http://datab.us/0Mh176OZ9a0#The%20JFK%20Assassination%20Conspiracy%20Explained%20in%205%20minutes
• For the impact of the new print medium on Luther and the Reformation, see:
http://www.reformation21.org/articles/the-importance-of-the-printing.php
http://www.reformation21.org/articles/the-importance-of-the-printing-press-for-the-protestant-reformation-part-two.php
“How Luther Went Viral” (The Economist, December 17, 2011):
http://www.economist.com/node/21541719
• For background on the World War I period in America, the Inquiry, George Creel, and the Four-Minute Men, see:
A. Scott Berg, Wilson (New York: G. P. Putnam”s Sons, 2013), especially pp. 15, 450-52, 455, and 471.
• For more on The Inquiry, see:
http://www.cfr.org/about/history/cfr/inquiry.html
• For examples of the speeches of the “Four-Minute Men,” see:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/4970/
• The source for William Sullivan’s quote about Hoover is the Fink-Sullivan interview of the HSCA, p. 40.
• For more on the death of William Sullivan, see the article by Jim Marrs and Ralph Schuster, “A Look at the Death of Those Involved:”
http://www.assassinationresearch.com/v1n2/deaths.html
• For more on the Nazis’ use of terminology and propaganda, see:
http://www.ushmm.org/research/research-in-collections/search-the-collections/bibliography/nazi-language-and-terminology#h118
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