Marketing War, Selling Occupation

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Sun, 18 Dec 2005 01:13:27 -0500 (EST)

Marketing War, Selling Occupation

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OpEdNews.com

 

Original Article at

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_charles__051217_marketing_war_2c_selli.h\

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December 17, 2005

 

Marketing War, Selling Occupation

 

By Charles Sullivan

 

It is always difficult for me to listen to the corporate news because

I know and understand that they are deliberately deceiving the

American people. In fact, anyone with even a modicum of self respect

should only rarely pay them any mind. The corporate media are key

players in the game of deceit that convinces people to do horrible

things to other people. The mainstream media are a wildly successful

propaganda machine for those in power. This media reports truth only

when it is convenient to the purposes of empire. Regard everything

they tell you with suspicion. Better yet, seek independent alternative

sources of news for a more realistic picture of world events.

 

The mainstream news behaves as if the American mission in Iraq, as in

other parts of the world, is based upon humanitarian principles of

good will. They would have us believe that America is not motivated by

empire but by just causes. These contrived causes are bandied about in

the mainstream media with extreme recklessness. Terms like liberation,

freedom and democracy, are the product of public relations firms such

as the Rendon group. They have no basis in reality; and they do not

fit the evidence. They are the foundation of a marketing strategy used

to sell the American people products that are detrimental to their

health. Selling war to the people who die in them is like selling

cigarettes to a nicotine addicted public. The process is exactly the

same. It is all about marketing. Cigarettes kill millions of people

every year. Yet millions upon millions of people continue to buy them

and suffer the consequences of their use. The same is true of war.

That is the astonishing power of marketing.

 

In a capitalist system of government everything is based upon market

values. In capitalism's twisted perception, the market is the solution

to every problem; and the creator of none. Truth hardly enters into

the equation at all, unless it happens to fit the desired spin. Like

any kind of marketing scheme, the news is foisted upon a gullible

public like any other product. The people, through lifelong exposure

to the constant bombardment of the corporate marketing machine, are

conditioned to buy. We buy the propaganda spewed forth by the Pentagon

as readily as we buy tons of cheap junk from Wal-Mart, thinking that

we actually want and need these commodities. The sale of these

unnecessary goods drives millions of us into bankruptcy, while lining

the pockets of the corporate CEOs. During their manufacture, millions

of the world's working poor are further exploited and abused by the

captains of industry. The market thrives by creating artificial wants.

 

Those useless commodities do wonders for the corporate bottom line.

They do wonders for the war mongers running the Pentagon. But they do

not serve the interest of working class people, for they are the ones

who pay the ultimate cost of corporate propaganda. They are the ones

who go to places like Iraq and have their lives snuffed out, their

limbs and even their faces blown off. This is happening while Dick

Cheney and the rest of the chicken hawks, secure in their lavish

mansions, are laughing all the way to the bank. Those of us who buy

into the sinister schemes spewed forth by the corporate media are the

chumps left to pay the real cost of war. You see, in America the real

criminals always get away with the heinous crimes they commit.

Moreover, they bear virtually no risk at all because we the people are

so disinterested. We fail to hold them accountable, as long as we are

entertained. Even more incredibly, we often cheer them on as they

fleece us and sell us wars we neither want or need. Those in power

must think that we are a stupid lot. We have done so little to prove

them wrong.

 

We keep hearing about the progress that is being made toward a free

and democratic society in Iraq. This is a story—a myth really—that

appears to lend credence to the idea of America's wrong headed

invasion and occupation of Iraq. They are the creation of public

relations firms such as the Rendon Group who use our tax dollars to

spin stories to deceive us. Understand that democracy, freedom, and

liberation are noble causes. But that is not what the occupation of

Iraq is about. These are nothing more than selling points that an

ignorant and gullible American public readily buy into. These are the

concepts that sell the hidden and sinister purposes of invasion and

occupation to the American people. These are the marketing tools that

force the Iraqi people to live in misery and abject poverty, while

simultaneously making American citizens the unwitting agents of injustice.

 

 

The real purpose of the invasion and occupation of Iraq have nothing

whatsoever to do with democracy, freedom, or liberation. They have

everything to do with empire building and insatiable corporate greed,

like all American made wars. The people that American soldiers are

killing and maiming around the world have more in common with them

than those who are directing them to do the killing. I do not intend

to denigrate the brave men and women who serve in Iraq and some two

hundred nations around the world. They are there because they have

bought the goods offered up by the superb propaganda machine for the

corporate media. They are being used and exploited the way working

people have always been used and exploited by those in power.

 

The sad reality is that these young men and women have been betrayed

by those who send them into harms way. They believe they are there for

the noble causes of sowing the seeds of democracy. They believe that

the Pentagon and the likes of Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and George

Bush care about them. The awful truth, however, is that they are

nothing more than pawns in a rich man's game. Those who are calling

the shots see them as nothing more than cannon fodder. See how we

neglect them when they come home broken and worn. Witness how we

abandon their families when they come home in body bags, mangled

almost beyond recognition.

 

The ugly truth is that our soldiers have been betrayed by the worst

imaginable kind of people. These are people who don't give a damn

about them. The public is being betrayed and sold goods that will

never benefit them— but will cost them everything in the end. In their

lust for power and fortune the champions of capitalism are destroying

the very social fabric of our society. The truth is not only out

there, it is not terribly difficult to find. But you must be willing

to look in some dark places. The Internet is a powerful tool that can

be used in the search for truth. Be careful, though; beholding the

unvarnished truth is often not a pretty thing. It is, however, a

necessary thing that will require some courage on our part.

 

 

 

Authors Bio: Charles Sullivan is a furniture maker, photographer, and

free lance writer residing in the eastern panhandle of West Virgina.

He welcomes your comments at earthdog