"ShortwaveMan" wrote in
ink.net:

We do put out propaganda - plenty of it: enough to employ a stable boy
full time for the rest of his life.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...M/103-4904152-
4251815

911, WMD (actually, we use this most often, Weapon of Mass Deception),
"Operation Iraqi Freedom", "coalition of the willing", Democracy in the
U.S., free elections, etc.

Visit the following link, for an unbiased dissertation on Propaganda, the
word. Anyone that believes that the U.S. is not actively involved in
propaganda, I have some prime seaside land for sale on mars. It's quite
juvenile to assert that the U.S. is somehow as pure as the wind driven
snow concerning propaganda. Please visit the link and see how propaganda
has shaped history over the ages. Plenty of pictures for those of you
that are alphanumerically challenged.

Dr. Artaud


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda
"Propaganda is a specific type of message presentation aimed at serving
an agenda. At its root, the denotation of propaganda is 'to propagate
(actively spread) a philosophy or point of view'. The most common use of
the term (historically) is in political contexts; in particular to refer
to certain efforts sponsored by governments or political groups.

The aim of propaganda is to actively influence people's opinions, rather
than to merely communicate the facts about something. For example,
propaganda might be used to garner either support or disapproval of a
certain position, rather than to simply present the position. What
separates propaganda from "normal" communication is in the subtle, often
insidious, ways that the message attempts to shape opinion. For example,
propaganda is often presented in a way that attempts to deliberately
evoke a strong emotion, especially by suggesting non-logical (or non-
intuitive) relationships between concepts.

An appeal to one's emotions is, perhaps, more obvious a propaganda method
than utilized by some other less overt and perhaps even more insidious
forms. For instance, propaganda may be transmitted implicitly. Propaganda
can be transmitted as the presupposition or presuppositions within an
ostensibly fair and balanced debate or argument. This can be done to
great effect in conjunction with a broadcast news format. Here is an
example of a hypothetical situation in which the opposing view points are
supposedly represented: the hawk (see: hawkish) says, "we must stay the
course", and the dove says, "The war is a disaster and a failure", to
which the hawk responds, "In war things seldom go smoothly and we must
not let set backs affect our determination", the dove retorts, "setbacks
are setbacks, but, failures are failures." As one can see, the actual
validity of the war is not discussed and is never in contention. In
giving the appearance of representing opposing positions and view points,
a debate (of what is really aspects of the actual, genuine, argument
worthy issue) in which the debaters argue from the same basic
assumptions, implicitly inculcates the presupposition(s) as sacrosanct
truth, thus, establishing it as an accepted fact about the given issue
for ignorant observers.

The method of propaganda is essential to the word's meaning as well. A
message does not have to be untrue to qualify as propaganda. In fact, the
message in modern propaganda is often not blatantly untrue. But even if
the message conveys only "true" information, it will generally contain
partisan bias and fail to paint a complete and balanced picture. Another
common characteristic of propaganda is volume (in the sense of a large
amount). For example, a propagandist may seek to influence opinion by
attempting to get a message heard in as many places as possible, and as
often as possible. The intention of this approach is to a) reinforce an
idea through repetition, and b) drown-out or exclude any alternative
ideas.

In English, the word "propaganda" usually carries strong negative (as
well as political) connotations. This is not necessarily so in other
languages, and usage of the term may lead to misunderstanding in
communications with non-native English speakers. For example, in Brazil
and some Spanish language speaking countries, particularly in the
Southern Cone, the word "propaganda" usually means the most common
manipulation of information—"advertising.""