Before you go witch hunting go read this.
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1wddfp/us_media_bl...
For anyone that thinks there is actually a problem here, what could the motivation or mechanism behind this "blackout" possibly be? Significant parts of the US media have been reporting pretty well on Snowden for a long time now.
Journalists depend upon access to government officials to report news on government actions..
No Access to those officials virtually decimates both the Media firm income and the journalists income
so what
If the whitehouse denies access like that - cutting off some of their own ability to disseminate propaganda - the journalist can simply write on the subject anyway.
Even better, while other journalists are busy copying down the usual stuff, the "cut off" journalist can run the "government interfering with the Free Press" story. Loudly.
Denying "access" merely changes what the story will be about.
And what do you complain about? That the government is not leaking you information anymore? That anonymous sources aren't taking your calls?
One is deliberately leaking the story line that the administration wants published, but for whatever reason doesn't want to be directly quoted on.
The other is the conscientious leaker, who wants to get the truth out but fears for job/safety if he went "on the record."
The former can be directed to "leak" only to favored media outlets. The latter cannot.
What will be reported on? In a case like this, the run with the information they have.... from Snowden. If the government decides it doesn't want to tell it's side of the story (officially or unofficially through "sources"), then they let the accusations stand without a challenge.
Oh, and you may remember a time when journalists got their own information ("investigation"), instead of relying on PR offices.
I am constantly amazed how the government (and many big businesses) get away with this obvious bluff. There is simply no way they would withdraw from the public debate.
The government uses implicit threats of retaliation as deterrence.
You made an assertion. Back it up.
That the government doesn't like Snowden being cast in a favorable light or that it uses mechanisms to deter people from doing so?
A good place to start for the latter is chapter 1.3 of "Manufacturing Consent"
[A former British official] described how the Foreign Office manipulated a willing media. "We would control access to the foreign secretary as a form of reward to journalists. If they were critical, we would not give them the goodies of trips around the world. We would feed them factoids of sanitised intelligence, or we'd freeze them out."
That's supposed to NOT be a blackout?
This is one of the most discussed persons in America, a "national hero" to some, a "threat" to others, and they don't care to show the full interview itself?
They sure know how to milk other topics 24/7, with repeat showing, panels discussing them, etc...
It's not like what's important makes the news -- or that media are free to play whatever they like.
If the intent is suppresing some news story (because lackluster coverage can also have other causes), then reduced coverage is a pretty effective way of creating a media blackout short of issuing direct censorship orders and preventing everybody from publishing anything at all.
The strategy is to control what the public discussion issues are --ie. what everybody on mass media is talking about--, not to stump every inner page single-column article or 30-second mention.
One important thing is still missing, though: Where is a link to the video that has a chance of persisting for some time? After all, this is a document of a certain historical significance, so it should be accessible.
Maybe I'm to meta-cynical, but the reason for that link not existing might just as well have something to do with a copyright-fuckup instead of an intelligence agency conspiracy.
> the full interview is here: https://archive.org/details/snowden_interview_en
Very good quality and on archive.org.
The whole situation makes more sense now, given those links. I also just remembered that the original video of the interview was region-locked for Germany (where I live) on youtube, so residents of non-Germany recieved a "blocked in your country" message. Smells like somebody badly misjudged and sold territorially limited broadcast rights for the interview.
Found the comment by truncating the URL back to the main thread, though. Not sure why the direct URL to /cf1801o is being denied.
[back on topic]
Yah, the video, while not the usual "lets all copy/paste the AP or Reuters story as many places as possible", there HAVE been a bit of coverage.
If we're taking about suppressed stories, I'm still amazed at the utter lack of coverage of Binney/Drake's [1] amazing open letter to the president[2] that was published on Jan 7. Part of me wants to blame it on short attention spans and the usual celebrity worship; it only involves the OTHER whistleblowers, pre-Snowden, so I guess nobody cares.
I was able to find a very minor mention on Huffington Post in the week after it was published, and a few video interviews by Reason of Binney trying to promote the letter, and... that's it. (not counting the handful of "personal blog"-style articles that covered the story, of course)
1: signatures also include Loomis, Wiebe, McGovern, Ellsberg, ...
2: http://consortiumnews.com/2014/01/07/nsa-insiders-reveal-what-went-wrong/that's a hell of an accusation
The EFF has been supporting these former NSA agents' whistleblowing efforts for a while now. Also, Ellsberg - author of the Pentagon Papers - has signed it in support.
While it's not a character reference, it is worth observing that the rather dramatic efforts the NSA has gone though to threaten and prosecute these whistleblowers. You may be interested in watching this talk from 29c3 where Drake and Binney told their stories in their own words:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDM3MqHln8U
And yes, it's a hell of an accusation.
It's also the one that finally made this NSA mess make sense, with their description of THINTHREAD being dropped because it was too inexpensive. It's all about moving money to their contractor friends.