On Oct. 24, 2005, a national public opinion survey released by the U.S. News
and World Report revealed that 73 percent Americans believe their leaders are
out of touch with the average person; 64 percent of Americans feel that their
leaders are corrupted by power; 62 percent think that leaders seek for increase
in personal wealth. A joint Gallup Poll by the USA Today and CNN found job
approval for Congress, which has a Republican majority, has fallen to 29
percent, the lowest level since 1994; 49 percent American adults say they
believe "most members of Congress are corrupt." Former U.S. Attorney General
Ramsey Clark said it is an offense to democracy to describe the United States as
a democracy.
The United States flaunts its press freedom but scandals about the U.S.
government blocking and manipulating information came out continually. The New
York Times reported on March 13, 2005 that the United States is in "a new age of
prepackaged TV news." The federal government has aggressively distributed
prepackaged news reports to TV stations. At least 20 federal agencies, including
the Defense Department and the Census Bureau, have made and distributed hundreds
of television news segments in the past four years.
The U.S. military pays Iraqi newspapers and journalists for the so-called
information operations campaign. The Los Angeles Times reported on Nov. 30, 2005
that the U.S. military troops havebeen writing articles burnishing the image of
the U.S. mission in Iraq, sending them to a Washington-based firm, which
translates them into Arabic and places them in Baghdad newspapers. It said the
military also has purchased an Iraqi newspaper and taken control of a radio
station "to channel pro-American messages to the Iraqi public." Other reports
said that U.S. army officers created an outfit called the Baghdad Press Club
that pays members as much as 200 U.S. dollars a month to churn out positive
pieces about American military operations. The Washington Post in an editorial
called these activities against freedom of the press as "planted propaganda."
The U.S. government's ban on different voices through various means has been
condemned by the international community. On Nov. 22, 2005, British newspaper
the Daily Mirror, citing a "top secret" memo on April 16, 2004 from Downing
Street, said the U.S. government wished to bomb the headquarters of Arabic TV
station Al-Jazeera in Doha, Qatar, during the Iraqi War to block information
about the real situation of the war and remove its negative influence on the
U.S. side; the revelation resulted in protests by all the Al-Jazeera staff in
more than 30 countries andcriticism from the International Federation of
Journalists. On Nov. 27, British Observer said Al-Jazeera offices in Baghdad and
Kabul had all been bombed by the U.S. military and its journalistsdetained,
threatened, abused and harassed by the U.S. military during the Iraqi war. In
fact, U.S. crude intrusion into press freedom happened repeatedly. On April 8,
2003, cameraman Jose Couso of the Spanish Telecino television station was shot
dead by U.S. soldiers. After Couso's death, the Spanish court issued warrants
for the Spanish police and International Criminal Police Organization to arrest
and extradite three suspected U.S. soldiers immediately. On Aug. 28, 2005, U.S.
forces opened fire at a team of Reuters reporters; one Reuters soundman was shot
several times in the face and chest, and he was killed on the spot. Two Iraqi
reporters who rushed to the spot were also arrested and forced to exposure to
the scorching sun. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the United
States is holding four Iraqi journalists in detention centers in Iraq and one
journalist of Al-Jazeera, at the United States Naval Base at Guantanamo bay,
Cuba. None of the five have been charged with a specific crime. InJuly 2005, the
New York Times reporter Judith Miller was sentenced to jail for refusing to
disclose her source. Covering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, a photographer
for Canadian Toronto Star daily was hurled to the ground by New Orleans
police.The police grabbed his two cameras and removed memory cards. When he
asked for his pictures back, the police insulted him and threatened to hit him.
A reporter for a local newspaper of New Orleans was also attacked while covering
a shoot-out between police and local residents. The police detained him and
smashed all of his equipment on the ground.
