accomplishments of Johnson's “Great Society" is its extraordinary capacity to manipulate the news, This is well known among reporters since it is one of the conditions of their job. Only rarely, however, do they write about it. ©
A recent article on this subject, prepared by Alfred Krusenstiern, was sent out on the wires of the United Press International, appearing in newspapers dated September 19.
The U.S. government is in “good company" if it is "guilty" of manipulating the news," writes Krusenstiern, but this is not its distinguishing characteristic.
"What sets the U.S. Government apart, according to Washington reporters, is the arsenal of subtle and sophisticated tools it employs to shape and channel the flow of information."
This boils down to two basic methods. One is simply to withhold information. This is often practiced but not as much as by other governments that are less "sophisticated."
"The other method," says Krusenstiern, “works the opposite way. It aims at regulating the public's daily news diet by supplying news~ men with carefully measured doses of information that is part true, part doctored,"
As an example, Krusenstiern cites the White House habit of issuing a list of appointments with Johnson, “But this list is by no means complete."' While reporters are buttonholing the people on the list -- who are ushered through the White House West Wing lounge adjoining the press room -~ others are brought to the president “through other entrances." Reporters are not aware of this.
"Thus, newsmen are often kept busy questioning minor callers, while more important and more newsworthy visitors come and go unnoticed," —
This is but one of the mildest ways of manipulating the news. The more insidious devices are the press conference, briefing where an “authorized spokesman" takes up prearranged topics, *the printed press release, the background briefing, and the interview. "All five can be doctored," declares the UPI correspondent. He cites a number of specifis instances of how this is done,
On the handling of printed press releases, Krusenstiern offers the following examples:
"For instance, when the President spends a weekend out of town, his press secretary often takes along a batch of press releases to
be issued at intervals until: the President returns to his desk in the White House. —
"When Johnson spent the Sept. 4-5-6 Labor Day weekend at his Texas ranch, Moyers doled out 18 press releases on Saturday, and Laitin issued another 16 on Monday. Most of them had nothing to do with the President's weekend activities."
Krusenstiern's article is not actually an exposé of Washington's use of deliberately lying propaganda. In his entire report, for . instance, he does not mention even once the way the Central Intelligence Agency doctors the news. Yet the CIA is so notorious that it is taken for: granted it will deny as'a routine matter actions of its own which even the State Department is forced to acknowledge, some= times after issuing its own routine denial.
A case in point.was the recent handling of an exposure of CIA activities in Singapore. On August 30, Singapore's Prime Minister. Lee Kuan Yew revealed that in January 4961, the CIA had offered him a bribe of $3,300,000 if he would keep his * mouth shut about a CIA espionage operation in his -government in 1960.
On August 31, the State Department "flatly denied the allega-.. tion. State Department press officer, Robert J. McCloskey, said: twa eh ‘peseaee to allegations about the C. I. Aes we deny that."
On the following day, September 1, Lee Kuan Yew revealed the contents of a letter of apology on the subject written to him by Dean Rusk on April 15, 1961. He threatened, in addition, to broadcast certain tape recordings, os
McCloskey had no choice,.in the face of such evidence, but to withdraw the denial, which he did with the hollow-sounding declaration that "Those who were consulted yesterday were not fully aware of the background of the incident..." The Washington press also said. that the CIA had sent out routine misinformation to other departments of the government when questioned about the. bribe attempt.
Krusenstiernts article itself is an example of manipulated news. It follows the formula of measuring out a dose of information that. is partly true, while withholding essential facts that are necessary to form an accurate Judgment on how the U. S. government distorts and twists the news. -
In this way the UPI presents the best possible picture of the | way news is handled in Washington and freshens up its own image as. an honest, hard-working news agency in search of the truth.