Consortium News

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[00:45] >> celebrating Consortium News's 30th birthday. I'm Joe Lauria, the editor-in-chief of Consortium News. With me is Kathy Vogan, our executive producer in Sydney, and Elizabeth Voss in Arkansas. 30 years ago today, on November 15, 1995, former Associated Press investigative reporter Robert Parry founded a website he initially called the Consortium and later Consortium News. Parry started online with two of his

[01:16] heroes had done on paper. And those heroes were the muckraking independent journalists I.F. Stone and George Seldes. Bypassing corporate media, Bob started the model for online journalism that blazed the trail for an explosion of independent media today that collectively is seriously challenging the dominance of mainstream media. Consortium News gave the public two crucial things the mainstream didn't and continues to give. One, it gives politically damaging stories to the

[01:46] establishment that corporate media suppresses and also angles the mainstream media ignores that provide essential historical context that corporate media conveniently omits. Here is how Consortium News began in Bob Parry's own words. In 1995, after more than two decades in the mainstream news media in AP, Newsweek and PBS, I founded Consortium News as a home for the serious journalism that no longer had a place in an American news business that had lost

[02:17] its way. At the time, I was the lead journalist on what had become known as the Iran-Contra scandal, and I had watched firsthand as senior news executives chose to squelch that inquiry, apparently out of fear that it would cause another impeachment crisis around another Republican president, Ronald Reagan. Such a possibility was deemed not good for the country, a view held both inside Congress and in the boardrooms of the elite national news media. But I refused to accept the judgment. I continued to pursue the many loose ends of the scandal, from evidence of drug trafficking by Reagan's beloved

[02:48] Nicaraguan contras to suspicions that the arms-for-hostages deals with Iran started much earlier, possibly even during the 1980 presidential campaign. The era of Watergate had come full circle. Instead of exposing crimes and cover-ups, the Washington press corp corp's job had changed into harassing and mocking serious investigators, the likes of uh Iran-Contra special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh, who stayed on the trail.

[03:18] The Washington news media had drifted into a culture of careerism, with the top jobs paid well into the six and seven figures. Your hairstyle and glib presentation on TV were far more important than the quality of your reporting. And the most important thing was to avoid the wrath of right-wing attack groups who would controversialize you. By the mid-90s, it had become clear to me that there was no feasible way to do the work that had to be done within the

[03:48] confines of mainstream media. The pressures on everyone had grown too intense. No matter how solid the reporting, many issues were simply off-limits, particularly scandals that reflected badly on the admired duo of Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush. Bob Parry continues, "Even when I obtained highly classified government documents in 1994 and 1995 shedding light on how US policies towards Iraq and Iran had evolved at the start of the

[04:20] Reagan-Bush era, this information could find no home, even in the liberal outliers of the mainstream media. So on the advice of my oldest son, Sam, who told me about this strange new phenomenon called the internet, I started this website in fall 1995. Besides seeing Consortium News as a place for serious journalism, I also envisioned it as a refuge for quality journalists who faced the same frustrations that I did. Close quote." And that's how Consortium News was born,

[04:51] as a consortium for mainstream journalists who, like Bob, had had their stories suppressed. Some of the biggest stories that Bob covered we will look at now. One of them was managing public perception, or aka propaganda. He Bob uncovered important details on the CIA in the Reagan administration working to manage America's perceptions, Americans' perceptions, away from the critical thinking of the 1970s. A big story, the first really big story that Bob worked on

[05:23] at Consortium News of worldwide importance was the Iraq 2003 invasion. There was virtually no one in the mainstream media who questioned the fevered march towards an unprovoked invasion of Iraq in 2003. I, Joe Lauria, was covering the UN for a Canadian newspaper chain that published a Montreal Gazette and the Ottawa Citizen at the time, and I was fired on the day of the invasion for having questioned the rationale and the legality of the invasion in my reporting from UN headquarters in New York. Chris Hedges, today a member of

[05:54] Consortium News board, had to leave the New York Times after speech he gave opposing the invasion. That's what it was like in the mainstream media at that time. But over at Consortium News, there was open and repeated questioning of the Bush administration's motive and cover story for invading a country that posed no danger to the United States. It was shortly after the invasion that the Veterans Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, or VIPS, uh one of whose co-founders is with us tonight, was formed to follow up on the

[06:25] criminality of the invasion and then on many other issues. Another major story covered by Consortium News was has been Ukraine. Bob was a real investigative reporter, a term that is very loosely appropriated today by many beginners in this trade. That meant that he spent months on a single story in the days when news organizations spent real money on that sort of thing. He also knew what it meant to be politically neutral. While he attacked the right from 1995, in 2014, he began to take on the nonpartisanship that characterizes

[06:55] Consortium News by contacting by attacking the Democrats, too. It began in earnest with his and other Consortium News writers' questioning of the events in Kiev in February of 2014. Bob's reporting led the way to establishing that a US-backed coup took place then, a fact that mainstream media still denies, and he explained the civil war that the US-backed coup government unleashed on Donbas, leading to Russia's intervention into the civil war in 2022. Of course, this led to baseless accusations that Bob and Consortium News were in the play in the pay of the

[07:26] Kremlin, blah blah blah, vicious smears that persist until today. That's what happens when your factual reporting exposes an empire's agenda. In 2016, Consortium News was among the very first news organizations, one of our guests was the first, to expose the so-called Russiagate scandal as a fraudulent attempt to dress up Democratic Party opposition research as serious intelligence, which led to powerful US intelligence agencies interfering in US domestic politics at

[07:57] the national level, a very serious matter indeed. Along with Bob, CN writers like Ray McGovern, also a guest tonight, Gareth Porter, and myself delved deeper into the deception of the scandal, leading to even harsher accusations of us being Kremlin stooges, which led to disagreements with family and friends in a fiasco that will not die, even though it has been definitively debunked. Since Bob Parry left, and I will speak about some of the things we've done since Bob Parry left. My

[08:28] first my very first article in 2011 in Consortium News came about as I was working for the Wall Street Journal, uh and I who continuously suppressed stories that I was working on. One of them was about Palestine becoming an observer state at the UN. I sent one of these spiked articles to Bob, and he published it. That day I became part of his consortium of mainstream journalists who found a way to get out his unapproved work. Since I became the editor-in-chief of

[08:59] Consortium News following Bob's very untimely death in 2018, January of 2018, Consortium News continued Bob's work on Russiagate, Ukraine, and the Middle East, especially on Gaza in the past few years. Consortium News has also distinguished itself in its coverage of the persecution of journalist Julian Assange, which Bob Parry wrote about in 2010, December, at the very beginning. He figured out that story, incidentally. The persecution of Assange by the US and British governments. Naturally, that made us even more enemies of those pursuing their own and

[09:31] not the public's interests. In the summer of 2019, Consortium News began its webcast program, the one you're watching now, CN Live, and I, Kathy Vogan, am the executive producer. Bob Parry always wanted to do more video, as he saw that that was the future in independent online journalism. Just going to turn this on. Okay, he had made a very rudimentary start. At the beginning of 2018,

[10:02] a Consortium News videos were only watched in five countries. When CN Live started, it was seen in 18 countries. And by 2020, it was up to 48 countries. Today, it's 163 countries. CN Live made its mark, especially in the coverage of the Assange case, but also on Gaza, Ukraine, the Ep- stein case, and many more topics. Thank you, Kathy. Most people are motivated by

[10:32] self-interest, but not everyone. Even though those who are motivated by self-interest think every thinks that everyone else is. Taking Russia or China or Iran's or Palestinian's point of view into account is death for the career of a Western journalist. So, why would Bob Parry and the many contributors to Consortium News do that? Except that they are motivated by something higher than self-interest. Before we begin our discussion, I want to share these words by the late and truly great John Pilger

[11:03] um which he said on the 25th anniversary of Consortium News. Quote, Consortium News was started 25 years ago by the late Robert Parry, one of America's finest journalists. It is the newspaper you can no longer buy at the newsstand. An oasis of real journalism which now needs your support urgently. So, we do ask you in the course of this show and afterward to go to our website, consortiumnews.com, and there's a red button that says donate on that. Please press that and help us out during our 30th anniversary fall fund drive.

[11:34] Our guests tonight are former CIA analyst Ray McGovern and John Kiriakou to discuss how they became dissidents and transitioned to journalism. And then we have two veteran highly accomplished ex-mainstream media journalists Mary Kostakidis and then Patrick Lawrence to discuss the state of media today and increasingly influential role of independent media in challenging the mainstream dominance. First guest is Ray McGovern, probably the second most important figure in the history of Consortium News, Ray.

[12:05] On uh December 28, 2011, Bob Parry wrote, quote, "To my great satisfaction, we also began developing what might be regarded as unlikely relationships, we being Consortium News, unlikely relationships with former CIA analysts such as Ray McGovern, Peter Dickson, Melvin Goodman, and Elizabeth Murray. Though these CIA folks had been trained not to talk to journalists like me, it turned out they also were looking for places to impart their important knowledge. I found that our experiences

[12:35] had run on parallel tracks. In the 1980s, as the Washington press corps was facing intense pressure to tow the Reagan-Bush line, the CIA analysts were experiencing the same thing inside their offices at Langley. It became clear to me that the right's central strategy of that era had been to seize control the information flows out of Washington. To do so required transforming both CIA analysts and Washington journalists into propagandists. The crowning achievement of that project had been the

[13:05] towering CIA analysts and fawning journalism that had been used to whip up popular support for George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003. And that is where I fear we still stand, Bob Parry wrote in 2011, stuck in a dangerous swamp of disinformation, spin, and lies. And I dare say we're still in that swamp. Ray McGovern, thanks for joining us. Ray, can you please for our audience, explain what you did at the CIA concisely, what made you a dissident, and how you

[13:37] transitioned into journalism with the assistance of Robert Parry? Take it away, Ray. Well, thanks, Joe. Uh first let me add an addition here. On Russiagate, uh the very first person to release the whole shamir and analyze it exactly right was another fellow called Patrick Lawrence. I think he's right there. There he is, Patrick. And if you want to see something really artful, you could see what Patrick did on Salon

[14:07] the day that uh Hillary Clinton's folks decided this is what they're going to do. The very day Democratic National Convention. So, I you know, I really feel that Patrick was even a couple of weeks before the rest of us. Anyhow, uh I was an analyst at CIA in current intelligence. That meant that I was a sort of a journalist. I had access to other sensitive sources, of course. And I had to make judgments based on

[14:37] fragmentary uh not not the whole picture. That was a little different from journalism. And when Bob Parry asked me to join Consortium News, it was a delight because I knew what Bob had done in his work on on Central America in particular. Uh it was a natural transition. Um we had, as Joe just mentioned, just created Veteran Intelligence

[15:08] Professionals for Sanity. Uh people laugh at sanity, but there was no sanity at all going on in Washington at the beginning of 2003. The press had already been completely corrupted. No one could get a word in edgewise. So, we wrote our first memo on the afternoon, actually, of Colin Powell's performance at the UN Security Council, February >> I stop you there, Ray, for a second? I think you skipped over something. If

[15:39] it's not classified, I want to know what it was that made you into a dissident. What happened? What did you see at the CIA that changed you? And then how did you meet Bob Parry? How did you contact him? I've never actually myself heard this story. Yeah, well, he contacted me after we had published a whole bunch of stories, myself and then VIPS. Um but you know, this business about me becoming a dissident actually is the agency that became a dissident. I mean, >> [laughter] >> we believe it or not, uh we were created

[16:11] to tell the truth. Truman wanted some little agency responsible only to him, okay? Career protection by him to tell him which end was up. He didn't want the Pentagon, he didn't want the State Department messing around with us. He knew what it was like. He wanted the real deal. And for most of my career, I was a Soviet analyst, okay? So, there was a big premium on getting that one right. And we got it up we got it right for two-thirds of my career, and then

[16:42] Bill Casey and Bobby Gates came in. Our institution failed, but the people I knew uh got it right, and I got it right, and luckily by a strange fate, uh I was I was working with Ron Ronald Reagan's President's Daily Brief, one-on-one downtown uh with his vice president, secretary of state, secretary of defense, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the national security advisor. Those were the people we briefed. We were a team.

[17:13] We'd do three two or three of those a day. Reagan usually slept in. We seldom saw Reagan. But this is a big deal. Now, those were the days when when Bob was searching around for making Consortium News even better than it had already been, and uh with the sanity that we introduced here, it was a natural that he asked several of us to uh sign up and and write. Um I don't want to take a lot of time here, but I was thinking about a vignette that I could that I could tell a true story

[17:44] about Bob. Yeah, maybe I'll pick this one. Um after Bob Bob had had made a lot of big name for himself. I think he had a Polk Polk Award, and it was just really it was a big deal having disclosed Ollie North's role, for example, in uh in in the Iran-Contra affair. Well, he was at AP at the time, but now Newsweek wanted him, okay? Newsweek, okay? So, he was promised certain things. Came down

[18:15] to Washington. Started to have trouble getting his stuff out, you know? But about 6 weeks after he came, uh he got word from his director there in the in the Newsweek office, "Oh, corp- a corporate's coming down. Corporate. Uh Maynard Parker. They're coming down from New York, and they're going to have a small dinner. Can you come, Bob?" And Bob go, "Yeah, of course I can." So, there was a small dinner. About 12 of them, like the

[18:46] 12 apostles, you know? Visualize it, okay? There's a a young representative from Wyoming, funny guy, his name was Cheney, okay? And all kinds of really big what my grandmother would call muckety-mucks, all right, out of the table. And Bob was there. Bob is usually not impressed by this, but he's looking around, and Maynard Parker's right at his at at his left hand. So, in the midst of this dinner, or at the beginning of it, um uh Brent Scowcroft, who had just

[19:18] left his post as national security advisor, uh piped up gratuitously and said, "Well, gentlemen," and they were all gentlemen. "Gentlemen, you know, uh my successor, Admiral Poindexter, is is going to have to go to the Hill on Tuesday, and uh he's going to testify about Iran-Contra and what what we told the president, of course. I've told him that uh they should say that we never told Ronald Reagan zero.

[19:48] We never told him a thing." Now, Robert Parry was not used to that kind of milieu. And unintentionally he opened his mouth and dropped his fork which shattered the shrimp cocktail dish, made a big din, and without thinking Robert Perry says, "Joe Scowcroft, do I understand that you would encourage your successor to perjure himself before he testifies before Congress?"

[20:20] Yeah, that's how quiet it was. Bob says half a minute probably. Maybe it was a minute. And then finally Maynard Parker from Newsweek, CEO, big guy, he puts his arm around Bob and he says, "Now, Bob." >> [laughter] >> Bob, you have to understand. We know what's best for the people. And there was chuckling. Uh guess how long Bob stayed at Newsweek.

[20:51] >> [laughter] >> I forget exactly. It was like four or five weeks. They wouldn't So the the lesson here is simply um we know what's best for the American people. And if we have to lie before Congress, come on, that's what you do. Why? Because we can't let the American people decide these things. Who Who knows best? We know best. And Dick Cheney and Scowcroft and all of them being there. I mean, that was a lesson for me. Bob

[27:32] And that's that that did me well. But tell me what That's an interesting point you raised. What is uh how do you see Consortium's significance in terms of the non-partisanship? I mean, it's very easy I have for us to be non-partisan cuz we we disagree and dislike both major parties and we criticize both of them equally. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Listen. You have never and Bob had never ever

[28:03] told me what to write, what not to write, what position to take or to not take. And at Reader Supported News, as soon as Donald Trump won the Republican nomination in 2016 uh we just were not allowed to criticize Hillary Clinton. It was off the table. No criticism. It was anything to stop Trump. And I said, "But Hillary's just as corrupt as Trump is. Hillary's positions

[28:33] on the issues are just as bad as Trump's are." And I said, "I'm not a Democrat. I don't know why I should have to write in support of of the Democratic nominee when I don't like her and I don't trust her." And so it got to the point where he said, "Well, I think we're not really going to be able to use your articles anymore." And I said, "Yeah, I'm really not comfortable writing for you anymore." And then that was the end of it in 2016. And that was now That was nine years

[29:03] ago. Nine years have passed. I speak with him every once in a while. All he does is complain about Donald Trump, which is fine, but that doesn't mean you have to jump in bed with the other guy. And so, you know, we just kind of wished each other well, and that was the end of it. It's bigger than that, John, obviously. Bigger than that. It's bigger than that cuz the mainstream media, the newspapers, and especially the main cable news, they're completely partisan now. I mean, I blame Rupert Murdoch for this because with Fox

[29:33] News uh became the first one was openly pro Republican one party. There was no pretense anymore of objectivity. And they blew the other MSNBC and CNN out of the water. They destroyed them. So eventually the other two networks had to replicate that and they chose the Democratic Party. So now these two all those stream networks are ruined and we've seen now that the mainstream papers and Ray is very familiar with this cuz he closely as Bob Day criticized the Washington Post and the New York Times almost every day about the way they covered various things, whether that be Ukraine, Russia, Russia

[30:04] gate, Syria, etc. So So to how much bigger is this problem about the mainstream media? That's a good segue after you and to Mary about the mainstream media and what's wrong with it from your perspective? John. Well, I'll answer that by by telling you a a short anecdote. I used to have a radio show with Brian Becker. And we covered a lot of politics on this show. It was on the Sputnik network.

[30:34] And so I would get up early every day and watch Morning Joe on MSNBC because they talked about politics more than the other two shows. I normally flip around through all of the networks just to see you have to see what everybody's saying. It's gotten to the point where Morning Joe is unwatchable. It's not about politics anymore. It's just about It's just about hating on Donald Trump and loving on whomever the Democrats happen to have, you know,

[31:05] leading them at any given moment. Unwatchable because for example, you know, and it is not just MSNBC. It's It's CNN and Fox, too. Unwatchable because everything the Israelis do is is fine. Everything the Palestinians do is a crime. The Palestinians take hostages. The Israelis take prisoners. That kind of thing. It's gotten to the point where none of them are watchable. They're all biased. They're all mainstream and they think

[31:36] they're so independent of one another. Um that I I I'm at the point where now I'll get the headlines from BBC. I still read everything. But I get my Middle East news from a variety of of Middle Eastern outlets, both Israeli and and Arab. And um and I can't rely on anybody. You know, time time was, Joe, where I would say, "Oh, I'll

[32:06] I'll look to see what so-and-so is saying. That'll give me a a good overview of, you know, what the issue is." I can't do that anymore. I can't really look at the post anymore. I mean, I read the post. I read the times. I read the LA Times. I read the journal. But I skip all of the editorial pages because I just simply don't trust any of them. They're all biased and they think they're so they're so independent. It's just laughable.

[32:36] Now, in fact, I'll call them up. Now I I start with, of course, the times, the post, the journal. But then I have to go to the Guardian, the Evening Standard, BBC, AP, Dropsite News, Al Jazeera, Al Monitor, Electronic Intifada, Consortium, Real Clear Politics, Axios, etc. Covert Action Magazine. That's the only way to really know what's going on. You can't trust these clowns in the mainstream. They're just simply not intellectually honest.

[33:07] Mary Kostakidis is smiling and nodding and Mary, of course, was 20 years a face of evening news and anchorwoman for the SBS newscast and she transitioned into independent journalism where she is now. So Mary, take it from where John was saying. What is the What is going on with the mainstream media and what about independent media? Is it really challenging it today? Okay. Well, from a former clown in the mainstream media, very good phrase.

[33:38] Can I just firstly congratulate you, Joe, and your team on the work of Consortium News. It's been invaluable to me as I'm sure it has been to people around the world for a very long time. And just to say what an honor it is for me to join you here today to celebrate Robert Perry's legacy with John and Ray and Patrick, whose work I've admired for years. I think we live in dangerous times

[34:09] because of the unprecedented suppression of speech throughout Western democracies. Now, no one is suing the mainstream media because it doesn't undermine the narrative sanctioned by the establishment. So, however, the Gaza genocide, I think, has exposed like never before the failure of the mainstream media to inform the public and to provide analysis and perspective that isn't profoundly disconnected from

[34:39] the reality of the public seeing on their devices. So it's a continuation of the dehumanization of the people on one side of the conflict, which has been happening for decades and has resulted in impunity for Israel and led to the genocide. They still won't use the G word and nor in Australia, certainly, refer to Palestine [sighs] because it's contested. Though most countries in the world have recognized it because Israel still has

[35:11] to be treated with enormous tact and respect. It's independent media that is debunking the lies, providing context and history and giving the other side a voice. You know, most Australians will never have heard anything Putin has ever said, let alone Lavrov. They are part of this sort of axis of evil. You know, people and countries who do terrible things because unlike us, unlike our allies, they can never be

[35:42] trusted. They're inherently bad faith actors and that maintains a fixed prejudice and polarization, often based on ignorance, and eliminates any chance of understanding a conflict, let alone how it might be resolved. You only have to look at the holy grail. Objectivity, tick. Then we get to impartiality, neutrality, balance and it's getting worse and worse as you go. But they don't stick to it

[36:14] anyway and this is why it's impossible for many journalists to remain in the mainstream media. Public trust in the mainstream media started gradually eroding since the digital world enabled connectivity for citizens. But the genocide, I think, has amplified that because of the profound moral injury of those watching on their devices compounded by the failure of the mainstream media to hold governments to

[36:45] account and the consequent failure of leaders to take action that would stop the genocide. I'll stop there because I don't want to talk for too long. All right. Let me ask you one more question then. Um You You in the era in which you were on mainstream television, there had already been a consolidation of media in Western countries. So we already saw how corporate-run media was pushing an agenda that was good for the interest of

[37:15] powerful people and government. But was there in those days, and Patrick will weigh in on this, too, when we bring him on. And what were there in those days and John Pilger used to always say that. There used to be a space in the mainstream media for someone like him. For someone like John Pilger who would plaster get his stories plastered on the front page of the Daily Mirror in London. Who made those incredible documentaries for for Granada TV. And he He said it's impossible today. He would never, had he been starting today, never been able to go into journalism or in

[37:47] certainly mainstream journalism. So I want to see if you did you recognize in those days something that's gone and why is it gone? Why do you think it disappeared? It is gone for for some of the reasons you've been others have been talking about so far. But to give an example, the organization that I worked for was a public broadcaster and I was part of establishing the service. And we hoped, those of us that were there at the time, that we would be able to use something

[38:19] other than purely the global north lens to look at the world. And and in the beginning there was an attempt to do that. We would run longer background stories on our news items in the news. But as time progressed and other things happened in society and this is all linked to other things. It's not Media is not operating in a vacuum. Uh we there was an influx of journalists

[38:51] from commercial television and there was a push to commercialize the public broadcaster to have advertisements on. So I was given an undertaking because I was fronting the news my news bulletin at the time that look, this will never impinge on the news. We will never cut into news to run ads. Uh of course, that didn't that that that's not what

[39:23] happened. They They did precisely that. And once you do that, you start measuring eyeballs per 15 seconds, really. What sort of stories are going to attract more viewers. And that that the pressure is on for you to do stories, in fact, than that all the commercial networks are doing. So, it fundamentally changes the basis on which decisions are made and it it it it prevents you from fulfilling your

[39:54] charter in fact. Um so, all those things I think brought a sameness to what people do. Um there's validation, which is really important. We'd all sit around and watch other other what other people were doing and if if you're all doing the same thing, then everyone pats themselves on the back because you must have got it right. You must have got it right because you're not you know, you you you're now in the big boys league, you know, that there's the there

[40:26] was that as well. And at the same time as that, you had this um you know, in addition to looking at it through the same lens, that sort of a global north lens, uh there was also there were other influences, if you like. Inappropriate ones in my view. So, take for example, the junkets, the trips back and forth to Israel.

[40:57] Uh which most journalists did did. Um and I'm not saying that they were all affected by but a good number would have been. So, uh when they were here, they were wined and dined by the Israel lobby. The Israel lobby has a whole bunch of organizations set up. So, you have this large number of people with business cards, letterheads, positions, CEO,

[41:29] board director. You know, they wear suits. They the doors are open to them. They have access to the top echelons of the media. Um we can see how that happened with the sacking of a journalist uh here recently, Antoinette Lattouf. Um a media campaign uh lobby campaign was conducted where they complained to the chair of the organization. Now, the Palestinians

[42:02] don't have that kind of access. You know, so the the the the power is skewed. Uh so, a whole lot of factors converged on why I think we have this situation. But, what it's resulted in is that people have um lost trust. And and I think um it's a good thing for independent outfits like Consortium News because more and more

[42:34] people are turning to it. And I think social media has been incredibly important because that's the platform on which you spruik what you're doing. You say, "Hey, here and and that that that's been my role to an extent. Uh the way I've seen it is to be able to promote uh perspectives that are not available on mainstream media. And it's not just journalists who uh can no longer work on mainstream media.

[43:06] It's a whole bunch of scholars and experts and analysts. Uh you know, people like Mearsheimer, Jeffrey Sachs. I don't know. I I don't think he appears they appear in American mainstream media anymore and they certainly don't appear uh in Australia. Um so, I think, you know, uh social media has enabled uh the public to to get it to see that there is this

[43:38] other universe. Uh and that if they don't engage with it, they're left with really what is what we call in Australia fish and chips wrapping. I don't know if you use the same metaphor, uh but that's that's about all you can do with them the newspaper. Wrap the fish with it, yes. They used to be when I used to eat the fish and chips out of Daily Telegraph in London in those days. Uh Patrick Lawrence, Patrick is a former

[44:09] Asia editor of the International Herald Tribune. He has a long background in mainstream journalism as a couple of us on this panel do. He's also editor of a book called Journalists and Their Shadows, an excellent book that I was very honored to write the blurb for a blurb for. Patrick joins us. He's a also columnist for Consortium News and various other publications like Sheer Post. Patrick, you want to bring take up the discussion, the state of mainstream media. It's a big subject with a little time, but if you can, give us your insights.

[44:40] Yeah, quite large, Joe. I want to begin where Mary began uh and to say how delighted I am to be here uh not only among this wonderful company but on the occasion of the 30th. I I met Bob only once, right? Uh and I'm I'm just very pleased to have joined his organization. Uh when you when you took over, right?

[45:11] Uh and uh uh well, you've done wonderful things with it, right? Uh and I think when Bob passed away, Consortium could have gone any number of different ways, uh up or down was were possibilities and uh here we are, you know, uh it's wonderful to be part of this, anyway. Um Now, uh

[45:42] in independent media, mainstream media, uh I was interested to um hear what uh John had to say about reading mainstream media, right? Uh um it's uh the credibility of mainstream media is I think I don't think collapsed is too strong a term, if you uh that's uh

[46:13] empirical, but if you want statistical evidence, all the surveys, Gallup and Pew, nobody believes it anymore. My favorite stats are um I guess they're a couple of years old, but never mind that. Uh who was it? Pew, I think, or Gallup. Uh what percentage of Americans believe what they read in the mainstream press?

[46:48] Take a sec. 16%. It gets better when we go to television and broadcast. 11% of people of Americans believe what they hear or see >> [snorts] >> uh in broadcast media, okay? So, but you know, uh my other half is always on me for spending too much time with the New York Times. But, uh as I try to

[47:18] explain, you don't go to the Times or or any of its pilot fish to understand what happened. You go to the Times to understand what you're supposed to think happened and then you're prepared to go and find out what happened. Uh and and this is the function of independent media in my view, right? It uh Now, uh uh someone mentioned Pilger.

[47:49] Uh you know, uh and and my experience uh John and I talked about this any number of times. And the point is made in that little book you mentioned. Um Uh there was a place for the independent principled journalist um uh for a very long time. Uh uh And I think Bob was remarkably early,

[48:23] listening to your opening presentation, remarkably early and wonderfully harsh in his assessment of what you could do with it inside the tent, so to speak, uh and what was no longer possible, right? Uh Uh and John and I agreed, there were such places, not many. Um and at a certain point, the medium became the message. Um

[48:54] Uh and I think things tipped over uh quite decisively in 2001, right? Uh What happened in 2001? Uh go back to the early Cold War years, when the media were uh enlisted uh let me put that actively, enlisted themselves uh in the Cold War cause, right? Uh um

[49:25] the same thing happened in 2001, okay? I I think in uh I think post-Cold War, there were there was a kind of opening for a good journalism for a while. I was still doing it myself, right? Uh Um But I think after 2001 the imperium went on the defensive. Uh and it was all hands on deck, right? You you had to

[49:58] uh you had to join the cause just as you had in '47, '48, '49 and and so forth, right? Uh And I I think this is pushed independent media forward. Uh a couple of points about our circumstances. Uh our responsibilities are far greater than our resources. Uh that doesn't mean our

[50:29] responsibilities uh uh are are in any way to be dismissed. They they are quite real. Um uh as a number of us have said, you you cannot understand what's going on in the world without independent media at this point. Um Uh But [clears throat] we have we have uh we have assets and we have liabilities and uh I'll mention a couple of the latter, right? Well, no. Uh

[51:01] First I I think the the best of independent media now comes from those of us who have had experience and training >> [clears throat] >> in mainstream media because there's a question of standards, right? Uh Technical standards, okay? Not intellectual standards, but how to do

[51:32] things, right? Uh >> [clears throat] >> Um Uh but what Caitlin Johnstone made a point about this just just this morning or yesterday. The reputation of mainstream media is completely shot. But what's going on now? Uh the our vote our vulnerability is that we're digital. Uh and you know, the whole sort of algorithm story and all that, right? Uh

[52:05] That was Caitlin's point. So, our strength is our our also our vulnerability, right? Um Uh there are other things I I would like to mention. They came up when [clears throat] you and I met in Switzerland uh this past summer. We need a revenue model, you know? Uh Uh not just because I'd like to be paid more. That's a separate topic. But because we need to attract people

[52:37] inside mainstream media. Uh There are any you countless reporters and editors who would like to do better. Uh you know, uh I don't think they're all [ __ ] right? Uh Uh I think they're stuck with school bills and all that sort of thing. Uh Uh and we need a revenue model so that we can grow. This is a long-term point, okay? Uh

[53:07] Uh figuring out how to um attract a good solid trained journalists, right? Where do you want to go from here, Joe? >> [clears throat] >> You're muted. It warned that if you mute yourself, you often forget and I just did. Um that's a very good point you did about the technical sides of the

[53:38] Those of us in the mainstream, we learned how to evaluate evidence, how to gather news, what to to write the story. I mean, these are things that not everybody could just do it. I mean, no, there's been a craze of citizen journalism, but uh that takes away from those of us who've actually worked in this business uh for a long time and how difficult it is. So, to combine those skills and that experience with the right political point of view is the is the issue here because in the mainstream, they can get the story, but they they have they're skewed by

[54:09] corporate and uh government empire uh agendas. I learned at the Wall Street Journal it was very clear that they were pushing American foreign policy interests in their reporting. They could not understand to be neutral, to actually independent international [clears throat] crisis is are extremely dramatic. If you look at all as a play, different actors in there. Take the Iranians, the Americans, the Israelis. What's going on on the battlefield there and to look at them objectively and just describe

[54:40] what's happening. It's a great story. You don't have to push what the US position is and to downplay the Iranian position, the Palestinian position, North Korean position. That also for the our audiences dehumanizes these people. It makes it easier to go to war against them because our readers and viewers don't have any kind of relationship with average people in Palestine or in North Korea or um any other country the US is targeting, Venezuela. We don't know these people. So, you they're just statistics when they're killed. Right? So, this is a real problem, the

[55:11] agenda of the mainstream media. And the problem for independent media is we have a lot of people who don't have those skills that you're talking about, Patrick. But if you know in the mainstream who want to get out, I mean, we were looking for people who can help and the main independent media needs these people. And I think that as all three of us here were inside the mainstream, tell me you and Mary and myself, we were trapped inside. At least I felt that way. I had a job. I had to get a job. I didn't want to work for the Wall Street Journal, God's sake. But um Consortium News saved

[55:43] uh the situation and it's a very rare situation to have a publication like this to work for. But there are people stuck and trapped who want to get out and do independent media. >> Lots and lots. Um I want to uh I wanted to mention um how I've always been impressed with Bob's guts uh in turning his back on the mainstream at not only as uh you know, as decisively, but as early as he did. Uh

[56:14] And if I may take a moment, I want to mention something Ray noted earlier, right? Uh Bob spent a few weeks at uh Newsweek. There's no publication better for propelling anyone out of the mainstream media, right? Uh And I I was quite amused that uh Maynard Parker uh it is the one who

[56:48] seems to have passively persuaded Bob get out of here, right? Cuz Maynard Parker fired me in um What was it? 1985? Uh It was a disaster. I was living in Hong Kong with very high overheads, but one of the great blessings of my career, right? >> [laughter] >> Anyway, Ray, thanks for mentioning that story. I liked it. That's very interesting. That connection

[57:19] there. I I want to point out that Bob that Bob was ahead of the game in a lot of other ways. Consortium News went live on November 15, 1995 and that was 5 days before November 20, 1995 when salon.com published its first online edition. Salonmag.com it was called. That's where Patrick was working and published the very first Russia Gate story, the one that we I referenced in my beginning and and uh Ray pointed out. And then the New York Times launched theirs on their online edition January 22, 1996.

[57:51] So, that was a a little more than a month after Consortium News. LA Times April 8, '96 and the Wall Street Journal April 29, '96 and the Washington Post June '96. So, it was all in that period where the major news were going online to try to get uh get into this new medium of the internet and Bob beat all of them. Cathy Vogans waiting patiently and Sydney Cathy, you have any put your camera on and if you have any questions for our guest, please. Hi everybody. I'm absolutely fascinated to hear your stories because back in

[58:23] those days, I was an academic and until 2010 uh at which point I you know, I became aware of what WikiLeaks was uh reporting. Um Mary, can you can you talk to me about how dangerous it became back then to actually make news cuz I started becoming an anonymous citizen journalist back then. But tell me about how dangerous it was for your professional

[58:56] reputation to be associated with an organization which was basically being called a a terrorist organization and Julian Assange was being called a high-tech terrorist. Well, I was out of mainstream media by then, Cathy. Um I think it would have been very difficult for me if I'd still been uh in the thick of it. But um

[59:26] it was certainly certainly um it puts you outside the circle. You know, uh because they did such a good job of smearing his reputation. Um uh that anyone who supported him or I mean I I thought having met him after I met him, I thought, "Wow, he is smart. He's clever.

[59:57] He's well informed. He understands geopolitics better than all the journalists in the newsroom I'd worked with put together. What does that say? You know, it blew my mind. Uh so and I thought they don't get it. They just don't get it. So he became a real threat and then listening to stories um of how, you know, the whole thing began. I mean, he was just, you know,

[1:00:28] someone with a backpack and everything in his backpack and Mark Davis at the time was a journalist. He was following what he was what what Julian was doing and he convinced him that he needed a couple of interns to help him manage this process and he was there in the bunker with the New York Times and the Guardian and which was the other publication?

[1:00:59] Um Le Monde? No. Well, there were Yeah, there were various German uh anyway. Der Spiegel. Der Spiegel. Der Spiegel. Yes. Yeah. Uh and um you know, he was they they all had PPEs and and he was this sort of colonial um and uh so I think they thought, you know, just hand it over, little boy. You know,

[1:01:31] that kind of attitude. So um anyone who was associated with him or was uh stood up it wasn't just a matter of standing up for him, although they did terrible things to him personally. Um He he deprived He was deprived of his freedom. The I don't know how he dealt with being confined in a space for so many years and not being able to go outside. You know, the the impact is beyond my comprehension.

[1:02:05] Um but it wasn't just about him. It was about press freedom and it's about the the very core of journalism, getting to the truth. Getting to the truth. And and going back to some of the other things everyone else has said, it is not about whether you're left or right. What's happening today is people on the left and right. I mean, I listen now to

[1:02:37] what Charlie Cook was saying towards the end and I think, "Yes. Yes." And I listen to Tucker Carlson. I mean, I I take my hat off to him because he has the capacity to change his mind. How many people in the mainstream media have demonstrated that? You know, so but then I'm accused of being a conspiracy theorist because and they talk about this horseshoe. I don't know if you've come across the metaphor. I hadn't before where the the loopy left

[1:03:10] converges with the loopy right. You know, so we're all conspiracy theorists and uh So um but we're we're finding resonance amongst the public and that's what matters. When I when I appear, you know, when I talk to at events, I sense that the public is with us. They aren't with them. I mean, of course, you know, being on social media,

[1:03:41] I get trolled badly. I get sent bombs. I um you know, people are rude to me. Go back to where I come from and all sorts of things far worse than that and it's all water off a duck's back, um frankly. But essentially, I think there's been a massive impact by independent media, independent journalists uh and that we have to uh capitalize on that and and going back to

[1:04:14] your point, Joe, work out a way of making this feasible, workable financially because that's the problem at the moment. And I have just to finish quickly, I have to tell you I was highly amused the first time I saw it because I was unfamiliar with the with the model, really, but I I've watched um Judge Nap do it and I think I've watched Tucker do it where you do an ad in the middle of, you know, what you're doing. All of a sudden, you

[1:04:44] pop up and talk about gold or >> [laughter] >> investing in gold or and it's just blew my mind, you know, cuz it's it's um isolated and and and and then it goes back to what was happening and I think it's based on the fact that the people advertising are doing it because you have a certain number of listeners. I it doesn't I don't think

[1:05:14] it doesn't work in the same way as as the mainstream media where there there's pressure for you to do more of the stories and adopt a position that's going to bring in more money. Because this that decision rests with that individual. It rests with Judge Nap and Judge Nap makes it very clear what he wants to achieve in the same way that you do,

[1:05:45] Joe, and and everyone associated with mainstream media. Sorry, uh Patrick, did you want to say something? No, wait. I have to I have to do the spot on copper. I'm selling copper. No. Yeah. >> [laughter] >> I was I was going to say Mary I do want you to go to the front page of Consortium News and click on the donate button and send us your coppers. Okay. >> [laughter] >> I was going to Mary, I was going to say it's it's either gold or nutritional supplements. Don't forget those. >> Yes.

[1:06:15] >> [laughter] >> And may I interrupt for a second? Mary, I'm embarrassed I'm embarrassed to even say that uh that I'm beginning my gold and nutritional supplements pitch on Tuesday for my [laughter] podcast. I want to mention something pertinent to what Mary said, okay? Uh When I I was away for a long time in Asia, um various periods in total, 29 years.

[1:06:46] But when I was coming back for the final time in 2010, uh I I sensed immediately that uh this has to do with public what the public what readers want to see. I I sensed immediately that uh post-Iraq invasion and all that, people were quite eager, as I said, eager on the way to desperate for a new

[1:07:17] story. Not only a new rendering of what happened in Iraq or what was happening in Syria or whatever, right? But a new version of uh a new version of uh what America was doing, the West by extension, um uh uh stripped of myth and all that, um and and I think

[1:07:49] to understand independent media it in its largest uh context, uh we're presenting a a new version of historical reality, right? Uh uh not only Ukraine or Gaza or what whatever story you wish to name, but uh a kind of new idea of the West,

[1:08:20] of the United States, and uh what it's doing in the world, and let us not forget, Joe will agree with this, the history of it. How we got here, right? Uh historical context. Uh lies by omission are very powerful. Uh and one of the great omissions of our time is the historical context. Uh Ready-to-hand example of

[1:08:51] so obvious it's a bit simplistic. The world the history of Palestine-Israel we're supposed to think began on October 7th. It's It's just too obvious to dwell upon. But uh that goes on always always always. Here's another one. Uh The the history of the Ukraine crisis began on February 24th or 22nd, whatever it was. February 24th, 2022. That's when the

[1:09:22] crisis began. Not in uh 1991 when the West began to betray uh Moscow uh with the collapse of the Soviet Union. We all We in this room all know that history. It's omitted, right? And this is what independent media are doing. Not just that story, that story. Uh a new I I don't like this word, but I'll use it. A new narrative of

[1:09:54] you know, a a new contemporary history, right? I'll stop there. Uh Ray, can I get you to weigh in on how indepen- independent media actually won. Now, going back to the Assange case, one of the key strategies that we employed, and Mary, you will uh um you will agree with this. So, is that well, we started giving all kinds of academic bodies, intelligence bodies

[1:10:24] started giving awards for accurate reporting. We have the Sydney Peace Medal that was awarded to Julian Assange indicating that this was a pathway to peace, accurate information. And uh Ray McGovern, we have the Sam Adams Award, which you attended, and people like Thomas Finger, who was reporting accurately on um weapons of mass destruction apparently in uh Iran not not true. And then Julian

[1:10:56] Assange got behind that. Julian Assange also won that Sam Adams Award. Uh can you can you give us an idea of how step-by-step even though we didn't have the primary audience immediately, which we we do now. You have to just look at the stats. Not just in terms of credibility, but in terms of actual viewers who prefer independent media as transmitted via

[1:11:27] social media. How did How did that happen? And And why did it work? Well, thanks, Kathy. Um yes, these are good questions. You had to have met Julian for long enough to admire him to the point where you would do anything to secure his freedom and to spread his message. First time I met him was in the anteroom there of the uh place there in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. Uh we were

[1:11:58] celebrating a Sam Adams Award for a very different kind of person. He was the head of State Department intelligence, but he had stood firm and prevented Bush and Cheney from making war on Iran because he said in a national intelligence estimate Iran had stopped working on a nuclear weapon at the end of 2003, had not returned or not resumed. So, that's the one major NIE, National

[1:12:28] Intelligence Estimate, that I know of that played a huge role in preventing what Bush and Cheney, by their own admission, read their memoirs, had intended on their last last year out. So, here here we are in the anteroom. We're drinking wine Julian comes in from his quarters there, and he And I'm next to him. And I said, "Uh Julian." "Yes." "I'm Ray McGovern." "I KNOW." "OH." "You read MY STUFF?"

[1:13:00] "NO." "I SEE you on YouTube." Lesson. Teaching point there. Julian was no spring chicken. I think he was 39 or 40 at the time, but he already knew that if you're going to going to reach the younger generation, you can write really fancy things, and I do, and I'm hopeful I'm really happy that Joe publishes But, you know, you got to be seen to be heard, so to speak. So, that

[1:13:31] was my first Well, then we gave Julian the award. And then we gave um a uh Chelsea Manning the award. And we gave Daniel Ellsberg the award 2 years ago. It was a very moving ceremony because he he duly was celebrated for for his first leaks, which helped put an end to the Vietnam War in 1968, not 1975. So, so the the the notion here is that we

[1:14:02] have uh Craig Murray, and we have Annie Machon. We have people from Britain. We have uh a Dane major uh that spilled the beans on Poul Rasmussen uh they're lying about. So, we have an international group here. We're on our 25th, I believe, nominee right now. But, the idea is solidarity, okay? Mutual support. People get recognized by people they admire for doing what is for doing what is good,

[1:14:33] okay? So, um last thing here on this thing is that uh in the Catholic Worker House in Baltimore, where uh Phil Berrigan used to be a part, there's a great big sign behind the common eating area, and it says, "The first duty of discipleship is to support one another." Solidarity. Well, now I recommend that

[1:15:05] to all of us because And we should be together next year at this time, Joe. This is very salutary. It lifts my spirit. It's just good to be with the rest of you guys. I have a little bit more to say about that, but I don't want to monopolize the conversation. Maybe I could back later. Yes, Mary. Sorry. Go ahead, Joe. No, go ahead, Kathy. Uh okay. So, Mary, I I just wanted to get back to this um concept of how we actually achieved

[1:15:37] predominance uh in the independent media. I think it's something to do with news for everybody, and that goes back to what you said, Joe, about ordinary people. They want news, but it has to talk about them. So, did we Did we actually get there through projects like Unity for J, where uh you know, there were there were the 50 people in at a time talking uh all about the same subject,

[1:16:08] also congregating on one single issue. Uh the whole idea being that okay, we can come together on one single issue. We don't have to agree on everything. Is that kind of the way that that an audience was finally gathered? I think people come to it um gradually for different reasons, but I think it's more that

[1:16:38] the other side stuffs up and stuffs up badly. Um and and I think going back to what Ray said about the importance of visual impact, um this is what Julian did with with collateral murder. It was showing that tape. I mean, there was a whole lot more in the revelations, but that tape was emblematic of what was happening, and and it spoke to people.

[1:17:08] Uh and in the same way, when Madeleine Albright is asked, uh was it worth killing half a million kids, and she can say, "Yes, I think it was worth it." Uh that's shocking, but it do- hasn't had the same impact as watching children beheaded, shredded, half their faces blown off, their intestines hanging out. So, we are at a moment where the public,

[1:17:41] I think, in much larger numbers have gone, "Whoa, there's something very wrong here. There's something I knew I couldn't trust this media, but now I know I can't trust it. And the the the the problem is because uh no one's been able to stop this slaughter, um people are thinking, "Well, hang on, but what What does it mean? Not just for

[1:18:11] these people who are dying, these children are being killed. >> [sighs] >> What does it mean for us? For our future? For our children? Because if no one's prepared to stop someone doing this, they can they'll do it to someone else next." Yes. Yes, exactly. >> I think it's a That's why I think this is such an important moment in history. Uh not just in the in the the geopolitical sense, but in in terms of the media uh and and um

[1:18:43] and the and uh independent journalism and uh you know, our capacity to tell people different for people to come to independent journalism for uh what they think is more likely to be the truth. Yes. Uh look, Patrick Lawrence has got something to say here. I I would just interject uh as well. I'm not not exactly interject, but to say that we we are in a crisis of the collapse of international law. And uh you know,

[1:19:15] there are a lot of people that are not getting justice, and you know, I think he has to say something about this fundamental problem. Um, go ahead, Patrick. Yeah, I this [clears throat] actually more a question than anything else, okay? Uh, Ray mentioned the necessity of being seen. Uh, and everyone in this room understands the drift toward podcasts such as we're doing right now, okay? Uh, but >> [clears throat] >> you know, uh, I taught journalism for a

[1:19:47] number of years in Hong Kong and elsewhere. >> [clears throat] >> And I used to say to my students, look, you go off on an assignment or something and you have all the gadgets you can possibly dream of, but I have never found uh, an electronic gadget or technology that replaces reading and language

[1:20:18] for thorough authentic understanding. You just mentioned international law and all that. I I I I don't know how you would get that on a camera, right? Uh, I don't want to sound like some sort of stickler, but we My point is we have to analyze, and maybe this is a professional question, not of so much interest to listeners or viewers at large. We have

[1:20:48] to analyze what balance we need between podcast, visual impact, everyone knows the impact of film and video, and print in order to if what My point earlier was we are interesting phrase making history. That was my point earlier. We are not just reporting Ukraine in a different way, right? Or any other story. We are producing a new version of

[1:21:19] history. Uh, and how do we do that? I don't think we can leave language behind. Uh, all by way of a question. I'd love to hear others' thoughts. Yeah, uh, so John Kiriakou, or Mary, go ahead. No, no, no, I just was wanted to agree wholeheartedly with what um, Patrick has just said. And and of course, Patrick is a a master of the English language and and an

[1:21:52] absolute joy to read. So, you know, every piece is incredibly moving. Um, and so, I I agree with you. You have to have a combination uh, because uh, different uh, mediums will will will appeal appeal to different audiences. Um, but also, I think it's more potent when you can offer, as Consortium News does, as Consortium News does, a combination

[1:22:23] of those things. Well, Mary, uh, we Excuse me, cut you moment. We have constantly discussing this balance between our print and video. We are a print publication going back to '95. Bob Parry began some videos. Uh, he knew it was important. Uh, we have built this up, but the demands of the print the the the the labor It's much more labor intensive to produce a written article, I have found. Many times I wake up in the morning, I want to do a commentary, I make notes. I never get to write it. Now, if I did a short 20-minute video presentation, I

[1:22:55] could probably do bullet points and discuss what's on my mind. So, we definitely want to move more to that type of video. We have a great producer, executive producer over there at City Lights, Robin. She's extremely uh, talented and and professional, and we are not making enough use of her. So, uh, we're going to do more video that, but we're not going to as Patrick saying, we're not going to sacrifice the core of what Consortium News is, which is the written word, which, you know, that's what I That's my background, so uh, anyway, I I think it's a really good

[1:23:25] point. You And also, I want to also echo what Patrick said about historical context. That's I think the essence of Consortium News is to provide what the mainstream leaves out, and that is historical context. Once you take out whatever happened before October 7th, the story changes completely. It's like we opening a novel in the middle and you see a woman shoot someone. Well, why? What happened before that? We don't know. Mhm. So, we're saying, "What did he kill that guy?" So, Putin on a He's a He's He woke up one morning, he decided, "I'm going to invade Ukraine." No reason. We don't

[1:23:56] have any reasons given to the public. He's just a madman. He's Hitler. This is the Sudetenland. This is He's going to march on all of Europe. And they're making so much out of that, European leaders and the press, that he that he's planning on conquering all of Western Europe. Now, they say Ursula von der Leyen on the one hand says that they use machine uh, washing machine parts the for the Russian tanks. But on the That's on the one hand. On the second hand, they're going to be in Russia will be in Paris by Christmas. So, which one is it? Are they a threat

[1:24:27] to Western Europe, or are they so bumbling that they have to use machine washing machine parts for the So, it's a complete lie. And once you leave out the what happened before the coup in '20 You go back to '91, you can certainly go back to 2014, where the civil war began that Russia intervened in. That's gone from the consciousness of the Western audience, never mentioned, and that is so crucial. Of course, that's the same story with uh, Israel-Palestine. You got to go back to '48, and that has never been told, that story. We have the Exodus Leon Uris

[1:24:59] version rattling around in most Americans' and Westerners' and Australians' and Europeans' heads that eliminates and excises and air brushes out the out of the history the most important story that doesn't mean you're taking the side of Russia or Palestine. You're just telling the story anyway. That's my my bit there. I just wanted to hear from John Kiriakou. Um, so, at the moment, I mean, it it's realized uh, how important

[1:25:31] mainstream media is, but you have people like Larry Ellison um, and buying up all of the major platforms uh, what can we do, you know, given that TikTok is going to be um, censored or moderated um, in a way that favors this dominant voice? Because this is essentially what it is. It's a battle for the ear of the the ordinary person who who wants to hear news that concerns them. It's about a platform that inspires

[1:26:03] empathy when you see people suffering on the other side of the world. This was never done before. What can What can independent media do if our platforms are going to be taken over? And it's going to but hopefully not revert back to how it was before. Well, let me make a couple of points be before I offer up a what's probably a weak solution, but it's the only one I can think of.

[1:26:34] Um, like Joe, I I default to the written word. I I have a a lot of trouble. Listen, I I have a a standard insult that I like to that I like to give every once in a while, that any slob can roll out of bed and make a YouTube video. Right? You live in your parents' basement, you wake up in the morning, you roll out of bed, you eat some Doritos, and then you put on a news show on YouTube.

[1:27:06] So, I I I just can't. I can't watch videos. I can only read things like what we produce on Consortium News. But with that said, what I've done is very carefully over the years, I've I've sort of um, I've sort of What's the word that I that I should use here? I I've I've very carefully chosen

[1:27:36] those news writers whom I know I can trust. People like Patrick and Ray and Mary and and you, Joe. Our colleagues at Consortium. Um, a dozen and a half others. And and I've tailored my Twitter feed, my X feed, just right. So, now I find myself getting most of my news from from my X or from Blue Sky or wherever people happen to be publishing

[1:28:09] where I know that I can find them and they're not going to be censored. And I've taken some criticism from friends for this because of Elon Musk and all, but so long as the people whose judgment I trust are able to publish on these platforms, I'll seek them out on those platforms. And so, that's what I've been doing. Yeah. Ray, you've got a huge audience on Judge Nap for the Intelligence Roundtable. But is the mainstream going to take over

[1:28:40] the narrative again? Well, it won't take it over from Consortium News or from Judge Nap's program. Uh, the question and and I My view is a technical one, how how powerfully they can shut us down, how powerfully they can physically eliminate us. Let's say that doesn't happen anytime soon. Well, I think there's a synergy here. Uh, I think there's a uh, John has heard me say this many times.

[1:29:13] You know, I think that in terms of breaking into the consciousness of most Americans. The fault is The fault is not in our stars, but in ourselves. Now, that's too harsh. On the face of it is too harsh. But aren't we smart enough? I'm not smart enough, but don't we have enough grandchildren and children that are smart enough to figure out a way

[1:29:44] to get us before more before more Americans. I have to think there's some sort of way to do that. But I've been saying that for 20 years now. And uh for the nonce, I think it's just terrific that we have Consortium News and Consortium News Live. And so we just have to keep plugging around and not plugging away and not uh later. Uh I want to get back to Bob Parry. He He was such a a important influence

[1:30:16] in my life. Truly. Uh a model. Not only how to write how to be a journalist, but how to be a person, how to be a mensch, okay? Cared about people. Uh when he was going off to Salvador, uh he gathered his children and said, uh I just want to say I'm leaving tomorrow morning and I'm going to a very war-torn torn place. I want you to know that and I may

[1:30:49] not be coming back. Uh Nat Parry, his youngest son, wrote this. He said, "Well, I was young and I said, 'Daddy, why don't you Why can't you just stay here with our family?'" And Dad said, "Because children are being killed." And Nat, "It You mean children like us?" And Bob Parry, "Yes, children just like you, okay?"

[1:31:21] Now, thank God he came back. And what he uh launched as people talked about 1996, 19 1996 was a big year. The year after it was founded, that the year after. Well, that's when Gary That's when um Gary Webb published his book about CIA facilitating um crack cocaine in the United States through the contras.

[1:31:53] Bob Bob had been with that story. He had been turned down, of course, for reasons we all know. But when Gary Webb published that well-researched story, who was the first guy to support Gary Webb? It was It was Bob, okay? And Bob did everything he possibly could to support him and failed. Gary Webb, as you probably know, committed suicide having lost his profession, couldn't find a job, and lost his family at the age of 49.

[1:32:24] Now, Bob talked about this and uh Nat noted it in one of his articles. I just want to share with you what Nat said. Um Bob's conclusion, of course, that the Reagan-Bush administration had colluded with drug traffickers to find the to fund the illegal war in Nicaragua. Bob could prove that and Gary Webb had proven it. Now, sadly, the damage done to Gary Webb was done. Um

[1:32:55] Here's what Bob said on Democracy Now when Gary Webb committed suicide, quote, "There is a special pain. I think all of us have felt this pain. There's a special pain when your colleagues in your profession turn on you, especially when you've done something that they should admire and should understand. To do all that work and then have the New York Times and the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times attack you and destroy your life,

[1:33:25] there's a special pain in that." Now, let me just share just a little bit of my special pain. I used to work with a guy, let's call him Dick. We did the President's Daily Brief together, okay? He was a really smart guy, but he couldn't He couldn't go out of the Democratic consensus when it came to Russiagate. So, here he says uh and fluently in in 2017,

[1:33:55] publicly, "I have had to denounce Ray McGovern for his adulation for Putin, whose virtues exist solely in Ray's imagination. The NATO extension that he and I warned against was not a casus belli for Putin's invasion of of the Ukraine, blah blah." So, I wrote to him and said, "Dick, you know, you know better. You got to apologize to me." And he wrote back, and this is the telling thing. "I will not apologize for denouncing the

[1:34:26] sharp turn in your thinking. Ray, you are manifestly wrong and your effects are evil. I have to conclude that something physical or psychological happened to you. And now [laughter] I feel myself relieved that I no longer have to fear that I would be investigated for having been associated with you." Wow. Mhm. Quits. Mine quits. Mhm. Now, this is a This is a really educated guy, been around a

[1:34:57] senior officer there. And this is 2017. I I've written him a couple times since, but even in view of the the latest deluge of proof that Consortium News and Bob Parry and Joe and Joe was right on this, too. Joe got criticized by what was that the the uh NewsGot? No, no, the HuffPost HuffPost. HuffPost did a job on you, yeah. Yeah, we won't go into that, but I I I could couldn't

[1:35:28] believe that they'd do that to Joe, so I I sent expressed a little solidarity to him. So, I guess my little message is there's a lot of pain in this. And one way to assuage that pain is to get together. And again, we ought to do this every year, if not every month, okay? And just the notion of looking at your guys and knowing who you are and what you stand for and what the guts you have shown, John Kiriakou, almost 2 years in jail. I visited John in jail. It was not a pleasant place, okay? And he got there

[1:35:58] because of John Brennan. John Brennan is going to be held accountable now, we all hope. So, you know, there's lots to do and I'm, you know, able to do it still and I'm really happy that I am and I'm glad that we have Consortium News Live, we have Consortium News, and we have this great group of colleagues. Brennan, of course, um involved in Russiagate with Comey. And that was intelligence agencies interfering in domestic US politics. And

[1:36:29] that is the essence of Russiagate. I think that's the problem. It's not a par- partisan thing. Certainly nobody at Consortium News ever supported Donald Trump, starting from Bob Parry. And up to me and everybody we've ever published. We're not supporters of Donald Trump at all, particularly the second term. But the idea that intelligence agencies would interfere in the politics, even to try to stop someone as odious as that guy is wrong. And that's why I said in my introduction, there are some people who are just driven by self-interest and

[1:36:59] there are others who are not driven by self-interest. But the people who are can't conceive that anyone would be motivated by anything other than self-interest because it doesn't help us to write what we do cuz we're going to get smeared as pro-Saddam, pro-Putin, etc., etc. Et cetera. James Comey is is the example par excellence here. Uh personal interests. He said in his book, and you've heard me say this several times, Joe, uh when people say, "Why

[1:37:31] People asking, how could you possibly take such liberties with the law, with the regulations, with the whole schmear?" And he wrote in his book, "I was operating in an environment in which Hillary Rodham Clinton was sure to be the next president of the United States." Period. End quote. And I would quote that all the time. Look, that's why. Can you understand that why? And now we know from his handwritten notes that he was ready to Yeah, I'm I'm planning to serve in the in the Clinton administration. I bet he hoped hoped to be Attorney General or something. So,

[1:38:03] that's how vain, how irresponsible, and how people think they can get away with these things and so far have. I hope they're held to account. Patrick. Yeah, I I wanted Ray Ray Ray McGovern just touched on a really interesting point about Russiagate, okay? Uh Russiagate was structured in 2016 precisely on the understanding, universally held, not

[1:38:34] even Trump thought he was going to win, right? That Hillary would be elected on November 8th of that year. So, it's a uh uh I uh I go to the metaphor of design tolerances, okay? Uh An M1 tank has rather considerable design tolerances. It's supposed to last who who knows how many years, right? In very adverse circumstances. It The

[1:39:06] plastic toy under your Christmas tree for your 6-year-old son is supposed to last about 4 hours, right? >> [laughter] >> And um And Russia gate was supposed to last just until November 8th. And on November 8th 9th, it would fall apart. Nobody would give a [ __ ] right? Uh And it didn't. Um and so the the Democrats were stuck with trying to make uh trying They were they

[1:39:37] put themselves in a position to make a machine with very fragile design tolerances last 4 years. And that's why the mess of Russia gate became so preposterous. That's my theory. You You should write an article about that for uh for of our >> Just in time for Christmas, under the tree. [laughter] For the nation. Try to write an article, Patrick, for the nation on that.

[1:40:09] Well, I've got one final That's a GREAT IDEA. >> [laughter] >> I'VE GOT one final comment and it sort of relates to their finding in them over there, so we don't have to fight them here. People like Mary Kostakidis are plowing through this horrendous primary evidence of war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide, so that a lot of the others um

[1:40:39] don't have to do it. But um I'd like you to tell me what that's like, Mary, and then I'd like to pass it on to Elizabeth because she's been waiting patiently to ask questions of all of you guys. Thank you. Mary, you're muted. I think she's thinking. She's not muted. >> [laughter] >> No. Um I was saying I'm I'm not sure whether your question is trying is uh

[1:41:11] aimed at ex- getting me to talk about my case, which I, you know, I don't think I I don't particularly um want to do only because this conversation is about uh a much broader and and more important issues uh than that the the price that an individual um who's, you know, privileged and my my um uh uh life is not at stake. I'm not in

[1:41:42] jail. I'm not paying the price that that John has paid or Julian have paid. Uh and um and my grandchildren are safe. But Ray, I I've loved every story you've told. And the one about uh the grandchildren, they've all rung a bell for me. But the one about the grandchildren, I had a similar experience where I was My grandchildren were born in the US. They're US citizens. I've spent a lot of time in

[1:42:12] the US because of them. Um but they've come to Australia now. And uh trying to explain to them what is happening in the Middle East in a way that um at their age they can understand. I mean, they're about eight, you know, eight and 12, nine and 10. Oh god. Um uh that age group, you know, between eight and 12, nine and 12. And um And I also don't want to say anything to

[1:42:44] poison their um love and and notion of what the US is. They They love the US. That's where they were born. And so when in talking about the war, um the war uh it's not a war, the genocide, and I do use that term when I speak to them, um my grandson said, "Just tell me one thing. Are they killing children?"

[1:43:16] And I said, "Yes, they are." And he put his hands in his pockets and walked off. And he said, "I don't want to I don't need to know any more." Mhm. Um and I think you're right, Ray. It is those It is that we can't afford to lose you know, our being in touch with our humanity. And for those of us for whom that is the most important thing. I mean, I'm I'm

[1:43:47] asked, "Well, you know, what basis are you doing all this? You know, posting what you are on on X. Are you a journalist or, you know, what are you doing?" And And Well, yes. Yes, I'm a journalist. But primarily, first and foremost, we're all human beings. And whilst the principles that you apply in your journalism are integral to who you are anyway, um

[1:44:17] you you can't divorce that. You can't You can't separate it. And I think the issues that we are discussing as journalists, the public are entitled to discuss as well. So it's not it's not something that we can argue that we have ownership of. We have an obligation to um to uh communicate in a way that it you know,

[1:44:48] that has all those principles of journalism at the fore of our minds. But the humanity uh is is is is integral integrally related to that. You can't separate it. It's my view. Thank you, Mary. Elizabeth. Thanks, Kathy. Um I was thinking as you were all speaking and as I was kind of considering what we heard in the introduction about the way that Bob

[1:45:20] Parry founded Consortium News in response to that censorship within uh corporate media. How is since that time, how is censorship changed, you know, during this whole internet age and independent news media kind of growing up but being throttled within this age by censorship? How do you see that changing now? Things like AI coming to the picture. Uh and how does independent media survive despite all of the censorship that seems to just grow year by year? The You Who are you asking, Elizabeth? I

[1:45:51] missed. Oh, me. Oh oh oh oh. Sorry, I'm going to have to ask you to repeat it so I can concentrate more. >> [laughter] >> Sure. So obviously, Consortium News was founded in response to censorship. So how has censorship changed, you know, especially in the last few years? Where are we going forward? How How does independent media survive moving forward? Not just financially, but in terms of the censorship apparatus that keeps changing. Well, the censorship's an enormous problem. And um the fact that uh material is being disappeared is

[1:46:22] an enormous problem. And I think Kathy understands understood that very well when her uh account Twitter account was discontinued. Uh and now, of course, with um the policies that are being implemented by various corporate entities who we have given control to over saving our uh the the material that we create, whether it's our documents on our computer or

[1:46:54] uh videos that we create. And um that is an enormous challenge. I I I don't know the answer to that. And that's probably the subject of a of a a different panel dis- a panel where we can have the input of people who um are perhaps like Julian, who has who has been thinking about these things for a very long time. Um but

[1:47:24] it is an enormous challenge because the it's not only interference with algorithms that will amplify um certain uh narratives and and diminish those that, you know, don't con- that they don't like. It's about disappearing you completely. And so if I were were taken off uh X now, I would lose an enormous

[1:47:55] amount of work uh and evidence and access to evidence that um that I need. Uh and I I I I don't know what the answer to that is. I wish I did. I think I think Patrick had some thoughts. Would you like to add something? Elizabeth, it's a wonderful question precisely because there's no answer just now, right? But what makes it a good question is it shoves us up against

[1:48:29] the reality of independent media, right? Uh I'll betray my age a little bit. I I started working in non-mainstream media parallel to my published career way back during the Vietnam war days, right? Uh for a paper called the Guardian, not the British Guardian, the American Guardian, okay? There was uh I'm not sure how much censorship there

[1:49:00] was then. There was infiltration. You never knew how many people in your newsroom were FBI, that sort of thing, right? Uh >> [snorts] >> But it's digitized now. Um and we exist because we're digital. Our projection, uh look what we're doing just this moment, right? Uh But uh I I made this point earlier, not to repeat. Our our great strength, projection and so

[1:49:31] forth, is also our burden, and I don't know uh uh I'm with Mary. Um I don't think there's an answer, but I think it's extremely important that we contemplate this question, right? Uh uh uh Max Blumenthal addressed this some some long while ago and said, "We do it until we're not able to do it anymore, right? Uh uh That's not bad for an interim solution, you know? Uh But uh I think we have to come to terms

[1:50:02] with the the the the universe of digital media, very complicated. Uh it's sort of on the one hand good, on the one hand very we're, you know, I think I've made my point, though. I'll leave it there, and maybe others have thoughts. Thanks for the question, I suppose, is my point. Ray, did you have anything to add or I think what Elizabeth is raising is the

[1:50:32] question of the backlash. Now, we've seen independent online media starting with Consortium News in 1995, and look at where we are today. Um On the right and on the left, Grayzone, for example, on the left. Drop Site News, which has done incredible reporting about the Epstein story right now, in terms of the actual high-level contacts, diplomacy that uh that uh Jeffrey Epstein was performing for the Israeli government. Deals with Mongolia,

[1:51:03] deals with Elizabeth, what are the other countries there? Mongolia, uh uh trying to make a deal with Russia. >> Russia, Syria. He was meeting meeting with Putin. Sorry. If we can believe >> Yes. these emails, he met with Putin, and he set up tried to set up He was a liaison between Israel and other governments. We had on our show this various show, CN Live, Ari Ben Menashe, a former Israeli defense intelligence agent, who said on our show twice and over a couple of years now, that he that Jeffrey Epstein

[1:51:34] worked for Israeli intelligence. Of course, people didn't believe him. A lot of people didn't believe him. Well, now we know it's true. But where is that reporting in the mainstream from the Drop Site News? We see online or we see these influences, a word I I despise, but I don't think we're going to get away from it. Well, I don't know what an influencer Well, they're online. They're social media personalities. People on the right who have million more than a million followers on Twitter, millions [clears throat] of people. What more

[1:52:06] than CNN's nightly shows are garnering right now. They have larger audiences than CNN or MSNBC. And they are they were invited a bunch of, by the way, to Israel. I did a story on that a few months ago to teach them what they're supposed to say about Israel. So, the Israelis are not stupid. They know where it at. They're not They don't care so much about CNN anymore. They care about these young influencers with 2 million and more of viewers. This is part of the independent media landscape

[1:52:36] they were going in. And the judge The judge has come up. I wonder and I've met the judge several times, and I keep forgetting to ask him. Um and I could just write him an email. Did he when he started this thing, Judging Freedom, did he think he'd have a half a million subscribers within a couple of years? Maybe he did. But that is an extraordinary amount of of viewers, half a million people. So, what is happening is that the mainstream realizes they're losing this ground to to likes of us and all these other people I'm mentioning, and there's a

[1:53:07] backlash. And that backlash we've seen now with the government is the Twitter files, where the FBI and Homeland Security actually told Twitter take down people's tweets. We have seen uh the Terrorism Act in Britain being used to arrest and interrogate British journalists as they return to their country, including Richard Medhurst being held for 24 hours, simply because of what they're writing or saying about Gaza. We have our on on a small potatoes thing, Consortium News now. If you want to put one of our articles on Facebook

[1:53:39] right now, you're going to get a forbidden 403 message. >> Yeah. Yeah. Any idea why that happens? We don't know how to resolve this. We don't know who to talk to. So, there's a big backlash against independent media because it's winning. And mainstream is going down the tubes, and all their careers, their multi-million dollar salaries at the big networks, they see what's going on. And I think there's a this is part of the backlash, the way to use algorithms to crush right and left center independent media, which has exploded, and they

[1:54:10] don't know what to do about it. I'm sorry, Patrick. I'm done. Yeah, uh Joe, uh you you inspire a thought or two in response to Elizabeth's question, right? Uh Maybe there's more of a Maybe there's more of an answer there than uh Mary and I thought, right? Uh It goes to the question of fragmentation. Okay? Uh You mentioned the Grayzone. Uh There are other things.

[1:54:41] Uh MintPress. I think Consortium. They're too big. Max is too big [clears throat] to wipe out, cancel, whatever your word is, okay? Um uh I I wasn't uh uh on a couple of a different occasions uh because I'm not very big, okay? But the problem I think we we come up against the question of fragmentation. Substack's all over the place. Um

[1:55:13] uh and um what I'd like to see in uh in independent media is a degree. It's It's not a very welcome word in many contexts, but I'd like to see some measure of concentration, so that the independent media who are really carrying the that are really carrying the banner uh uh are large enough and strong enough and visible enough, so they can't be

[1:55:43] they can't be wiped out. That's that's just my thought, maybe uh I'm kind of in a mode of making statements and calling them questions, but uh that's you know, that's what I think. Uh too much fragmentation in independent media. Uh And Blumenthal, yeah. He's a superb journalist, right? I.F. Stone said long, long ago, uh "Every generation has

[1:56:16] a handful of authentic journalists." Uh I think Max is one of them in his generation. Uh and they're not going to be able to remove him. Not to personalize it with Blumenthal. MintPress and others, uh Alan MacLeod, you know, they can't do to these people what they have done to others. Myself or other minor example.

[1:56:56] You still have the floor, Elizabeth. If you have any more questions. I don't think I do at this moment. Okay. subbing part of it. I feel that was a really great statement by Patrick, and I'm kind of floored by it, so I'm still taking that in. Thank you. Yeah, I think we're at a crucial point here, and this is an important point about whether independent media survives if whether mainstream media survives. Um but I don't see how I can consolidate

[1:57:28] this um Oi. What do you think, Mary? Is that Mary who piped up? >> Well, um Yeah. Uh a situation arose in Australia recently where um we tried to have impact as independent journalists, and we realized that we don't really have a voice, not a collective voice. And we considered and it's still on the cards that we need to form some sort of association

[1:57:59] uh that allows us to remain independent, but allows us to come together on certain issues. Uh For example, in >> A consortium. That's your missing word. >> Yeah, exactly. [laughter] Exactly, a consortium. That's exactly right. Um Because when when there are discussions about journalism, and there was one that that was quite dangerous, in my view, from which we were all excluded. Um One was about, you know, press

[1:58:31] freedom, and Julian Assange was the elephant in the room. And none of us were allowed to participate because in case we, I suppose, raised that issue. Um But um it it's of concern because, you know, this is where the editors get together and senior journalists, and uh they contemplate issues like, "Oh, should we have an informal D notice

[1:59:02] um operate so that we talk to in you know, the head of the Intel services in Australia before we do a story to get their point of view on things. That kind of thing. And and we don't have a seat at that table. And and so yes, to to your point, I think we do need some sort of coming together at particularly then to

[1:59:34] to assist when one of us does get attacked and and that happens. And I I don't feel as hopeful as you Patrick that people who are very senior or who have not very senior but who have large followings won't be attacked because from what I can see on X it's happening to people with large groups of followers and people who I think you know, I may not

[2:00:05] agree with them politically for example, but it they have a right to say what they're saying. And I agree with some of the things they say. But I don't I just don't I can see it's very easy to make them disappear. So I think we have to I think we have to really value what we have and try and make sure that we find a way for it to survive in the long term.

[2:00:37] I think Patrick's right about being too big to fail like like Max Blumenthal and somebody like Carlson who has I don't know how many more than a million I'm sure several million maybe followers on X. He's an independent journalist. He got kicked out, right? Of mainstream. And he's picked up. He's doing what we're doing but with an enormous following. How could they destroy him? They could prevent us from posting stuff on Facebook. But I don't see how they can bring down a really big Now Ray and I by the way

[2:01:09] Yes, go on. I think you need to ask Tucker that question. I was listening to Judge Nap once and was shocked by what he said and it was a throwaway line. I can't remember whether he was interviewing Mearsheimer or who it was. But he almost said to himself I've been a friend of the president's for 40 years. But I think they're going to come after me.

[2:01:40] Yeah, that was the judge who said that. Yeah. Now John if you have something you want to tell to Carlson John's your man cuz he's he's in touch with him. I'm not. So uh Yeah, I'll tell you he he genuinely is worried about this exactly this kind of thing. I I know Judge Nap as well not as well of course as Ray does. But Judge Nap has been worried about this for the last five years.

[2:02:11] With Tucker it's it's new. And and Tucker's not the only one. There was a a major and public break today between Trump and Marjorie Taylor Green. Marjorie Taylor Green this wackadoo who all of a sudden I find myself agreeing with 75% of the time on some of these issues. But their their break has been very public. Trump today called her a traitor and withdrew his political endorsement of her. So I mean who who knows what to make of

[2:02:43] all this and where does it all end? It's not like the courts we can count on the courts to protect us anymore. Oh, that's a very good point. Very good point. I think you want to stay away from the courts so we have our own experience. But you know, Ray and I were at a dinner in Chicago at the end of September just when you mentioned Mary about associating and Patrick you're talking about forming an association and some organization called Integrity Media with huge deep pockets that we didn't know about put on this incredible dinner

[2:03:14] at the University Club in off Michigan Avenue and everyone that we know in media with I turned around every I saw somebody I turned around there's Kim Iversen I turned around there's Jimmy Dore I turned around there's Alexander McCoy who sat at my table there's Ray there there's Robert Scheer there's and I on my table as well was uh uh from antiwar.com Scott Horton and on and on and on everybody who's just about anybody in our world was at this dinner and I thought this is incredible. And one thing that

[2:03:45] bothered maybe Ray agrees I don't know is that it was a little bit like it was we were making celebrities out of the people who were up there who won awards. Aaron Mate was the MC and awards were given out to Jimmy Dore and to Robert Scheer. And so we don't want to become celebrities in that way. We've got to avoid that kind of thing. But on the other hand there was a feeling I don't know if you agreed with it that those of us that we didn't realize that together we had this kind of incredible community. And that we were all in one room together for one night. And there was a feeling of strength there and solidarity.

[2:04:18] Well, I agree Joe and it goes back to my point about solidarity. Just knowing other people are out there and in one room maybe 150 people there. Most of them people like you and me. And besides that we got a nice little cup from the Unity >> [laughter] >> I have mine on the shelf right here. That's right there. But all kidding aside it was an incredible night and that was the first time they did that. It was funded [snorts] by by this group that

[2:04:49] does have a podcast that does support please pull like well, Bob Scheer gets some support from them and others. So yeah, there would be good that there be liaison between those people and the rest of us. You know, trying to have a umbrella organization. I think what Mary said about the initial attempt in Australia is very instructive. It's got to be done delicately. It can be

[2:05:19] done and I think there are some benefits to having some sort of corporate sort of thing saying well, all right. Are we are we not giving this area of the world enough attention? That kind of thing. But uh Yeah, there's a lot of us out there and we need to be more open and supporting one another. With Judge Nap for example, I'm [clears throat] always telling him let a hundred flowers bloom. Let a hundred flowers contend. Mao's expression.

[2:05:51] Uh There's Where I grew up as an analyst in the CIA you coordinated things, right? If Max Blumenthal wanted to say something and I wanted to say something and and what's his name Alister Cook wanted to say something well, we make we sort of come to terms and then say it in a in a in a cogent way but together. That doesn't that doesn't totally work and it's good this way because every all our all our views disparate as they may

[2:06:24] be get out in the public. Let me say one other thing. There are some certain things that uh I'll just give an example from my own recent analysis. There are some things that seem like gems to me. McGovern you got that one, you know? And what I'm going to suggest is when there's a gem in all of us many gems there's got to be a vehicle that brings that to the rest of our attention. So we have to watch all

[2:06:54] of all of shows of Judge Nap. Here's two gems, okay? Putin's not going to stop in Ukraine. He's going to take Poland and then he'll take the Baltic states. Okay? If you think he's stopping Ukraine you're crazy. Direct quote from President Biden, okay? Answer, Putin already stopped. He stopped in April 2022 when he scared the hell out of Zelensky and they had a deal. That's when he stopped. So you prove to

[2:07:26] me that he won't stop. He has already stopped, okay? That's the perfect squelcher on that one. Number two. These geniuses the West's policy now on Ukraine is the following. See if you can See if you can understand. We're not giving any more money or arms to the Ukrainians. We're going to give weapons to the Europeans.

[2:07:58] When we get them we don't really have enough right now but in a couple years when we get them we're going to give them to the Europeans. They're going to pay us with money that they well they don't really have right now but they'll make it maybe get it. And then the Europeans are going to give them to the Ukrainians who will not at that point have any soldiers or real armed forces to man them. I mean it's a genius idea, isn't it? It's stupid on its face and when people say to you oh you think Putin's going to stop? Well, that's one thing. And if you think that you know,

[2:08:29] we have a plan for you if that's the plan for Ukraine. Well, I think little correct me if I'm wrong and these may not be gems at all. But these shorthand little things if they're available to all of us and we all have them. I mean those are just two that I think I have. If they would would be kind of circulated in some some bulletin board say hey, this week this is what I thought. Feel free to use it. I don't know. I'm just talking off the top of my head, which is not very

[2:09:00] good. >> We're We're still, you know, as a journalist, even as independent journalists, there's a competitive part of this business that you cannot deny. So, there's always going to be some kind of competition to get the story. I think a little bit of that is good to motivate people. And I don't see how you could create an organization uh coordinate that, but um you know, you said that you and um Alice to Croc and others uh in a sense, the judge asked you the exact same question and the same day.

[2:09:31] So, you're getting getting all of your answers coordinated in that way, even if it's not intended like that. Yeah, I think it's good the way it is. Uh Yeah. >> Yeah, I do, too. I do. >> Well, I I just like to mention the fact that uh Jeremy Corbyn at one point um you know, during the worst moment for Julian Assange, he called for all the independent media channels to live stream the same thing at the same time.

[2:10:05] And and then we would we would outnumber the the news going out from mainstream media. But I also just want to um respond to what Mary said about my X account being canceled, discontinued, I think was the word she used. It has not. Um I'm still on X, but I'm in solitary confinement. So, I can see the world, but they can't see me.

[2:10:35] Um I have been uh you know, robbed of all my connections. I've been confined in in a way. I have nothing more on my feed as well. Um and this was somewhat of an accident, I believe. There were five over five I think it was 5.3 million people this happened to in the first half of 2024 alone. And a lot of these cases uh

[2:11:08] in my case, there was no explanation given. A lot of these cases, there is a prove you're human test that I completed and X uh told me, "Yes, congratulations, you've proven you're human." But then it said there was a problem in returning me to my account. And that resolved uh 2 weeks later into me being permanently suspended with no particular reason. This has happened to a lot of people,

[2:11:39] and Mike Pence has really spoken out on this because there's been a lot of mom-and-pop businesses that have been wiped out wiped out. And also, people like myself that are generating a lot of evidence, as you do, Mary, on X because we trust that platform. Um that all of that has been removed from the historical record.

[2:12:10] It's an extraordinary thing, and they're still charging, Kathy, by the way, every month. Yes, for a year. For a year. >> How many millions of people you said are in that position? >> 5.3 million in the first half of 2024 alone. I mean, this kind of thing started with Alex Jones, and there was a lot of people who said, "Yeah, get him get him off the net. Get him deep platformed." But now this thing has been happening to so many people, presumably accidentally. I I had a [laughter] long conversation

[2:12:41] with Grok, uh X's AI, which I'm not allowed to talk to anymore, but um in particular in relation to the billing for premium account. And And Grok said that that X's monitoring algorithms are not talking to their billing algorithms anymore. And if you write to the address on your invoices, the email address on your invoices, and say, "Hey, will you stop billing me while my account is broken?" They tell you that this email account is

[2:13:14] not is not monitored anymore. So, you will not get um a response. I have had I have reported technical faults on X in the past, and I had a a fantastic response, you know, people getting back to me, someone signing his email Paul, and then [clears throat] writing uh you know, saying, "We're going to fix this." And then writing follow-up emails to say, "Is it still broken or is it working

[2:13:44] now?" And all that kind of thing. But you can't get to an email box and uh uh you know, a human, I should say. And Grok agrees with me that any kind of complaint, if you are canceled on X, it's a dead letter box. There's absolutely no one there. And that that somewhat corresponds to >> This was a long time ago. uh discontinuing the employment of thousands of people. Yeah, I was about

[2:14:15] to say that, Kathy, that this was supposed to end with Musk. This was a Twitter problem before. >> That every that so many people were censored and and cut out. Uh and then Musk it it turns out that it's the conservative voices that they wanted to preserve. They were only upset about conservatives being canceled. Like um Trump himself had his Twitter account suspended, if you recall, while he was still president. So, it's unfortunately it's uh it's a partisan issue that they will go after each other's, and this is not getting

[2:14:46] any better. But I think it's time for us to call this evening to a close on a happy note because all the misery that we've experienced that we report about, you know, uh we used to say at the UN um that if there weren't any wars, how many people go out of business? So, we are um we are uh you know, we're going to put that aside for a moment. The absolute horror of Gaza, the the incredible dangers of Ukraine and the possibilities of a nuclear conflict, these are all

[2:15:19] These are all very serious matters that are real. But I want to raise up a bottle here >> [laughter] >> show us that we are going to celebrate Consortium News's 30th birthday. We have reason to feel good about what we've accomplished. And not only us, but all of independent media, as we've been discussing, challenging a a corporate and governmental monolithic power that wants people to all think the same. And we're still keeping alive diversity of thought and dissident. So, I'm going to try to

[2:15:49] open this cork here online on There it is. You may have heard that, I don't know, but uh-oh. >> [laughter] >> I have a glass, but I'm not sure I need it. Okay, I'll get it. I'll get the glass. >> Well, everybody else have a glass there, Kathy? Does it >> this is this is an empty can that I managed to find. Um so, I'm going to I'm going to toast with a Coopers Green, which is um non-preservatives. It's It is a good Australian beer. Um made in South

[2:16:21] Australia. And uh the reason that I want to toast with Well, not really toast, cuz it's empty. But the reason is because, you know, United States has been our number one audience on Consortium News. And in 2020, uh Australia, which had been number three audience, moved to number two. And in the last month, Australia is our number one audience. So, hello, Australia.

[2:16:54] >> [laughter] >> We must be doing something right in Australia. Cheers. >> [gasps] >> Cheers. Ah. Excellent. Well, we will meet again. Maybe next on the 31st anniversary, Ray, if you want to make this a yearly tradition, we certainly will do that if you anybody else wants to take part. I thank you all. We lost Patrick, but yes, Ray. Yeah, Joe, you mentioned I have Stone as

[2:17:26] uh one of Bob Parry's patrons or uh I just like to recite a quote from him, very very short. I know what it is, and it's wonderful. Yeah. I love this quote. >> he was saying, "Look, if you're going to do this investigative journalism stuff, go in it go into that with your eyes open, you know, because you got to realize you're going to lose. And then you're going to lose, and then but then you're going to

[2:17:57] lose again. But then one fine day, you might not be around, but somebody who thinks, believes, and is courageous like you is going to win. Okay? And so, in the meanwhile, you realize all this, and you take it in stride. You rejoice when it's time to rejoice, like right now. And you keep a perspective on this thing because we're not supposed to be successful always. We are supposed to be faithful.

[2:18:29] And Joe, again, I hold my hat up for to you for being faithful to the vision of Consortium News, and for recruiting such incredible people as Kathy and others to help this this ship go ahead. So, uh I have Stone comes to mind. I think he's right. We have to keep that balance and take some joy in the interim. What he was talking about Ray, and I love that quote, is the definition of sanity. You keep doing the same thing

[2:19:00] over and over and over again, and one time it's going TO WORK. >> [laughter] >> WELL. NO, THAT WAS GEORGE BUSH. SO, we're going to keep plugging at it with Cathy, with Elizabeth, with our Yeah. business manager Michelle Steinberg, with our deputy editor Corina Bernard, and all the great columnists and writers like John Kiriakou, As'ad AbuKhalil, Patrick Lawrence, Ray McGovern, and others.

[2:19:31] Even we we just published a new piece from Lee Camp, who was writing for us a few years ago. He's back with Consortium News. So, Good. we can't do it without these people, and you know, it's a grind putting out a daily publication. It's really something. And then when it's all done, the day is over, and then you think, "Shit, I got to do it again tomorrow." Same thing. So, it is having a background in daily newspapers helps, because you did you have the discipline to do it. But, you know, we we are really grateful to our donors, and we've got many people who have

[2:20:02] sustained us over these years, the eight years that I've been in charge, and the many years before that with Bob. And I want to thank all of them right now, and I hope that you continue to help us. And it's to them that we have to produce work every day, and they've come to a lot of them have come to depend on us as other independent media to get a different point of view that we're being force-fed from above. So, thanks again Ray, Mary, John, Cathy, Elizabeth, and Patrick for

[2:20:32] joining us tonight on our 30th anniversary celebration. Happy birthday, Consortium News. Happy birthday, Consortium News. Birthday. Get out your notebook. >> [music] >> If you are a consumer of independent news, and the first place you should be going to is Consortium News, and please do try to support them when you can. It doesn't have its articles behind a

[2:21:03] paywall. It's free for everyone. It's one of the best news sites out there, and it's been in the business of independent journalism, and adversarial independent journalism for over two decades. I hope that with the public's continuing support of Consortium News, it will continue for a very long time to come. Thank you so much. >> [music]

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