There is precedence for this. In the days of World Wars One and Two, the Federal government said that it needed to have expanded powers over the media for security reasons. There were not as many types of media then, so it was easier. In the case of WW One, it was still only the newspapers that needed these restrictions. In WW Two, you had radio around and the movies had become a really big thing by then. TV was still in its infancy and was not a force at all then yet. So the government had it easier doing that with their new powers. You had those newsreels things and that was the only way that people ever saw anything about those wars because they showed those things before movies in the old days. By WW Two, there were radio newscasts every day, but those were easy to control because all that entailed was controlling the news ticker that a station had, and there were only like two types in America in those days, and then you could control what these newscasters said, and then, what the public heard. Things that happened overseas were just talked about over the airwaves, they weren't seen unless yo went to the movies and saw the newsreels and those were films from many days earlier that had much time to be edited by those that would be concerned about their content. So the public saw and heard only what the government wanted them to see and hear. When it came to matters of the war, that was usually not the whole story, like it is in virtually every society in wartime. Bad shit happened as a result of this and a lot of it was not known by the masses, such as the Japanese internment camps of WW Two days. There was scant talk about that when it was being implemented, and the people were not given much of a clear picture as to what was really going on with this shit. After the war, in the ensuing years, many of these things, especially the internment camps, became viewed as atrocities of a sort, things that should not have been allowed to happen. Many that say this blame the restrictions that were in place on the media then so that they kept the people from fully understanding what was really being done. These examples were sued for a long time to illustrate what evils can happen if America's cherished freedom of information and the press ever gets curbed in any great way. This was a refrain that you heard from about the 1970's when this shit first came to light until the modern day, that is, until September 11th 2001 happened.
Once that happened, everything changed, seemingly in an instant. We had our first instant war in America, one that was declared by the President mere hours after the attacks, without going through a single one of the procedures clearly spelled out in the Constitution about the declaration of a state of war. Then, suddenly, all of those new restrictions that were needed for security reasons were instantly back in effect too. Within a 24 hour period on September 11th, 2001, the rules for the media in America were drastically changed. The rules for everything else were changed too. How could this have happened so suddenly? Because of the tactics used to bring it about, that's how. Once the attacks happened, they unleashed a wave of patriotism not seen in America in many years. There are images of firefighters raising the American flag amidst the still smoking ruins of the Towers and all that. Everywhere you go in America today, you now see flags flying everywhere. Interminably long baseball games were made even longer by the endless displays of patriotism that were put into them. Old Glory was everywhere being used for every conceivable purpose. Patriotism is in, and anything that is not strictly toeing that line is out, way out in America now. People that never really gave a fuck about America are now flying flags and singing songs and giving money and all that shit. Anything and everything American is big business all over the land. Patriotism is being used by Mr. Businessman to sell you whatever he has on hand. Cars, mattresses, radio stations, soup, cereal, insurance ( a lot of that, actually), clothes, you name it, patriotism is being used to sell it now. As I have enumerated before, Mr. Businessman has wasted no time and spared no effort in order to make sure that he gets his profits from this current state of affairs, no matter what it takes. Everything in America is a business, including the news. They need to make money to survive, just like any other business does. They make their money by getting good ratings, so that they can justify charging advertisers lots of money to reach their audience. Since patriotism is being used by all sorts of businesses to increase their profits, why should the news be any different?
The people over at CNN think that way it seems. CNN was the first of the all news networks, a maverick brainchild of Ted Turner that many scoffed and laughed at and said that it would surely fail. Well, not only did it not fail, but it became the premier news gathering and reporting service in the whole fuckin' world. As a result, it helped make Millionaire Ted into Billionaire Ted ( remember him from the WWF shows?), and many were envious. Especially Ted's big rival, Rupert Murdoch. He wanted to make bread like Ted did. So he went into the all news business too, with his Fox News channel shit. Competition is always said to be good for a business. It wasn't for Ted and CNN. Their audience share was relentlessly eaten into by Fox, and then, by MSNBC, who parent corporation, whoever the fuck they are, wanted some of that bread too. Things got tight at the once mighty CNN giant. Revenues were down, and people were laid off and shit. Meanwhile, the other news channels were steadily gaining audiences and revenues. This was not good when the Time-Warner/AOL merger was happening. CNN was a prime piece of revenue expected by the new corporate bosses at AOL when they bought this entire Time-Warner package. So they were not pleased with things. They didn't want to have to make an example out of CNN like they did with WCW to show that they were a no nonsense corporation when it came to profitability. The head honchos over at CNN were sweating it out, that is until September 11th happened. Then they saw a way out of this problem. They saw that patriotism was selling all around them, so they needed to jump on the bandwagon too. For them, it meant taking their news programming and basically making it into a total pep rally/propaganda show for America and its cause. And that they have done, to huge ratings success.
The very heads of the CNN news department are the ones behind this in large part. They are the ones that decide what shall be aired and how it shall be aired. There's a good company man named Walter Isaacson running the CNN news department now. He has done his part to play both the patriot and the profiteer. He has said that if there is a great focus on casulaties (especially to civilians) in Afghanistan, that this would be "Perverse." He has said shit like reporters covering events there need to keep stresing that it's the Taliban that has brought this upon them, and not make any mention of the US military, even when mistakes occur and civilians are stricken by them. Mr. Isaccson's lackeys, especially one Mr. Rick Davis, the CNN standards and practices ( remember then from the WCW shows?) have fallen all over themselves to make sure that this policy is strictly adhered to on the air.he has gone so far as to whip up these cute little tags for the news people to use after a story about something bad happening in Afghanistan that say all this shit about how the Taliban is bringing this about because they harbor terrorists that are responsible for the deaths of 5,000 innocents in America, and so on. They are stressing that this must be done each and every time that such a story airs, and since they are not much covering any other story these days, it is something that you hear on there regularly now. By doing this, CNN reduces its news to outright government propaganda and destroys its credibility, and chillingly, becomes a mouthpiece for the government. This also makes a mockery of press freedom and impartiality as well, but they don't seem to give a fuck about that. They have jumped on the patriotism bandwagon with both feet firmly. News has been discarded in favor of some constant All-American show. This is a disgrace, not to mention terrifying. This is the largest news company in the entire world here right in the pocket of the American military and government doing whatever they ask of them compliantly.
This did not happen in the last wartime period, the Persian Gulf War. Then, CNN did whatever they had to in order to come across as impartial news gatherers and reporters. There was a reason for that Back then, CNN was still owned by Ted Turner, and he was not a government stooge, just a rich dude, and he wanted his company to come across as fairly as they could under the circumstances. Now, CNN is owned by the AOL corporation, and they look at shit differently. They want money, and nothing else, as opposed to Turner, who wanted money, but he wanted integrity for the organization too. He got them that integrity, and now AOL is more than willing to sell it down the road. The worst part of that is that the American people suffer because of this, for they cannot get the information that they need to make informed decisions in this climate. Al this will do is to further the ways of the military-industrial complex and the Police State and all these other awful things that can surely destroy America much quicker than any terrorist could. This could all conceivably be done in the name of profit for a fuckin' corporation that would go down with the rest of America if it was indeed destroyed. This is a shameful tragedy that rivals the attacks of September 11th and could end up being far worse for America than the horrible acts of that day could ever possibly have been.