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Posted on 01/13/2005 1:18:52 PM PST by Destro
D.C. PROPAGANDA
BY GEORGE F. WILL
January 13, 2005 -- IN communist East Berlin, one sign of the govern ment's swollen self-regard was the cluttering of public spaces with propaganda banners by which the government praised itself for providing socialism. In Washington today, the Department of Education building is an advertisement for its occupants.
Eight entrances are framed by make-believe little red schoolhouses labeled "No Child Left Behind." High on the building's front are two other advertisements for that 2002 law: large banners hector passers-by to visit NoChildLeftBehind.gov.
This building-as-billboard is the workplace of those eager beavers who had this brainstorm: Let's pay a million taxpayer dollars to a public relations firm to manufacture enthusiasm for No Child Left Behind, including a $241,000 payment to columnist and television talk-show host Armstrong Williams for his praise of the legislation. The eager beavers are long on energy but short on judgment.
Just 10 years ago Washington trembled because many Republicans who had won in the cymbal-crash elections of 1994 had vowed to abolish the Education Department. Education, they said, is a quintessentially state and local responsibility. But soon Republicans in Congress and a Republican president were deepening Washington's reach into education. In 1996 Republican appropriators gave the department a 15.7 percent increase in discretionary spending. And No Child Left Behind increased federal education spending more than any increase requested by President Clinton, who was the teachers' unions' poodle. Some of that money went to Williams.
When conservatives break with their principles, they seem to become casual about breaking the law, too.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Black conservative ping
If you want on (or off) of my black conservative ping list, please let me know via FREEPmail. (And no, you don't have to be black to be on the list!)
Extra warning: this is a high-volume ping list.
Bring your brilliant self over here. We need your straight-line-parallel-drawing commentary on the publicly-funded NEA/PBS/CPB.
Wasn't there an article here that said the Education Dept did not pay Williams directly?
I smirk everytime I see those little red schoolhouse awnings down at the DOE.
I hadn't seen that one.
It was direct enough. It was via a PR firm. The excuse is that Armstrong was paid to advertise and it had nothing to do with his opinion columns. Okay, whatever. I suppose newspapers do THAT all the time. But he did not disclose the fact that he was getting paid to advertise for the gov't program (a creepy idea anyway) while he was ALSO writing positive opinion columns about the program.
Breaking principles? When Snapple approached Rush to endorse their product because he was already a Snapple fan, is that breaking principles?
; ]
One of the basics of a media occupation is that you use your ability to influence readers/viewers to enrich yourself, from books to syndication to "specials" to promotions to anchor man. It is why the NYT began (in the early '70s, I believe) to allow reporters to use bylines, so that they could profit in other areas by their work with the paper.
Are there no other examples of a government agency apying a media type who is also advocating a position that the agency supports?
It's illegal for the govt to pay for such advocacy. "no part of any appropriation contained in this Act shall be used for publicity or propaganda purposes not authorized by the Congress" and appropriated funds may not be used "in a general propaganda effort designed to aid a political party or candidates."
no part of any appropriation contained in this Act shall be used for publicity or propaganda purposes not authorized by the Congress" and appropriated funds may not be used "in a general propaganda effort designed to aid a political party or candidates."
Two words for Georgie Boy: Conrad Black.
So then it is the Department of Education that is at fault.
They employed the PR firm.
And we know that the teaching profession is Liberal. Who runs the Department of education?
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