War Made Easy : How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death

by Solomon, Norman

• ISBN13: 9780471694793
• ISBN10: 0471694797
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-06-24
• Publisher: WILEY

Summary

War Made Easy cuts through the dense web of spin to probe and scrutinize the key "perception management" techniques that have played huge roles in the promotion of American wars in recent decades. This guide to disinformation analyzes American military adventures past and present to reveal striking similarities in the efforts of various administrations to justify, and retain, public support for war. War Made Easy is essential reading. It documents a long series of deliberate misdeeds at the highest levels of power and lays out important guidelines to help readers distinguish a propaganda campaign from actual news reporting. With War Made Easy, every reader can become a savvy media critic and, perhaps, help the nation avoid costly and unnecessary wars.

Author Biography

Norman Solomon is a nationally syndicated columnist on media and politics. He is the founder and Executive Director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, a national consortium of policy researchers and analysts. His columns have appeared in such publications as the Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Newsday, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and USA Today. Solomon has appeared on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and C-SPAN's Washington Journal and Book TV, and has been a guest on various National Public Radio programs. His last book, Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You, has been translated into Italian, German, Hungarian, and Korean.

Table of Contents

Prologue: Building Agendas for War.

1. America Is a Fair and Noble Superpower.

2. Our Leaders Will Do Everything They Can to Avoid War.

3. Our Leaders Would Never Tell Us Outright Lies.

4. This Guy Is a Modern-Day Hitler.

5. This Is about Human Rights.

6. This Is Not at All about Oil or Corporate Profits.

7. They Are the Aggressors, Not Us.

8. If This War Is Wrong, Congress Will Stop It.

9. If This War Is Wrong, the Media Will Tell Us.

10. Media Coverage Brings War into Our Living Rooms.

11. Opposing the War Means Siding with the Enemy.

12. This Is a Necessary Battle in the War on Terrorism.

13. What the U.S. Government Needs Most Is Better PR.

14. The Pentagon Fights Wars as Humanely as Possible.

15. Our Soldiers Are Heroes, Theirs Are Inhuman.

16. America Needs the Resolve to Kick the “Vietnam Syndrome”.

17. Withdrawal Would Cripple U.S. Credibility.

Afterword.

Notes.

Acknowledgments.

Index.