American sly foxes and European less smart animals

American sly foxes vs European less smart animals

Dear reader,

First things first . The title will be explained right away.

Sly foxes is tributes to @Simonefoxman of Business Insider reporting on events of the Eurozone, and all other American journalists, analysts who these days have very much to do to gather lots of information in different languages in order to stay on the story of the Euro and the Eurozone. As it is hard enough to translate all of the European sources for every angle of this daily drama it's even harder to fully comprehend the European cacophony even life long Europeans have difficulties to comprehend. So in crash course our American friends across the Atlantic will also have to learn many different governmental and parliamentarian procedures of many individual countries as well as of the many European institutions and bodies.

Less smart on the contrary for those European journalists who remind me as a person familiar with soviet and communist propaganda of those paws of a big propaganda machine who serve their task which is of course also as prerequisite needs a special “mindset”. As far as the events of the Eurozone as concerned many (not all!) domestic journalists watch events trough the pink glassed specs of their masters who are the political leaders of course or even worse their individual dreams of a good functioning Euro and fully implemented European socialism. Known as a less fast running but also hard hitting commentator of politics (but then more in discussions instead of written monologues) these despicable views aren't not new just this blog is something new: holding a compilation a earlier expressed views on conclusions drawn sometimes decades ago.

But what really triggered this recent particular blog entry is one event of a different news story primarily focusing on one project of one (there are many) European commissioner. Secondary much more important so it seems focusing on the person of being chosen by commissioner Neelie Kroes of the digital agenda portfolio of the European Commission. So once more (as it happens all the time) it's highly unusual to report something from ANY part of the European commission since it this “big unknown” of the public and journalists are usually their utmost best to keep it that way. And as so often the reason for reporting is not based of facts but on prejudices of individuals finally allowed to be transported into the public because we (the journalists) a subject as spark to inflame to the public for the personal reasons of propagandistic zeal. I am referring to the fact commissioner Neelie Kroes has chosen a former defense minister of a large European contributor state of the NATO alliance with highest NATO clearances and actively working now in a Washington based think tank mainly concerned with trans Atlantic strategies (read NATO) to come to her support when her branch of the commission is now working on European strategies for actively supporting freedom activists in oppressive regimes.

Support in means of logistics, Internet strategies involving secure encrypted signals for protection of bloggers, chatters and all other forms of individual and group communication as well as preventing of export of detection, localization and jamming equipment to such regimes. (As unfortunately this happened so often in the past) In order to see what other members of the Washington based think tank are doing (ger): US-Geheimdienst identifiziert mutmaßliche chinesische Hacker

So far the facts which were only reported as far as the name of the commissioner was almost properly pronounced , as far as the fact that the previous task of Mrs Kroes within the Commission was correctly stated and as far as the “Internet freedom” was mentioned. That's it concerning facts. Now the propaganda part will be described to expose that kind of “journalism” which intends to transform their readers/listeners/viewers into “believers”.

So as I had my “German day” on Monday in order to follow mainly German news for the outcome of last weeks big summit and some side events of Eurozone such as the FDP member vote for or against the future of the ESM there was no way to overlook the other “big story” (at least as it were presented on “pole position” (first place) with some 2-3 minutes of coverage of evening propaganda for the German people). As already described above the facts were reported in a limited way and some more was added in order to convince the German public that not only Baron zu Guttenberg was a schmuck but also Mrs “Nelly” Kroes by picking a totally disqualified person who lost a PhD title because of a proven attempt of cheat. So the press conference of 35 minutes was reduced (cut) to reactions of Mrs Kroes and Baron zu Guttenberg defending against some questions about his losing of the law degree. So it was broadcasted that Mrs Kroes did not think expect him to be a saint and he said that he certainly will focus of convincing people by focusing on the job and yield some results and not on a speculated on return to German politics since he intends to stay in the USA along with his family for the next months to come . So no answers of what the task for Baron zu Guttenberg will exactly be was relayed to the German public nor the reasoning of Mrs KroesCohn-Bendit of the greens (Who is now elected to parliament by a French green party nomination after the Germans didn't give him another opportunity.) Mrs Kroes was analysed by German main news anchors as “eager to make forget the loss of the post of commissioner for competition and now having the less important of “digital agenda” when she now tries to put herself into the limelight by presenting controversial figure of Mr zu Guttenberg”)

Well is this reporting on the rather important of “digital agenda” which is now after the events of “arab spring” , “Russian mass protests” and the importance of Facebook , Twitter, Google etc more important than ever before NOT a shame ?

But is this all worth such a hype with almost no facts reported on a press conference never been reported on before as even more important fields of European Commission ever make it into German TV news ? No of course not ! The main reason is the intense fear of left leaning media and also left leaning conservatives (yes those 100% followers of Mrs Merkel) of a return of Baron zu Guttenberg who was rumored to be earmarked as next German chancellor before he lost his academic title. And the still very high numbers of followers and potential followers among German constituency which form a serious thread for Mrs. Merkel and her “followers of fashion” which have estranged not only German conservative (CDU/CSU) voters but also broader parts of the public now in fear of being made the paymasters of Europe for Merkels way of solidarity to other countries of the Eurozone.

Coming back to good reporting after getting out all the anger about manipulative, inadequate and improper reporting it is worth also mentioning the British media which also offer a different angle to the Eurozone story as well as the American counterpart. When American reporters are just now getting baffled of the rather strange and long procedures of European politics and its direct effects on a currency their British colleagues know this weird European Union for much longer as they also had once to choose to either join the Euro and its zone or to “just” keep their beloved pound. So their journalists not only were into the subject some 10-20 years ago but also all the years until this current mess were confronted by calls for joining the common European currency for better relations in trade also especially in times when the exchange rate of the pound skyrocketed against the Euro. So in Britain all those years there was not only a struggle between Euro fanatics and Euro skeptics maybe accompanied by Euro neutrals in parliament but also in the public and of course in the press. They were perhaps much more mentally focused on the “well being of the Euro” than the European countries which adapted this new (now proven political) currency and therefore also not blind to its inherent risks. As they were not subjected to “group thinking” as many of their European counterparts were. Maybe the best judgment these days come from the Americans which may ask themselves sometimes (or more often) what kind of zoo Europe and its Eurozone is after all ? They had to rapidly get into a mixture of different languages, cultures (also financial ones), political agendas and many institutions which all offered a wide choice of solutions or at least what they thought would be one. As many American reporters and the much more hated (by governments) analysts of rating agencies had figured out pretty soon that the Eurozone was indeed a mess and it was no wonder things went wrong time after time. They also figured out that hard way that time was of the essence to heal a patient whereas European politicians acting as b-class actors in a hospital soap seems to have plenty of it and no hurry at all. Maybe that was also only a reflection of German culture which knows at least two popular phrases maybe mindsets: “In der Ruhe liegt die Kraft” and “Gut Ding will Weile haben” (In inertia their rests power/good thing needs time) Basically both journalists and analysts from across the Atlantic can focus on the facts (even when they are hard to gather) and therefore also give realistic pictures to their audience or their companies what is happening in the Eurozone, what isn't and maybe also what will happen next whereas many of their European colleagues are still fully embedded in their political preference and focus their reporting closely on what will be beneficial for their “political flock” and what won't. So no wonder 80-90% of them always feel enthusiastic whenever a summit is ended by a press conference, they hurl back to their studios or bureaus and trumpet the “big success” to their constituency oh no it should be written as readership/audience putting aside the often many untouched problems and therefore realistic looked upon thin results of such summits. (Seldom questions like: “Where is the beef ?”) Therefore majority of European language and culture skilled journalists from e.g. Germany have better tools to their disposal but fail to use them properly. Maybe comparable to C3PO of those Star Wars movies which has language skills of millions of lifeforms across the universe but is a acting a bit odd or as a retard.

I don't want to get fully into pointing out or even moralizing about the importance of fact ONLY based reporting but wanted to make clear the existing differences in approach and by congratulating all those sleep deprived Americans who keep very closely focused on the Eurozone nowadays whereas before in “normal times” at last European financial markets were monitoring events in New York / Washington and Chicago very closely. Also a good time to mention Google and its tools for translation favorably because surely it is used quite often by many people these days in order to keep track of all those events reported in all European languages. It's still far from being a perfect translator but already very advanced. Not much needed to get as perfect as the golden much liked metal skinned retard ;-)

[Update Dec 14th (later)]
Once more the main question is if it is still possible for journalism to limit itself to transport the FACTS to its readers/listeners/viewers. Examples above just picked in order to make a point of how some reporting went "adrift". Not all reporting in Europe is like that, but when it is done like described above, it needs to be condemned.  


As some readers may find the content "provocative" and disagree partially or fully and therefore want to leave a comment. No problem .. as long it's no Spam, link to malicious websites, or other nonsense.  All comments are subjected to being checked before being released to the public.
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[update Dec 16th]
additional links:
"No Disconnect" Die Strategie hinter Guttenbergs Beraterjob
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