The NY Times is up for festive start to their 2006 campaign of Bush bashing. Amazon and the bookstores will soon have James Risen's NSA intelligence leak book, and in today's online edition they have a fresh charge of military 'propaganda'. The report says the same contractor who paid Iraqi newspapers to add American points of view also paid Sunni clerics to say good things about us. Just like the previous story, the Times doesn't suggest the information was disinformation, just propaganda.
The first time I recall hearing the word propaganda was in grade school in reference to World War II and its legendary figures Tokyo Rose and Joseph Goebbels. From that point forward the word has always been synonymous with evil intentions, and I've never thought of it in relation to American information dissemination efforts during wartime. Naive, perhaps, but true I'd wager for many others as well.
Checking Merriam Webster's, they have two germane definitions of the word propaganda. One is "the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person", and the other.."ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one's cause or to damage an opposing cause..". So, technically the Times use of the word is correct. However, I doubt the street meaning of the word escapes them.
This is yet another reason many seriously question which side they're on, since they act as if the enemy is within. Guess it makes sense--they did send Judy Miller and her WMD stories packing months ago.
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