Media Control: the Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda

Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda. By Noam Chomsky
Seven Stories Press. 2002

Synopsis of the book.
Chomsky examines and explores the use of propaganda in the mass media. His focus remains on the "elite" as he would call them, or the corporations and politicians that control the mass media in our country. He speaks of how the U.S. government used propaganda in order to gain support for our country's involvement in wars from Wilson's presidency to Bush Sr., and now in our so-called "War on Terror" brought upon by George W. Bush. He explains how he believes this elite group of people control the minds of those that are less educated, and without an open minds. He believes that propaganda has been used through the mass media to guide this population towards supporting political interests.

Why I chose this book.
I had heard from many of my friends about Noam Chomsky and how he may just be the most important intellectual alive today. So while I was helping my friend with an assignment of hers I came across this book at her house. I flipped through a couple of pages and decided to use this book for this project. I thought it would provide a new insight into the role of our government in the media.

How this book relates to this class.
This book discusses the governments role in the media. Although Chomsky's views might be considered somewhat extreme by some standards, his message s important. We have discussed the government manipulation of the media. For example, President Roosevelt created his Sunday announcements in hopes to create the most important story in the newspapers the next day which would be lacking big headlines due to the weekend. This is an shows how the government has used propaganda to push an agenda, the main focus of Chomsky's book. There is also the issue of priming in the media. During the Gulf War, president Bush's ratings were a record high. During the war very few other issues were covered by the media, and soon after the war ended, the President was voted out of office. Chomsky discusses the ways in which Bush Sr. propagandized the country into believing our involvement was important. The information the media reported was from the Bush White House, therefore promoting his agenda.

The most valuable piece of information I learned from reading this book...
I have discovered how truly complex the relationship between the government, media, our United States, and even the world really is. There is so much that I have left to understand. This book really made me think about how much control the elite in this country could really have over the thought processes of much of the nations population.

Would I recommend this book to others?
Absolutely. There may be issues that Chomsky discusses in this book that many might not agree with or understand, but he is defiantly a modern intellect that more people should know about. I know that I will continue to read other works of his and hope to gain a different prospective on many of the issues facing the world today.