phone calls from hell

[Alan Horowitz]

I almost hate to start a thread about something that will inevitably 
implode into a middle-east-politics flamefest, but this reminds me of the 
time the newswires reported that 10% of Israel's population had attended 
that peace rally in Tel-Aviv. Was it right after the Sabra-Shatilla massacre?
Anyway, the followup news (which of course never made the news) was that 
it would not be physically possible for a third of that many people to 
all be in that place (Kikar Square?) all at once.  The original numbers 
were published by the Israeli "peace camp", who would have liked for 
there to be that many people there.

100,000 people at a funeral?  I don't doubt that there were 100,000 
people who would have liked to be there, but I am skeptical 
that there's enough vehicles in Gaza to assemble 100,000 people  to a 
funeral within a few hours.

It doesn't matter does it?  Everyone is willing to lie when they write 
press releases; newspapers are willing to not check ridiculous claims (if 
the claim comports with the publisher's outlook); and setting the record 
straight doesn't help sell advertising, publishers really care how lazy 
journalists are.

I saw a great interview with the man who invented the phrase "ethnic 
cleansing" - a PR-agency guy in Boston under contract to the Bosnian 
Government. He openly stated, that he doesn't get paid to write the 
truth into press releases; he's paid to get his client's press releases 
into opinion-molder's fax machines FIRST. The first press release always 
wins. He also openly stated that he didn't know and didn't care if the 
Bosnian-Serb militias were operating concentration camps or not; the 
important thing was to fax the story to the American Jewish groups; he 
knew that the very *word* concentration camp would catch their eye and 
push them into agitating against the Serbs. He specifically stated, 
that he was so proud of his cleverness, because the Croatian President 
(foe of the Serbs) has a book under his belt ("Wastelands of Historical 
Reality") that is packed full of some very hot anti-Semetism.

Alan Horowitz
alanh at infi.net