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Amid last night's storm of Bad Things you might have missed this Bad Thing:
Trump appointee Michael Pack has eliminated the US Agency for Global Media's editorial firewall, which protected networks like @VOANews, @RFERL, etc from political influence. https://www.npr.org/2020/10/27/928118147/u-s-agency-targets-its-own-journalists-independence
Trump appointee Michael Pack has eliminated the US Agency for Global Media's editorial firewall, which protected networks like @VOANews, @RFERL, etc from political influence. https://www.npr.org/2020/10/27/928118147/u-s-agency-targets-its-own-journalists-independence
The calling card of these networks -- I know, I've lived and worked in the places they serve -- is that they provide independent, fact-based news where little to none exists.
Putin has long critiqued VOA and RFERL as propaganda mouthpieces, and has claimed that their very existence neutralizes any Western critiques on Russia's state-run media and lack of free speech.
Well, Michael Pack is adding fuel to that whataboutism fire now.
Well, Michael Pack is adding fuel to that whataboutism fire now.
But the thing that *really* upsets me is that Pack and the Trump administration's insistence on turning these outlets into propaganda *endangers USAGM journalists' lives.*
They have long been targets for their courageous reporting - Belarus @svaboda reporters have been arrested on mutliple occasions since protests broke out this summer, for example - but this decision puts them further at risk in environments already hostile to them.
This, on top of Pack's decisions to not renew visas for foreign staff working in the US bureau, is cruel, inhumane, and in contravention of American morals and values.
In HOW TO LOSE THE INFORMATION WAR I predicted that a second Trump admin might seek to eliminate outlets like RFERL. That they're rushing to do this before the end of Trump's term shows they are not invested in USAGM's mission or the values the US has, until now, represented.
