Judith Siers-Poisson's News Articles

Herr Stauber In Der Spiegel

by Judith Siers-Poisson — May 15, 2007 - 9:35am

Topics: Iraq, Global Warming, Environment, International, Propaganda, Public Relations, U.S. Government, War / Peace

CMD Founder and Executive Director John Stauber has been in Germany, Austria and Belgium for the past two weeks speaking in major cities and discussing the publication of "Toxic Sludge Is Good For You" in German. On May 16 Vienna's daily paper Der Standard ran an interview with Herr Stauber that can be read in German by searching his name on their website. He was previously interviewed by Nils Klawitter for the German magazine Der Spiegel, and a translated portion of the interview is below. (Thanks to Orange-Press, publishers of the German edition of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You, for the translation.) If you would like to read the German interview in its entirety, please go to http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,481658,00.html

Spiegel: For you the media as the Fourth Estate and as a fortress against propaganda is a myth: you write that in many cases the American media is nothing more than the stenographer of the powerful. Instead of discovering propaganda, the media serves as a channel for it.

John Stauber: America surely is the country mostly influenced by PR, which is a multi-billion dollar industry. Tens of billions is a conservative estimate. Unlike in Germany, in the United States journalists are clearly outnumbered by spin doctors. You immediately grasp the scale of this influence if you compare the USA with other western democracies and see how topics such as climate change, environmental toxins, and workers' rights are discussed. This is exemplified most clearly by the war in Iraq. The big media companies actually repeated the lies of the Bush regime. The result of a poll was, that even last July, half of all Americans still believed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. That's the idea of the embedded reporter.

Appetite for Profit: An Interview with Michele Simon

by Judith Siers-Poisson — February 28, 2007 - 11:16am

Topics: Corporate Campaigns, Advertising, Obesity, Front Groups, Corporations, Health, Marketing, Media, Politics, Public Relations, Science

In December 2006, I interviewed author Michele Simon about her book, "Appetite for Profit: How the Food Industry Undermines our Health and How to Fight Back." The excerpts below are from that original interview, which took place on WORT, community radio in Madison, Wisconsin. For more information on Michele and her work, please visit her website.

JSP: How did you personally become so involved and interested in food politics?

Michele Simon: It started about 10 years ago when I was struggling with my own weight and turned to a vegetarian diet and, lo and behold, I lost the weight I was struggling with. And then, from there, I started to learn all of the other ways our diet impacts our own health, in addition to the environment, animal welfare, and labor, and so many aspects of society — I was just amazed at how much was impacted by those food choices.

What Would the Other George Do? An Interview with the Author of "Saving General Washington"

by Judith Siers-Poisson — December 27, 2006 - 11:19am

Topics: Arts / Culture, Democracy, Politics, Propaganda, Religion, Science, U.S. Government, War / Peace

I spoke with author J.R. Norton in June of this year about his book, Saving General Washington: The Right Wing Assault on America's Founding Principles. The following excerpts are from an interview on "A Public Affair" on WORT (89.9 FM), community radio in Madison, WI, and from a follow up in-person interview.

JSP: Why do George Washington and the rest of the Founding Fathers need to be saved?

J.R. Norton: Well, it's a bit of metaphor. It's in part aimed at rehabilitating and reintroducing these founding figures of American history, but on a broader level, on a more important level, it's about reintroducing the values that these guys stood for. Certainly over the last five or six years, I think we've really lost sight of those virtues.

A View of 9/11 from North of the Border

by Judith Siers-Poisson — September 13, 2006 - 9:28am

Topics: Iraq, Terrorism, Health, International, Politics, War / Peace

I happened to be in Vancouver Sunday evening and all day Monday, so spent 9/11 north of the border. While people in the U.S. and other parts of the world only had The Path to 9/11 docudrama as a television viewing choice, I was fortunate to be able to watch two excellent documentary films about 9/11 and its aftermath aired by the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC).

Funding the Left

by Judith Siers-Poisson — July 28, 2006 - 4:59pm

Topics: Politics, Think Tanks

The July 2006 issue of In These Times magazine carries an enlightening and overdue article about how the Left is funded, or not. The New Funding Heresies, written by Senior Editor Christopher Hayes, focuses on the relatively new group of very wealthy liberal and progressive funders called the Democracy Alliance. This group of close to one hundred donors has pledged to individually donate a minimum of $1 million over five years to organizations chosen from a docket that is vetted by the staff and board of the Alliance. In addition, each Democracy Alliance donor pays a $25,000 entry fee and annual dues of $30,000 to cover the operating expenses of the Alliance according to the article.

The Alliance seeks to counter the juggernaut of right-wing think tanks and grassroots coalitions in part by creating a similar infrastructure on the liberal/left side of the aisle, and increasing the odds of reaching liberal political goals in the 2006 mid-term elections and beyond.

War Is For Children: Reading, Writing and Recruitment

by Judith Siers-Poisson — July 19, 2006 - 10:07am

Topics: Iraq, Children, Politics, U.S. Government, War / Peace

As a child I absolutely adored Cricket magazine, published by Carus Publishing. I now have a twelve-year old daughter who likewise enjoys their magazines for kids, but the May 2006 issue of Cobblestone Magazine floored me with its blatant pro-military marketing pitch to children.

Chances are, depending on your age, that either you or your children have read one of Carus’ publications at home, school, the library, or a doctor’s waiting room. For the smallest tykes—those under seven years old—they offer Ladybug, Babybug, and Click magazines. For six- to nine-year olds they put out Spider, Ask, and Appleseeds. And for the “tweens,” Calliope, Cobblestone, Cricket, Dig, Faces, Muse, Odyssey, and Cicada.

From Russia with Spin

by Judith Siers-Poisson — April 5, 2006 - 1:06am

Topics: Crisis Management, Terrorism, Public Diplomacy, Democracy, International

All is not champagne and caviar in Moscow. Pro-Putin political forces are concerned that the West -- particularly the US -- is growing increasingly distant from President Vladmir Putin and the current Russian administration.