If Only There Was A Way Our Media Could Verify The Information Our Government Gives Them

[no limit]

Run time: 02:23 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6LBeNrIbgM   Posted on YouTube: April 01, 2011 By YouTube Member: leftunderground Views on YouTube: 5   Posted on DU: April 01, 2011 By DU Member: no limit Views on DU: 800

 
This morning the Today Show on NBC did a story about radiation showing up in milk here in the states thousands of miles away from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. The story concluded that "the experts" are telling us this is absolutely nothing to worry about. Although this could be absolutely true notice how many times they use the phrase "experts say" without giving any real specifics about why they are saying this.

From what I could gather the Today show was using data from the EPA. They essentially took an EPA press release and published it as news without any kind of independent analysis on NBC's part. Isn't the job of a news organization to take information the government gives us and do it's own independent analysis of it? There are thousands of independent experts out there NBC could have hired to do their own analysis. They could of then done this report with an actual name of an independent expert who did their own analysis and is willing to put his or her own credibility on the line. Instead NBC had to keep falling back on the phrase "the experts say".

This should especially be true considering the reputation the EPA has for lies and covering up information. After the 9/11 attacks the EPA claimed people in New York had http://www.publicintegrity.org/investigations/broken_government/articles/entry/1006/">absolutely nothing to worry about when it comes to air quality:

Days after terrorists brought down the World Trade Center towers, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that the air was safe to breathe, but that proved to be a dangerously optimistic assessment. Nearly two years later, EPA’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reported that the EPA “did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement,” as “air monitoring data was lacking for several pollutants of concern.” The OIG also discovered that the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) significantly revised EPA press releases “to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones.” Samples showed asbestos levels between double and triple EPA’s danger limit, but CEQ edits defined the results as “slightly above” the limit. EPA was instructed to clear all statements to the media through the National Security Council, giving National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice’s office final approval. While the EPA pointed to its recommendations that workers and volunteers on site take precautions such as using respirators, OIG said “EPA’s basic overriding message was that the public did not need to be concerned about airborne contaminants.” Former EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman maintains that her assurances referred to lower Manhattan in general and not the Ground Zero site. Yet, first responders like Vinny Forras told CBS, “We were being told ‘Don’t worry about it.’” Forras is one of the nearly seven out of 10 World Trade Center responders who reported new or worsened lung problems, according to a 2006 study by Mount Sinai Hospital.

The EPA was also the agency that allowed BP to dump thousands of gallons of toxic dispersants in to American waters.

In interest of being fair and balanced the Today Show did give a couple seconds to people that had concerns. But any concerns the Today Show aired was labeled as coming from groups opposed to nuclear power. What a great way to frame the issue: "the experts say" you got nothing to worry about while these crazy anti-nuclear power fringe groups think there could be concerns about radiation showing up in our food supply (what a crazy concept).

So this is just another example of our media not doing the job they should be doing, and this type of incompetence must be intentional. And maybe having corporations such as GE that directly profit off nuclear power owning news networks isn't a very good idea.

[valerief]

1. Today Show is Fox with Matt Lauer. nt

[walerosco]

2. I have already switched

to powered milk and I like it. Its cheaper, last longer and I can control the concentration. Powdered milk ftw

[AlbertCat]

4. All radiation now comes from Japan.

Ignore that Nuke Power Plant next door to the dairy farm....

[blackbart99]

5. How can I get me some of that powered milk?

Your typo made me chuckle....Notice that they had this guy drinking milk at the end to show all
you sheeple how to behave.

[walerosco]

6. stupid me

I get mine from walmart for anyone who wants to know where I buy my "powdered" milk. It is actually the only item I buy from walmart.

[Charleston Chew]

3. Orwell Rolls in his Grave (Full 3HR Documentary)

ORWELL ROLLS IN HIS GRAVE moves through a troubling list of questions and news stories that go unanswered and unreported in the mainstream media.

ORWELL ROLLS IN HIS GRAVE reminds us that 1984 is not just a date in the future.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php/www//seattletimes.nwsource.com/photobucket.com/albums/v611/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x559676

[underpants]

7. That looks very interesting. I am bookmarking this thread

Thanks Mr./Mrs. Chew

[DeSwiss]

8. I liked how the reporter needed a carton of milk.....

...as a prop so that his apparently brain-dead "audience" would know what he was talking about.

"Don't use big words like R-A-D-I-A-T-I-O-N and P-L-U-T-O-N-I-U-M -- show them pictures and stuff -- you'll lose 'em with those big words!!!"

I also noticed that Matt failed to mention that those goddamned leaking reactors in Fukushima which are spewing all this radiation poison into California's milk as well as all over the rest of the world right now, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_I_Nuclear_Power_Plant">were designed by NBC's parent company GE.

- Gee, you would have thought it would have been a natural segue.....

K&R

[WhoIsNumberNone]

9. One grain of radioactive dust is more than I want to ingest

Does anybody still believe the "experts" when it comes to things like this? These fuckers are saying 'don't worry- it's radioactive, but it's insignificant.' Isn't that what they were saying about the porno scanners before it was revealed that they actually zap you with 10 times (or is it 100 time) what they were telling us?

Radioactivity = Bad. I don't care how "insignificant" the amount is.