U.S. Videos, for TV News, Praise Medicare Law

[Snellius]

WASHINGTON, March 14 — Federal investigators are scrutinizing television segments in which the Bush administration paid people to pose as journalists praising the benefits of the new Medicare law, which would be offered to help elderly Americans with the costs of their prescription medicines.

The videos are intended for use in local television news programs. Several include pictures of President Bush receiving a standing ovation from a crowd cheering as he signed the Medicare law on Dec. 8.

The materials were produced by the Department of Health and Human Services, which called them video news releases, but the source is not identified. Two videos end with the voice of a woman who says, "In Washington, I'm Karen Ryan reporting."

But the production company, Home Front Communications, said it had hired her to read a script prepared by the government.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/15/politics/15VIDE.html?hp

[Media_Lies_Daily]

1. Anyone really surprised by yet another fabrication from the NeoCons?

[Moderator]

2. kick

..

[0007]

3. Didn't someone on 60 minutes say that America won't

be happy campers when they learn the truth in 2005 about Medicare? The reason there is no outrage now is because hardly no one knows anything about this Medicare bill.

The whole Medicare bill should be rescinded.

[htuttle]

4. Keep an eye out for stuff like this on your local news

The video version of 'Toxic Sludge is Good for You' gave a lot of examples of this. PR firms funded by industry shoot these little 'feature pieces' too, and send the tapes to local news stations, free of charge.

They look like news stories, but are actually 'infomercials' that look like news. More often than not, they end with one of those 'In ________, this is Special Health Correspondent _______ reporting," or something similar -- some reporter you've never heard of. Local news stations don't usually state where they came from or who paid for them, either.

Keep an eye out -- you'll probably see at least 2-3 a week.

It's criminal that the Bush administration is using tax dollars to pay for them, however.

[colonel odis]

5. but isn't the media overwhelmingly liberal

and not to be trusted?

what's a sheep to do?

[Snellius]

6. This is one of two most unreported scandals of the Bush admin.

Bribed congressmen, threats, extortion, violations of the rules of Congress, intentional deceptions, fraud, and misrepresentation of the facts. Along with the role Cheney and his cronies played in the California energy crisis, this is one of the biggest and most blatant examples of the kind of institutionalized corruption at the dark heart of the Bush administration. And like California, the press could care less.

[nibbana]

7. I wonder which television stations

would use this propoganda...Could we ever trust them again...
I wonder who is the "media empire" that owns them...does anybody have a list of these posers?