Politicians can decide whether I’m a journalist? Good luck.
By Jon Rappoport
September 19, 2013
The Free Flow of Information Act, Senate Bill 987, is now under consideration.
This misnamed piece of insanity seeks to define who a journalist is and isn’t, thereby compelling all “non-journalists” to reveal their sources on demand.
Who would be non-journalists? Millions and millions of people who blog, write online articles, and post videos.
Sorry. No sale, Congress.
The bill, which tries to define what a reporter is, is going to be as effective as trying to stop waves from breaking on the beach with your prurient sniffing noses.
If politicians can decide whether I’m a journalist, I can decide whether they’re representing the people who elected them.
If politicians can declare I’m not a reporter, and therefore I must testify about my sources, I can decide they’re not representatives, and therefore all their votes on legislation are null and void.
I can also decide Brian Williams, Scott Pelley, and Dianne Sawyer are animated cartoons that read press releases from the White House. Not journalists.
I can decide that one of the bill’s main supporters, gun-toting Senator Dianne Feinstein, who replaced her weapon with armed security guards, is a frog who was hatched in a Superfund site.
I can decide the Constitution makes illegal 95% of what the federal government does, merely on the basis of the 10th Amendment.
I can decide the NSA is a fake investigative reporter who is sourcing 90% of his stories by spying on the American people—and therefore must reveal those sources. He must disclose all the names of all the people in America (his sources) on whom he is spying.
I can decide Washington DC is a cesspool of poison and must be cordoned off, eliminating entry and exit, and thereby protecting the rest of America.
My freedom does not come from the government.
My freedom to write and speak does not come from politicians.
Or from the courts.
Feinstein wants to define a reporter as someone who draws a paycheck from a legitimate news organization. I define her as a politician who draws an illegitimate paycheck from the American people.
I define mainstream news organizations as cowardly thieves who spend their days deceiving their audiences. These organizations should exist in a giant soap bubble, where they can talk only to each other.
Because news companies are bleeding red ink out of every orifice, they want protection. They want an official legislated monopoly on inventing reality.
But intrinsically, reality is a matter open to debate.
That fact will never change.
No president, whether he claims to feel our pain, can’t read a teleprompter, or appears out of a cloud to save the world can alter that fact.
Here is the truth. Everyone is a reporter. Everyone can seek answers and look for them. This is: the ocean.
Now, you politicians, waddle up to it and stick your nosy noses against it and try to stop it.
You lose.
Your cesspool will go dry before our ocean does.
Jon Rappoport
The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com
proof-read version 🙂
Yes, Jon, we are free to ridicule them, but at the end of the day, they use the cops to take our money so they can pay said cops. Slavery has always worked that way. Humans living in the Anglo/American Empire have no problem with this system. Even though the gravy train has fewer and fewer passengers, the riders get fatter and fatter. Therefore, the competition gets uglier and uglier to get on this train.
LOL @ Congress.
report – as defined – give a written or spoken account of an observation.
journal – a daily record…
NEWS = north east west south…
I’ve just defined bloggers, online articles and first person observations that pretty much covers everyone reporting on world events. Thanks to all of you, because you aren’t awaiting payment and consider it a job, doing the dirty work, em-ploy-ment of another, providing the slant they desire for the lies, propaganda leading humanity astray, rather instead your conscious is leading you, ultimately, we the people towards the truth.
With much gratitude to the writing conscious people of the world.
Reblogged this on Jericho777's Blog.
It’s really the “Lamestream Media Protection Act”!
It isn’t about protecting anyone other than the media members that support them the most! The media members that won’t go any further than to say what they are told to say!
Big Government wants to regulate the “shield law” status to protect against leaks and national security. But there’s one major flaw in this argument: who the heck is going to leak to a small-time blogger and his audience of 20 people? We need to change the terms of this debate because the current discussion and justifications are a distraction from the primary issue of speech rights in general. Once regulation starts, it only invites further regulation. Full article, see link:
TND Proposal: Definition Of Who Is A Journalist:
http://thenewsdoctors.com/tnd-proposal-definition-of-who-is-a-journalist/
The question is not about defining the term “journal” in the dictionary.
The question is asking who is saying what as defined by our definition of the press: A person who is trained in the field of gathering and disseminating news.
If one decides a politician is in fact a frog, fine. Where did you get your source? Or, is this your opinion? I don’t care, but just tell me how you know what you know.
Maybe it’s me, but I like to know where people get their information. We already have a lot of questionable news sources with shaky “facts” delivered in a style to keep their hands clean. The use of “What if……” carries a lot of weight with some who don’t know better.
So, perhaps if we can define instead asking anyone posting or writing about the state of affairs where they got their info is not such a bad thing. If we can all work to a higher standard of journalism, I’m for that.
What we should be asking our politicians is to show their sources and then we will show ours.
absolutely 100% right, but…
people who are employed in government or private enterprise have no right to release publicly without authority any information they may have privileged access to,
if people were to have their private medical histories publicly posted on WWW in the name of public interest without their consent or knowledge how loud would the squealing be then about breaches of security and illegal releasing of sensitive information?
the world has become overrun with squealers and self obsessed mentally deranged narcissists who think the rules don’t apply to them,
[…] Politicians can decide whether I’m a journalist? Good luck. […]
if someone is giving you information and you don’t know or they don’t tell you where their information comes from and you can’t verify that source of information, should it exist, as legitimate ortrustworthy, then a good defense for this scenario is utilization of your brain. Not assigning the government as your personal thinker or information controller.
[…] Politicians can decide whether I’m a journalist? Good luck. (jonrappoport.wordpress.com) […]
I have a plan. Since “journalist” is impossible to describe in the proscribed manner, as the word simply applies too broadly across the spectrum, why not use the term, “hockey-pucker?” Surely the hockey-pucker can be defined with some degree of clarity, at least. Every hockey-pucker has eyes, ears, mouth and typewriting fingers. Thus, let the government outlaw hockey-pucker activities. If any hockey-pucker is caught releasing, reading or listening to sensitive government information, let the sanctions come down. This way, journalists of every stripe could continue reporting what they see, read or listen to, and government would not continue attempting to represent me, John Q. Public, so embarrassingly before all the nations of the world. All in favor of outlawing the hockey-pucker, walk outside and holler, “Aye!” But yell real loudly so Washington can hear this din over the one it is creating for itself right now.
P.S. Moses was a reporter, so was Jesus, and so is God. Will the frogs (Feinstein, et al.,) outlaw the Bible? Ooops. wait a minute, they already have, and for different reasons than reportorial misbehavior. Oh well, let us go back to the hockey-pucker.
[…] The Free Flow of Information Act, Senate Bill 987 now under consideration, is a misnamed piece of in…. […]
Reblogged this on The Surf Report and commented:
Good luck.
Reblogged this on Jesse Talks Back.
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Remember the “reporter” (sorry I forget his name) who got extra special press privileges during the Bush Administration. Although I never heard of him publishing an actual news article, he was visiting the White House even at odd hours of the night. Turns out he had a website where he posed nude and there were strong implicatikns he was a gay gigolo. It was not determined who was calling this guy and what knnd of “reporting” he did, and what or whose “microphone” he was using. Would he be considered a “journalist” more than Jon or the other honest voices out there? Sucking up should not be the criterion.
[…] Blogger John Rappaport states this: […]
@ Rob O’Leary-I believe you are thinking of Jeff Gannon
[…] Politicians can decide whether I’m a journalist? Good luck. (jonrappoport.wordpress.com) […]
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