Wednesday, April 24, 2013 by: Jon Rappoport
You're a reporter for a TV news outlet.
You've become aware of a disturbing trend. Thousands of private citizens are now analyzing video and photographs of crime scenes and posting their findings.
They're hounds, and they can't be stopped. They're looking at news footage, casual video, photos, and what they're coming up with challenges the official story lines your network pushes.
Some of the their analysis is ridiculous, but some of it isn't.
For example, video footage of the first bomb in Boston doesn't appear to show any shrapnel damage to the fencing near the explosion, or to the blue canopy just above the street. You, the reporter, wonder about that.
The now-famous 78-year-old runner who fell down in the street, just after the first explosion? Security personnel wearing yellow jackets were standing closer to the bomb, but they didn't wobble or duck or waver. You, the reporter, wonder about that, too.
You, the reporter, see a photo of a storefront which was presumably right next to the first bomb. The windows are blown out. But all the glass is lying in the street, which would indicate the force of the explosion was coming from inside the store. How is that possible, you ask yourself.
Then there are the quickly circulating photos of the man in the wheelchair. He's missing large parts of both legs. People are pushing the chair. His legs are bleeding. But other posted photos? Do they show he already was wearing prosthetics? Is it true he should already be dead from the massive blood loss? You, the reporter, are disturbed by this.
You also look at several photos of the pressure-cooker bomb. In the twisted metal remains, you see discoloration, but no signs the nails or ball bearings in the bomb penetrated the pressure cooker or pitted it or ended up embedded in it.
You look at photos of men standing near the Marathon finish line, the men in identical uniforms, who have variously been described as Navy Seals, Coast Guard, and Craft International security personnel.
What were they doing there? Running a drill? Watching suspects or patsies or bomb-planters? What was going on?
You look at a photo of the younger Tsarnaev brother leaving the scene after the bombs went off. He's still...wearing his backpack? And another photo, the one of the ripped-apart backpack on the ground. Is that a white square on it? Because one of the Seal-Craft-Coast Guard guys had a white square on his intact backpack...and is that him, leaving the scene of the bombing without that backpack? Hmmm...
You, the reporter, now face several quandaries.
First, if you decide to look into all this, you'll have to do actual work. Investigation. That isn't part of your job description. You basically talk to official sources, obtain their statements, repeat them, and sound like you know what you're talking about. Investigation? What's that?
Second, if you undertake a serious inquiry, you're going to have to verify that all these photos and all this video footage are pristine and haven't been altered or cropped in order to mislead.
You'll have to find experts to help you. More work. You're already feeling exhausted, just thinking about it.
On the other hand, your network has shown faked and cropped photos and edited footage in the past, to slant stories. So maybe you can get by with less work.
However, there is a rule in your business. Reporters aren't allowed to follow their noses. They aren't allowed to do investigations on their own. They most definitely aren't permitted to do technical analysis of evidence, like crime-scene photos or video. No, all technical interpretation has to come from government agencies.
If you go off the reservation, you'll take heavy hits from your bosses.
But all this is meaningless. It's just mental masturbation, because, finally, you know there is no possible way your producer will allow you to present evidence that the official Boston scenario has gaping holes in it.
Your own network has the explicit job of promoting that scenario.
You'd be torpedoing your own people. Professional suicide. Just walking into your producer's office and pointing to issues raised by private-citizen analysis of video? It would put you on a watch list.
Your producer would think, "This guy's gone soft in the head. He wants to pursue a story on his own. He must be some kind of grandstanding goof. He doesn't have a firm grip on things. He doesn't know what his job really is. And he wants to raise doubts about the Boston bombing? Wow..."
To the degree that you have any shred of conscience left, you're in a bind. Maybe it's the moment to offload that last bit of idealism and go completely corporate. It's not as if you've been challenging your bosses; you've just been asking yourself questions privately. So what's the problem? Just stop asking the questions.
Maybe you're depressed. Maybe you should go in and see a shrink and get a script for Zoloft. Something to take the edge off. Of course, then you'd have to cut back on your drinking. Screw that. Just up the booze. Have a few more every night after work. Make the coffee stronger in the morning.
Wait. An idea is forming.
It's coming.
Sit there. Let it formulate.
Mmmm....
Yes. Yes! Here it is. Some of these video hounds are saying no one at all was hurt or killed in Boston; the whole bombing thing was a hoax. Well, tell that to the doctors at the hospitals who were doing amputations.
Okay. Okay. Now you're on to something. You can feel it. There's an obvious way to destroy all this wildcat video evidence in one fell swoop and, at the same time, endear yourself to your bosses.
They'll be grateful. You can rack up some brownie points. They'll think of you as a company man. A tough defender of the realm, their realm... More>>
