On Michael Parenti

In the United States, for over a hundred years, the ruling interests tirelessly propagated anticommunism among the populace, until it became more like a religious orthodoxy than a political analysis. During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime’s atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn’t go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them.

The essence of capitalism is to turn nature into commodities and commodities into capital. The live green earth is transformed into dead gold bricks, with luxury items for the few and toxic slag heaps for the many. The glittering mansion overlooks a vast sprawl of shanty towns, wherein a desperate, demoralized humanity is kept in line with drugs, television, and armed force.

In pursuit of counterrevolution and in the name of freedom, U.S. forces or U.S.-supported surrogate forces slaughtered 2,000,000 North Koreans in a three-year war; 3,000,000 Vietnamese; over 500,000 in aerial wars over Laos and Cambodia; over 1,500,000 in Angola; over 1,000,000 in Mozambique; over 500,000 in Afghanistan; 500,000 to 1,000,000 in Indonesia; 200,000 in East Timor; 100,000 in Nicaragua (combining the Somoza and Reagan eras); over 100,000 in Guatemala (plus an additional 40,000 disappeared); over 700,000 in Iraq;3 over 60,000 in El Salvador; 30,000 in the “dirty war” of Argentina (though the government admits to only 9,000); 35,000 in Taiwan, when the Kuomintang military arrived from China; 20,000 in Chile; and many thousands in Haiti, Panama, Grenada, Brazil, South Africa, Western Sahara, Zaire, Turkey, and dozens of other countries, in what amounts to a free-market world holocaust.

Michael Parenti

There's much to be said for Parenti. His lectures are short and very easily accessible.

And his history books are some of the first that helped shaped my understanding of history as it occurred. He outlines the perspectives of historical forces well; he demonstrates the incentives at play during some brutal periods of history.

I came to Parenti because of twitter user Aren LeBrun (@proustmalone). Aren is well-spoken and cutting, and he mentioned that he got much of his insight into the way the world works from reading Parenti. So I decided to put him on the ever-growing list of books-to-read.

While looking for one to read, his most popular book - The Assassination of Julius Caesar - happened to be in an old area of interest. I had a bit of Ancient Rome in the brain already, so I thought it would be a great place to start.

TODO: say stuff about it, Gibbons quote, notes

As I was reading, I searched Parenti online. I think I had watched a lecture (or at least some clips) at this point. Online, many recommended Blackshirts and Reds as an essential work. I was interested, I've always known my modern history is a weak point, so I read it in a couple hours.

TODO: say stuff about it, USSR quote - compare to today, notes

After that, I decided to check out Inventing Reality. This was another really great read that helped me gain clarity on how history went down. Parenti does a great job of pulling relevant newspaper clippings while illustrating the events that occurred.

TODO: notes

TODO: link yellow parenti, other lectures

TODO: Gibbons quote - Caesar?

For now, I'll link some works (in a logical order) and post some of my own notes for quick takeaways:

• Blackshirts and Reds (1997) - A great read on WW2 and Cold War history, fairly short and goes pretty quick.
• Anticommunism & Wonderland (1997) - These are chapters 3 and 4 of Blackshirts and Reds, which serve as a good standalone work if you want something shorter to start.
• Inventing Reality (1986) - A Marxist-Leninist take on news media; similar to Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent, but better and published first.
• Friendly Feudalism: The Tibet Myth (2007)

Inventing Reality (1986) notes

• Media serves to portray (and normalize) existing power structures and maintain the status quo. Black people are overrepresented in bad news stories. Black people and women are underrepresented in news media.
• The "minimal effect" of media (ie. re-enforcing current stances and world view) is the intended effect. Media promotes tunnel vision, explaining the small-picture cause and effect without looking at larger causal links between wealth/power/policy.
• "The existing media market of ideas is more like the larger economic market of which it is a part: oligopolistic and accessible mostly to those who possess vast amounts of capital, or who hold views that are pleasing to the possessors of capital."
• Real news is more expensive than canned features and soft stuff is also less offensive (more appealing to advertisers)
• Must follow direct (and implied) orders from bosses/owners; must not offend advertisers; must maintain reader goodwill.
• Discussion of "freedom of press" centers around government influence or limitation, whereas censorship generally occurs in the private sector powered by owners/advertisers who determine what gets shown to the public.
• There is a conditional autonomy that grants power to those who support the ideals of those already in power; editors only become (and stay) editors if the owners support their work. Thus, editors serve as conduits of owner censorship rather than resistors to it. Similarly, reporters are given autonomy so long as their work is satisfactory to their masters.
• "The press does not speak the voice of the nation. It does not even speak the voice of those who write for it." ~Fanny Wright, 1829
• All reporting is influenced by prior biases and current incentives, which serve to promote the status quo. "Total objectivity" doesn't exist (perception is inescapably biased) and in journalism it is used to prevent journalists from injecting their own opinions or asking too many uncomfortable questions. Orthodoxy masks itself as objectivity.
• Cannot ask questions that go against the class interests of the owning class: Why are wealth and power so unequally distributed between classes within nations and between developed and Third World nations? Why do corporations have so much power and citizens so little? Why is there so much underemployment, want, and economic insecurity in so many countries in which capitalism is said to be working so well? Why does the United States need a global network of military bases around the world? And why are US leaders hostile toward any nation that charts an independent course, one that might infringe upon the interests of multinational corporate investors?
• "Objectivity is believing those in power and printing their press releases"
• it is not the laziness that is allowing the manipulation; it is the manipulative control that encourages and rewards the lazy, superficial (“objective”) approach.
• Maintain appearances via a) ideological congruity between the working press and media owners, b) limited range of views that don't question the status quo, c) anticipatory self-censorship, d) rewards for conforming to the existing system, e) obvious instances of coercion, censorship, and bias are explained away as outliers or isolated issues, f) suppression is not often felt, so journalists perceive autonomy guided by integrity despite the actual control editors and owners have.
• Lots of CIA propaganda comes in (directly via journalists, indirectly via blowback articles initially published elsewhere).
• Although corporate mishaps may be reported on, the underlying class interests and the rippling out of imperialism are both ignored. Foreign policy and US global interventionism are glistened over at best.
• Washington Post is owned by Jeff Bezos
• Consumer ideology fostered via the 60-80% of print space and 22% of television time dedicated to advertising as well as during the programming that emphasizes spending. The consumer ideology fabricates false needs and panders in a false way to real needs. Media teaches people to define their needs and lifestyles according to the dictates of the commodity market.
• Big business enhances its legitimacy and social hegemony by portraying itself as society’s Grand Provider.
• Advertising shows us our want and frustration are products of our own deficiency. They advertise not only the consumer wares but also the capitalist system and normalize a gluttonous American lifestyle.
• Today, one-third of all corporate advertising is directed at influencing the public on political and ideological issues as opposed to pushing consumer goods.
• Public service announcements are monopolized by the Advertising Council, a nonprofit corporation run by corporate, network, and bank officials. They run with the theme: Personal charity, individual effort, and neighborly good-will can solve any mess. Collectivist, class-oriented, political actions and governmental regulations are not needed in a land of self-reliant volunteers. The goal is to change individual behavior, not social conditions.
• Gulf war spoken about through football euphemisms, abstracts the slaughter of a people to a mere strategic victory by a better player.
• Weather is only spoken about within the smaller context of "what's it like out today?" and the underlying causes are not discussed. Bad trends for the world are ignored while focus is directed to the immediate niceness of warming weather. The usefulness of snow is ignored and low snowfall is lauded despite the lack of snow making it difficult for northern climes to renew themselves.
• News media promotes business perspectives but rarely lend a voice to the labor perspective. The economy is presented as something business and the government attend to while organized labor tags along as a junior partner that occasionally threatens the system.
• Owners and managers are painted as offering concessions patiently and earnestly while strikers are portrayed as violent, crazy, and greedy.
• Worker viewpoints aren't covered, the causes of strikes aren't covered, solidarity between strikers and unions isn't covered.
• The government is portrayed as a neutral arbiter working towards the "national interest" of restarting production.
• This portrayal of organized labor creates a negative view in the eyes of the people, even those with otherwise progressive views. This discourages unionization and creates suspicion around labor organizations.
• There exists not only public opinion but media opinions about public opinion. What the people think is one thing; what is publicized about what they think can be something else. Despite not controlling opinions, the news can control opinion visibility. Protestors are painted in a negative light while ignoring the underlying causes of the protests.
• The news reported a move towards conservatism while ignoring pro-labor, anti-war, anti-corporation, anti-imperialist, and anti-governance protests, strikes, and movements during the 70s and 80s.
• The right generally cannot stir popular support for economic policies that support pentagon funding or corporate tax cuts and therefore relies on non-economic issues such as busing, school prayer, porn, and abortions.
• Centrist media generally favors conservative viewpoints on free-enterprise capitalism, labor unions, protest, etc. even if they don't see eye to eye on all issues.
• Fraudulent claims are repeated until they're accepted as true, such as Russian interference.
• The view on the left that academia generally sides with the corporate-military establishment is ignored while the view on the right that academia is filled with "cultural marxism" and radical political correctness pervades the media.
• Dukakis had popular policy support and an electorate that was ready for change after eight years of Reagan. Low voter turnout was spurned by the ineffectuality of the Democratic candidate and low enthusiasm for either candidate. This led to the Bush presidency, which was used to signal a turn towards conservatism.
• Accuracy in Media attacks liberal bias while receiving syndicate support and public exposure that no leftist media can reach.
• Conservative christian groups receive millions in funding while leftist Christian groups who support housing and war reforms generally don't have enough financial backing to gain media exposure.
• Protests are covered with a bias against protestors. Intersectional issues are covered as people protesting "various issues" since the press treats political issues as isolated, unrelated events.
• The press: ignores and undercounts leftist protests; favors rightist protests for eg. abortion and anticommunist movements; ignores the underlying issues being protested while covering the events (not lending visibility to chants or speeches given) and scants content through single-issue reductionism (eg. MLK was a good civil rights leader but his criticisms of the US economic system are largely unpublicized, Malcolm X was a militant black separatist whose anti-imperialist views were also uncovered, both got assassinated when they started linking racial issues to class and economic conditions); trivialization and marginalization of protests for their surface-level appearances (anarchists = set things on fire); and exaggeration of protestor violence while ignoring the state violence being protested.
• The media lumps together syndicalism, anarchism, communism, etc into a danger to the American life; opposition to the institutions of the powerful are taken as opposition to America itself.
• Anti-red sentiment was present during Eugene Debs' attempts to improve railway working conditions and increased during the Russian revolution era. In 1919, fourteen nations (including Britain, France, and the US) sent an expeditiary force to overthrow the new Russian gov. When this failed, the media picked up stories about Russia wanting war with the US and attacking India.
• Those leading and participating in strikes were denounced and arrested. Socialists who won congress seats were denied them. These efforts killed the strikes, brought wages down, and decimated the ranks of unions.
• At the same time, Mussolini was praised for bringing back the Italian economy and Hitler was reported as "softening down" in 1933. This led to news pleading great takes such as, "let's give Adolf a chance"
• After WW2, cold war propaganda was a way to inculcate the people with want for more government military and defense spending. This was a boon to the corporations that fulfilled such contracts. The anticommunist sentiment led to laws decreasing the efficacy of unions by taking away the right to work, forcing unions to accept corporate spies, and allowing owners to refuse to bargain collectively. CIO had to expell many unions, membership reduced by a quarter, and the union movement lost momentum it never regained. Despite all of this, the press still called the Truman admin "soft on communism"
• McCarthy came around. Reporters knew he was a liar and power manipulator but reported what he said due to "objectivity"; the press played his lies for years despite his claims having been proven false and objectivity was mocked when the story's almost always favored McCarthy. Opposition to McCarthy challenged his methods as "ineffective against communism" but did not challenge the assumption that communists deserved persecution for their political associations and beliefs. His undoing was the eventual targeting of the Republican Eisenhower admin, when conservative publishers decided to stop publishing him.
• Red peril propagated by gov-industrial-media complex because of 1) limiting labor movements/gains, 2) distracting from the crises of capitalism, 3) marshaling public support for defense spending.
• Whether or not fascists and capitalists believe their rhetoric, their ability to mass distribute it limits political discourse and consciousness.
• Anti-communist and anti-soviet genuflection was commonplace for liberal and leftist intellectuals. This showing worsened anti-communist hysteria around the cold war and reduced the leftist space, rather than lending them credibility. Hardliners who chose to give nuanced pros/cons of the USSR (refusing to take a purely anticommunist stance) were rejected by those on the anticommunist left.
• In the early 80s, the USSR reduced their arms and called on the US to do the same. This was ignored by the press or dismissed as propaganda initiatives, and US News reported a Soviet arms buildup while they were calling for cutbacks. When the Soviets agreed to an arms freeze with the US, this wasn't reported on by major news media.
• The Red Menace image propagated by government and media repeatedly attempted to direct popular discontent away from domestic realities (poverty, riots, strikes due to the effects of capitalism) and toward imaginary foes.
• Lithuania: fascist in 1926; "democratic" in 1990 post-communism but with striking similarities to fascist Lithuania.
• Reformist eastern european governments cut price controls/subsidies for food/housing/transportation/clothing, healthcare, education; they sold lands, factories, and news media to rich westerners; they removed much progress in the ways of women's rights. This led to severe economic recessions, drops in real economic income, increased crime rates, and more corruption in places like Poland and Hungary.
• Homelessness was caused by family quarrels and nether world restlessness. Freed from the restrictions of communism, people now could pursue their preferred life-style, abandoning their domiciles and sleeping on the floors of train stations. Not once did the Times suggest that the new government and the free market itself—with its unemployment, wage cuts, inflation, and a doubling of rents—had anything to do with the homeless families of Hungary
• The major press did not reveal much of the knowledge they held about the Vietnam war and the US atrocities committed; reporters were expected to share the military's view of the war and its progress. Those who did try to share these stories and images found difficulties publishing and were banned from returning by the US-supported South Vietnamese gov. Despite the reporting, the underlying goals of US intervention were rarely questioned - the criticism lay mostly in the effectiveness and necessity of the tactics used. The rationale for the war was avoided by the media, the war was a "blunder" rather than an atrocity, and the post-war state of vietnam was due to "economic failure" rather than destruction of capital by US military forces.
• In Chile, Allende was democratically elected and then couped by a fascist Pinochet. Allende was villainized while Pinochet was portrayed as a hero of the economy (despite the lower classes being far worse off) - The Times advocated for Pinochet's dictatorship over democracy for achieving economic growth but conceded that “left behind [were] large numbers of the urban poor, who live less well today than they did 15 years ago.”
• Grenada, 1983: US invaded. Media focused on how we were doing rather than what we were doing. False claim ("rescuing students") used to justify the invasion despite the students denying any threat or inability to leave the island (this was largely ignored by the media). Media exaggerated Cuban presence and went along with Reagan's expansions of scope ("rescuing the Caribbean" as opposed to just students)
• This treatment by the media can be observed in Cuba, Zaire, Guatemala, El Salvador, Indonesia, East Timor, South Africa, Cambodia, Turkey, the Dominican Republic, the entire Arab world, including Palestine, and most other Third World nations and regions. The media 1) accepts the White House narratives, 2) downplays reactionary repression as well as the US' role in it, 3) suppresses the third world's struggle for national independence, economic justice, and revolutionary change, and 4) reduces these struggles to encounters between the virtuous US and it's savage/demonic adversaries.
• Nicaragua: Sandinistas were blamed as totalitarian in the media while the US funded a contra war and embargoed the country. Democracy was criticized when it legitimately elected the Sandinistas in 1984 but was accepted without question when US-backed candidates were elected in 1990 based on promises that the war and embargo would stop. The media blamed the Sandinistas management of the economy more than the contra war or the embargo, but in reality they were voting for an end to war more than they were voting out the Sandinistas.
• Panama: Omar Torriijos (populist-reformist who worked with communist Cuba and extracted money from businesses/banks to find social programs). Got killed via exploding plane in 1981, likely by the CIA via funding to Manuel Noriega. Noriega was a known drug and weapons runner, but after his allegiance to the US waned he was villainized and the US invaded. The media covered their invasion as liberation, ignored popular working-class support of Noriega, and didn't give info on civilian casualties due to lack of verification (despite citing an insane 80k-100k deaths by communism in Romania at the same time). The demonization of Manuel Noriega continued in full force during the invasion of his country, thereby reversing the roles of aggressor and victim. Deposed officials from Noriega's gov were jailed and kept without trial while crime/poverty/destitution increased under the US-backed Endara gov.
• Iraq: Confirmed Iraq-Kuwait interactions weren't a UN or US concern, went into Kuwait; Bush used this opportunity to claim Saddam Hussein was going to control all oil reserves and destroy Israel. When Iraq attacked Israel in retaliation to massive US aerial attacks, this was used to paint Iraq as engaging in a conflict that the US in fact incited. The media also highlighted the possibility of nuclear arms in Iraq while not discussing why this was more of a threat than the nuclear powers in China, Pakistan, Israel, or South Africa. No questions were asked about why other invaders (Syria on Lebanon, Israel on Lebanon, SA on Angola, Indonesia on East Timor, etc.) were ignored while Iraq's aggression on Kuwait was used to demonize Hussein and go to war with Iraq. Iraq's consistent demonization was used to reverse the roles of victim and victimizer. Iraq went from a rather highly urbanized and mechanized society to relegation to a pre-industrial age with the disabilities of postindustrial dependence on energy and technology. The press gave almost no attention to the real reasons for the war (protect interests/profits of oil cartels, beat Iraq into submission, boost military budget, drive the savings and loan scandal off the news, and bolster Bush's image as a bold leader).
• When the UN criticized the White House line it was ignored in the news; when they went along with WH policy, the media gave great attention to the organization.
• Haiti: Jean-Bertrand Aristides also villainized by media and his call for a minimum wage, land reform, enforcement of taxation were ignored. Replaced by US-supported Jacque Honorat. Same message of "if democracy picks a leftist leader, democracy has to go."
• Any challenge to the privileged class order is portrayed as an attack on all social order and an invitation to “chaos"; any revolutionary or even reformist action is portrayed as "economic mismanagement."
• Focus is put on the "middle-class," generally a privileged petty bourgeoisie, in order to paint discontent at leftist leaders. Those who lose power, privileges, and wealth under populist leaders are given a voice but rarely are peasants interviewed.
• The media thus: 1) doesn't say anything positive about democratic economic reforms of a leftist gov, 2) can only show sympathy for the wealthy and privileged unless a peasant shows disdain for the populist gov, 3) say nothing about devastating wars, embargoes, sanctions, and 4) assume economic adversity is due to mismanagement.
• Most common form of media misrepresentation is omission.
• When we see that news selectivity is likely to be on the side of those who have power, position, and wealth, we move from a liberal complaint about the press’s poor performance to a radical analysis of how the press fulfills its system-supporting function all too well
• Transmitting information at face value without examining its veracity maintains a noncommittal "objectivity" while propagating false information.
• "Both sides" is often two variations on what's essentially the same side.
• Framing and labeling also paint an impression without necessarily providing supporting evidence for the conclusions implied.
• Many stories are "neutralized" so as to not evoke too much emotion; those who complain about social inequities and popular grievances are painted as overwrought.
• Passive voice to avoid saying who did the killing when "killing of civilians has left 75,000 dead"
• Scanting content to only discuss trivialities and surface level news without discussing the underlying issues is used to give a feeling of understanding without presenting the full story.
• It is said that cameras don’t lie. But we must remember that liars use cameras.
• Music and images are both used to pain impressions and set the mood.
• The goal of the owning class, as Marx and Engels put it, is to present “a particular interest as general or the ‘general interest’ as ruling.”8 This indeed is what the press does, as I have tried to demonstrate throughout this book, treating a wide range of subjects from a ruling-class perspective but presenting this perspective as the objective, general one, as representative of things as they really are
• In providing coverage to maintain credibility, the ruling interests are sometimes left to the back burner. Persistent coverage of the war in Vietnam, given with upbeat predictions and anticommunist rationales, were not enough to outweigh the costly conflict.
• there is an element of struggle and indeterminacy in all our social institutions and political culture.

index tags: Communists, Reading List, Reading Notes North America, America, USA, New York, Michael Parenti, Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism, Inventing Reality: The Politics of News Media, The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome, @proustmalone, Aren LeBrun

category tags: Famous Communists