No yes that’s exactly what happened here, he’s dismantling the soft power the US has in Europe because he thinks they don’t need it anymore. And TBH, maybe fascists in Europe are strong enough now that it won’t immediately backfire, but it’s probably true that eventually this is going to look very, very bad for them when communists have enough popular support and no one is around to spread right wing propaganda.
I think you are underestimating the grip the right has on the media here and will continue to have. RFE is superfluous when there are other, better media outlets to spread their shit, and not just traditional press. In any case the absence of US influence will just leave a niche for the local bourgeois media.
Yes of course, fascists will continue to have their cultural hegemony that they inherited from US efforts to suppress the left. What I’m suggesting is that this can only be a permanent condition as a result of external force, and the steady state condition is a tendency toward class consciousness as material conditions worsen. It’s like there was a magnet that was holding a pendulum all the way to the right, but now the magnet has released and the pendulum will swing to the left (over several years, of course, not immediately). It’ll swing back, dialectics, but having a weaker local enemy is always preferable to having an untouchable international enemy.
Yeah this is probably objectively good for hindering the US’ propaganda efforts. It’s absurd that anyone would call these outlets radical or leftist haha. Voice of America though was actually started in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda, allegedly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they intended it to also help steer people away from the Soviet messaging at the time. It’s funding was increased throughout the Cold War.
Yet another case that feels weird but can be explained easily when you go back to this phrase: The 20th century makes a lot more sense when you realize the Western Allies came to regret the side of the war they fought on. VoA has only ever been used to spread anticommunist right wing propaganda since the 50s, it was an important part of Gladio.
Weren’t these started as propaganda against the USSR during/after the Cold War?
Is this one of those situations where the “worst person you know does something good?”
Not trying to be snarky, honestly curious.
No yes that’s exactly what happened here, he’s dismantling the soft power the US has in Europe because he thinks they don’t need it anymore. And TBH, maybe fascists in Europe are strong enough now that it won’t immediately backfire, but it’s probably true that eventually this is going to look very, very bad for them when communists have enough popular support and no one is around to spread right wing propaganda.
I think you are underestimating the grip the right has on the media here and will continue to have. RFE is superfluous when there are other, better media outlets to spread their shit, and not just traditional press. In any case the absence of US influence will just leave a niche for the local bourgeois media.
Yes of course, fascists will continue to have their cultural hegemony that they inherited from US efforts to suppress the left. What I’m suggesting is that this can only be a permanent condition as a result of external force, and the steady state condition is a tendency toward class consciousness as material conditions worsen. It’s like there was a magnet that was holding a pendulum all the way to the right, but now the magnet has released and the pendulum will swing to the left (over several years, of course, not immediately). It’ll swing back, dialectics, but having a weaker local enemy is always preferable to having an untouchable international enemy.
It’s to launder fascism into the liberals.
Yeah this is probably objectively good for hindering the US’ propaganda efforts. It’s absurd that anyone would call these outlets radical or leftist haha. Voice of America though was actually started in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda, allegedly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they intended it to also help steer people away from the Soviet messaging at the time. It’s funding was increased throughout the Cold War.
Yet another case that feels weird but can be explained easily when you go back to this phrase: The 20th century makes a lot more sense when you realize the Western Allies came to regret the side of the war they fought on. VoA has only ever been used to spread anticommunist right wing propaganda since the 50s, it was an important part of Gladio.
Yeah pretty much