Posted on 09/04/2011 10:11:56 AM PDT by ProgressingAmerica
In his book "Public Opinion" Walter Lippmann has written this:(page 47)
A rough estimate of the effort it takes to reach "everybody" can be had by considering the Government's propaganda during the war. Remembering that the war had run over two years and a half before America entered it, that millions upon millions of printed pages had been circulated and untold speeches had been delivered, let us turn to Mr. Creel's account of his fight "for the minds of men, for the conquest of their convictions" in order that "the gospel of Americanism might be carried to every corner of the globe." [Footnote: George Creel, How We Advertised America.]
Mr. Creel had to assemble machinery which included a Division of News that issued, he tells us, more than six thousand releases, had to enlist seventy-five thousand Four Minute Men who delivered at least seven hundred and fifty-five thousand, one hundred and ninety speeches to an aggregate of over three hundred million people. Boy scouts delivered annotated copies of President Wilson's addresses to the householders of America. Fortnightly periodicals were sent to six hundred thousand teachers. Two hundred thousand lantern slides were furnished for illustrated lectures. Fourteen hundred and thirty-eight different designs were turned out for posters, window cards, newspaper advertisements, cartoons, seals and buttons. The chambers of commerce, the churches, fraternal societies, schools, were used as channels of distribution. Yet Mr. Creel's effort, to which I have not begun to do justice, did not include Mr. McAdoo's stupendous organization for the Liberty Loans, nor Mr. Hoover's far reaching propaganda about food, nor the campaigns of the Red Cross, the Y. M. C. A., Salvation Army, Knights of Columbus, Jewish Welfare Board, not to mention the independent work of patriotic societies, like the League to Enforce Peace, the League of Free Nations Association, the National Security League, nor the activity of the publicity bureaus of the Allies and of the submerged nationalities.
Probably this is the largest and the most intensive effort to carry quickly a fairly uniform set of ideas to all the people of a nation. The older proselyting worked more slowly, perhaps more surely, but never so inclusively. Now if it required such extreme measures to reach everybody in time of crisis, how open are the more normal channels to men's minds? The Administration was trying, and while the war continued it very largely succeeded, I believe, in creating something that might almost be called one public opinion all over America. But think of the dogged work, the complicated ingenuity, the money and the personnel that were required. Nothing like that exists in time of peace, and as a corollary there are whole sections, there are vast groups, ghettoes, enclaves and classes that hear only vaguely about much that is going on.
If it very largely succeeded, then it's a great success. What's interesting to note is how many journalists were a member of the CPI. Most of whom, names you'd never know. L. Ames Brown(Philadelphia Record), J W McConaughy(NY Evening Mail), Leigh Reilly(Chicago Herald),and Edward S Rochester(Washington Post). But the newspapers was the first place Creel went about scouting for talent. As a journalist himself, that's the natural first place to turn.(see "Encyclopedia of American journalism" By Stephen L. Vaughn, Page 113)
Most notably, Edward Bernays, the father of spin was a part of CPI. So too was Walter Lippmann himself, though perhaps to a bit of his credit he quickly turned against Creel and his CPI. But as Lippmann would go on to write in Public Opinion(1920):
The mass of absolutely illiterate, of feeble-minded, grossly neurotic, undernourished and frustrated individuals, is very considerable, much more considerable there is reason to think than we generally suppose. Thus a wide popular appeal is circulated among persons who are mentally children or barbarians, people whose lives are a morass of entanglements, people whose vitality is exhausted, shut-in people, and people whose experience has comprehended no factor in the problem under discussion.
He was no fan of individual rights or "the masses" in general. Here's another example of what he writes:(Phantom Public page 145)
The public must be put in its place, so that it may exercise its own powers, but no less and perhaps even more, so that each of us may live free of the trampling and the roar of a bewildered herd.
This quote is widely available online, though most don't cite the book from where it originates. But it's just a quote. There are all kinds of things in these books which will give you insight into progressivism. It isn't pretty. But there are things we need to know if we are to defend ourselves.
“The public must be put in its place, so that it may exercise its own powers, but no less and perhaps even more, so that each of us may live free of the trampling and the roar of a bewildered herd.”
My Mom said that during World War II there were protests all the time, but that they never made the news or newsreels. You’d just see people with signs. Today if there’s one protestor the news covers them 24/7. Take the woman who protested Bush by camping in front of his ranch. Clearly a nut case, but you’d think she was the Pope by the amount of news coverage she got. Was this good for America or the war effort? (No more than Hanoi Jane, who should have been tried and shot for treason.)
I agree the government needs to make its case. In WWII the government produced “Why We Fight” to outline their case. It would probably be impossible to have an effective information campaign today. A Russian friend told me; “There are no secrets in America. Somebody will write and sell a book for any secret they have.” So, you can’t even shade events with a pro-American spin without the news media “outing” you.
We make these information mistakes all the time. The Abu Grab debacle should have been quietly buried; instead this non-story ran for 46 weeks in the news magazines. The names of Seal Team Six and their families should never have made the paper. Nobody needed to know we lost a helicopter to the enemy with 30 dead. Why are we helping the enemy?
Mr. Creel could have written quite a book on “How We Censored America.”
Glenn Beck spoke of this many moons ago. What I got from reading this post is that Glenn might as well have been talking to stones, as it seem the author of this post has no clue that this subject has already been covered.
A great success for who?
Creel’s flank-covering book is available, free, in its entirety online at Google Books.
Bottom line, he believed censorship was necessary and wished it were “voluntary.” And since it wasn’t he used all the myriad powers of the government to apply it involuntarily, not just in the press but in motion pictures as well. Content was what the government decided it should be, and you complied or got frozen out of business.
We need a President like Calvin Coolidge..
Glenn did a fantastic job on progressivism on his fox show. And when he was doing it, I was taking notes. I’ve got a stack of notes I sometimes don’t even believe. But some people didn’t seem to notice, the website watchglennbeck.com is gone.
So if you want to easily reference these sorts of things, where do you go?
I’ve been saying this for a long time. Lippmann, Bernays and Ivy Lee did more to convince the American public that black is white, good is evil and experts are always right than any other people in history.
FDR was pretty fascist too and his economic policies were like something out of Ayn Rand novels with guilds of companies not allowed to compete and stuff.
The public must be put in its place, so that it may exercise its own powers, but no less and perhaps even more, so that each of us may live free of the trampling and the roar of a bewildered herd.I think he got the interpretation quite wrong. One is either in favor of the rights of the individual or the rights of "the masses" (which I read to mean group rights). You can't favor both, because they are in conflict.
I read the "so that each of us may live free"phrase to be clearly supportive of the rights of the individual.
Progressivism ping
If you haven’t already, consider joining my ping list. Thanks
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.