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To: Sam Gamgee

The Committee on Public Information (1917–1919), also known as the CPI or the Creel Committee, was an independent agency of the government of the United States under the Wilson administration created to influence public opinion to support the US in World War I, in particular, the US home front.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_on_Public_Information

Among those who participated in the CPI’s work were:

Edward Bernays, a pioneer in public relations and later theorist of the importance of propaganda to democratic governance.[43] He directed the CPI’s Latin News Service. The CPI’s poor reputation prevented Bernays from handling American publicity at the 1919 Peace Conference as he wanted.

In the 1920s, Joseph Goebbels became an avid admirer of Bernays and his writings – despite the fact that Bernays was a Jew. When Goebbels became the minister of propaganda for the Third Reich, he sought to exploit Bernays’ ideas to the fullest extent possible. For example, he created a “Fuhrer cult” around Adolph Hitler.

Bernays learned that the Nazis were using his work in 1933, from a foreign correspondent for Hearst newspapers. He later recounted in his 1965 autobiography:


65 posted on 06/30/2021 10:06:33 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: dfwgator

Bernays’ quote:

They were using my books as the basis for a destructive campaign against the Jews of Germany. This shocked me, but I knew any human activity can be used for social purposes or misused for antisocial ones.


66 posted on 06/30/2021 10:07:42 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: dfwgator

Yes what a betrayal. Of course in Canada when the British yelled jump we said how high. Being part of the commonwealth and all. But what argument was there really for US involvement, except for the Lusitania matter.


69 posted on 06/30/2021 11:32:36 AM PDT by Sam Gamgee
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