Language and Propaganda - an example

I get the notion you haven't been attending very closely to my argument here.

Politics is many things. One aspect of it is communications designed to convince others that your notion of policy are worthwhile. Not all such communications are propagandist unless you axiomatically define the term in that way. And that obscures far more than it provides any means to think clearly about differences. The NY Times is not Pravda. Are you, writing here, the equivalent of Joseph Goebbels? Is an honest statement in political communications the same as a purposeful deceit?

I don't know if there is the one and only definition of propaganda.

As far as I remember, propaganda is the attempt to influence the thinking, acting and feeling of people.

The main characteristic of propaganda is that the different aspects of a topic aren't shown but opinion and information are mixed to one unit.

And usually propaganda is linked to other forms of state information control such as direct censorship, monopolization of the media and/or persecution of others.

Does the NY Times print only "honest statements designed to persuade others of worthwhile policies"?

biases can come in many forms, including the omission or exclusion of unwanted facts and otherwise unwarranted emphasis on others.

I have the impression Blatham would consider the National Review to be largely Propaganda (indeed part of a coinspiratorial "movement:" as he often notes)

Conservative Movement
The conservative movement is a collection of volunteers, principles and goals for the betterment of society. A defining characteristic is adherence to logic and faith above self-centered behavior. The primary goals include:

less government
more morality
hard work and prosperity
genuine charity rather than forced big government income redistribution via the Welfare state and Nanny state.

while considering the New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly and others perhaps to be sophisticated analysis .... indeed perhaps even scholarly. How about the Wall Street Journal: is it propaganda?

Clearly the real definition of "special interests", and even "propaganda" usually has far more to do with the perspective of the commentor than the intrinsic nature of the "interest" itself.

The Nazis were quite honest about it: they didn't have a spokesperson or press officer in the local party organization but a propaganda warden ("Propagandawart").

There's been a lot of discussion of anti-Semitism and the Trump campaign but a fierce resistance to coming to grips with the fact that anti-Semitism is a key driving force of the Trump campaign, that the campaign itself is an anti-Semitic one even though the great majority of Trump's supporters are not anti-Semites. When he closes out his campaign with a blatantly anti-Semitic ad, it's time to rethink that resistance.

Meanwhile, fake news is everywhere. The Drudge Report, in one of the most bizarre examples, has been promoting a story about Clinton campaign adviser John Podesta drinking bodily fluids at a secret Satanist dinner. Though absurdly false, the tale had plenty of believers, inspiring hundreds of thousands of related tweets and plenty of “news stories” on right-wing sites.

But even as the worst of media grows exponentially, the best is deeply threatened. The Wall Street Journal — whose journalistic standards are historically top-notch — is laying off reporters this month to reduce costs.

And as print advertising revenue slips into something perilously close to free fall, much more of that is sure to come.

In this case, the Journal let us know what the Enquirer had done. That takes time, money, skill and reporting talent. When those wither, journalism will be in worse trouble.

Yes, that’s possible.

I think you are laying it on a bit thick here. Your pasted comments indicate Trump is anti Semitic, and his campaign is significantly motivated by anti Semitism. Really?

Trump closing campaign ad revives remarks seen as striking anti-Semitic tonesAudio from criticized speech that rails against global conspiracy is overlaid with images of prominent Jews

“the words that show up most in the bios of Twitter users sending anti-Semitic tweets to journalists are ‘Trump,’ ‘nationalist,’ ‘conservative,’ ‘American’ and ‘white.'”

Do you believe that President Obama is also anti Semitic, or possibly harbors some deep rooted sympathy for Islamism?

On a related matter, do you believe there is a Progressive movement afoot in the United States, or something that could be labelled as "movement Progressivism" ?

This is an interesting question from you. What I think you're up to is merely just trying to reject my descriptions of movement conservatism because it doesn't have an equivalent on the other side. As if such a balance must exist.

“Propaganda works best when those who are being manipulated are confident they are acting on their own free will,” Goebbels said. Everywhere one turns one hears people parroting lies as if they were their own carefully considered personal opinions. The upshot is that an alternate reality has been constructed for millions in this country over the last couple of decades thanks to TV, talk radio, and the Internet. Spreading falsehoods, of course, is very profitable, as con artists of every type from mealy-mouthed preachers addressing their mega churches to those touting loans that require no background check can tell you. Lies sell everything from fattening foods to “your computer is damaged and we’ll help you fix it” scams. The basic requirement for democratic governance—that the majority of the population agrees on the parameters of what is true and what is false—has been deliberately obfuscated in this country. The absence of accountability for repeated fraud by those in power, both in government and in the private sector, the proliferation of fake grass-root organizations, think tanks, and lobbyist firms funded by the wealthy to deceive their fellow citizens and turn them against one another, has become the most characteristic feature of our political life. A genuinely functioning democracy endangers powerful interests and those working so hard and making so much money to destroy it, since they may sooner or later end up in jail.

To mislead one’s fellow citizens on such a vast scale is evil...