FilmMan

Simon Shasha, if people would research, they'd see the truths in your comments about Syria.  By the way, I used to go to a Syrian barber.  We used to have very good conversations.  I understand the plight of the Syrian people.  People, who I know from the Middle East, have expressed similar stories as to what you have explained too.  
Below is a very interesting video by an expert.  If people are open to understanding they should watch the entire video.  Cheers.
 

Paul Joseph Watson's  take.......
 
 

Syrian War.......   Interesting Video.  Perhaps watch.....
 
 

Paul Joseph Watson's  take.......
 
 

It's a shame that Western journalism, especially in the USA, has turned to complete and utter s**t.

The mainstream media isn't really the "Fourth Estate" anymore, nor does it hold or adhere to the "muck racking" ideals that the Fourth Estate was built upon. Rather, it has mutated into nothing more than a public-relations firm - regurgitating and glamouring-up State Department press-releases and political speeches.

I remember when I began my Media Degree at University here in Sydney, the first lecture I attended, the lecturer's opening words were; "The modern mainstream media...is a lie. The Fourth Estate is dead."

It's funny how Australia gave the world that wretched bastard, Rupert Murdoch, however, has also given the world Julian Assange and John Pilger - two great inspirations to me personally - and the future of independent media - how the Fourth Estate was originally intended and meant to be.

I hope to be travelling back to Syria soon to make a documentary about my village/region (Syria's Christians), and how they suffered at the hands of Western-backed "rebels" - something that is never reported on in the West.

I have seen a handful of reports about what ISIS has done in regards to my people. What I wish to uncover and show is how the more "moderate rebels", as Western media phrases it, have also done the exact same things to us that ISIS have. That is what I was getting at.

Though I disagree with some parts of the article, i.e. "U.S.-led Western coalition trying to restore stability with an as-yet-unidentified new regime" (that's a nice way of saying "we're trying to overthrow a government and replace it with a government that is favourable to us"), I am glad to see my people's plight get exposure, regardless. 

I never "ranted". In fact, I only mentioned it once...

Regardless, the U.S mainstream media is rubbish. Absolute filth. A morally corrupt conglomerate of six-corporations that control 90% of all news media made in the U.S.A. Complicit for decades with the U.S. military industrial complex and the cronies on Wall Street with whom they share financial. business and social ties.  Any defense you try to mount for it will be in vain to those that are well aware of the lying shit-pile that is the U.S. mainstream media.
Media critic, historian, and Bernie Sanders delegate, Norman Soloman, summed it up well; “One way or another, a military-industrial complex now extends to much of corporate media. In the process, firms with military ties routinely advertise in news outlets. Often, media magnates and people on the boards of large media-related corporations enjoy close links - financial and social - with the military industry and Washington’s foreign-policy establishment.”

It is getting worse, and more concentrated, as time goes on, too. In 1983, 90% of the U.S. mainstream media was owned by 50 companies. Now, that 90% is owned by 6 companies. Four of the top-ten U.S. mainstream media companies have major defense contractors on their boards of directors:
William Kennard: New York Times, Carlyle Group

Douglas Warner III, GE (NBC), Bechtel
John Bryson: Disney (ABC), Boeing
Alwyn Lewis: Disney (ABC), Halliburton
Douglas McCorkindale: Gannett, Lockheed-Martin.
And no, there hasn't been "extensive coverage" regarding Iraqi civilian deaths at the hands of U.S. forces, nor has there been "extensive coverage" or in-depth reporting on the use and abuse of Depleted Uranium used against Iraqi civilians by U.S. and coalition forces. No in-depth reporting, nor war-crimes charges, or anything even remotely close to war-crimes charges, no compensation for the Iraqi civilians (and the majority of U.S. soldiers that loaded Depleted Uranium rounds).

Why has there been no charges? No mass outcry? No major compensation for the victims? Because they great majority of people don't even know about it...
The only organisations that reported in-depth on the use of Depleted Uranium on Iraqi civilians were health organisations and journals, like WHO and The Lancet.
And even then, Hans von Sponeck, a former UN assistant secretary general and UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq (who resigned in protest of U.S.-backed sanctions) said "I saw in Geneva how a WHO mission to conduct on-spot assessments in Basra and southern Iraq, where depleted uranium had led to devastating environmental health problems, was aborted under U.S. political pressure."
Do you think they want the masses to be aware of this? Do you think the six-corporations that own the mainstream media want people to know about this? I'm sure General Electric, which owns COMCAST(NBC, MSNBC, CNBC), and made $11.6 billion in 2012 from military contracts with the U.S. government, wants their viewers to be anti-war. I'm sure General Electric is telling the media companies they own to publish Depleted Uranium stories "extensively"...

"Reported on extensively by the U.S mainstream media" - give me a break. Sorry if this offends you, but that is a rather demeaning remark to say, especially with respect to the victims of Depleted Uranium...
What's "extensive" to you? A few news briefs, a few short-wire stories? I'd say "extensive" is one article a week, no?

The war began in 2003 (though the ramifications still continue until this day), with the U.S. military officially withdrawing on the 18 December, 2011.

That's 8 years and 8 months (448 weeks). Please provide an "extensive" list of coverage. At least 448 articles/news reports published/broadcast by the U.S mainstream media about the use of Depleted Uranium on Iraqi civilians by U.S. and coalition forces. If not, please provide at least half that...

Pointless, anyway. Your mind is made up, as is mine.

I will say this before I leave indefinitely. I do believe there is a media, and journalists, out there that are honorable. That seek the truth. That are not controlled by corporations and boards of directors. They exist, and I know they exist, because they are the small, exceptional, subtle few that did write about Depleted Uranium and Iraqi civilians deaths by means of their own independent ways.  And I think their voices are growing ever stronger and the people are listening ever more intently. In a world where the mass mainstream media has become so concentrated and controlled by the few, whom have the power to influence the many, the rise of independent voices can only be a good thing. Though I supported neither Trump nor Hillary (I supported Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein), the one good thing that has come out of this shit-show of an election is, what seems to be, the beginning of the end of the mainstream media...

Thank you. You have in a way agreed to what I said, though you said it in such a way to try and save face.  The fact that you accept there are other possible meanings for what he said disqualifies his comments from being declared an admission or confession.   As an admission would have to be explicit.  A confession would have to be an admission of all facts neccesary for conviction of a crime.
As for the timing of the allegations. It is true that the timing has no bearing on whether the allegations are true or not.  I didn't say that it did.  What the timing has a great bearing on is whether people believe the allegation are true.  It effects the believing, not the truth itself.
It should also be noted for the record that an allegation existing also has no bearing on whether it is true or not.

I feel for you man.  I'm all for criticising people where criticism is due.  It's nonsense and blowing things out of proportion that irritate me.  I think its interesting that you have basically regurgitated the whole CNN media narrative, proven by the fact that you have actually missed the one element that Trump should be criticised on more than any other: The fact that he supports waterboarding and 'stronger than waterboarding'.  Of course the media stopped talking about that because it wasn't juicy enough to put in their headlines.  The fact that he said that and you are whinging about what he said about his daughter:  That tells me what I need to know.

I agree wholeheartedly

And I see how my wording may be taken as a generalisation - which I didn't intend, but yes, when I say "Western" and "U.S. led", I do mean the corporate run-and-owned media, and military-industrial-complex influenced governments of the West - not the citizens of the West, nor Western values - which I cherish, personally.

Every so often, I am given hope when I read posts like yours - it reminds me that not everyone has fallen victim to the propaganda the corporate Western media has put out against Syria (and Russia).

Back when the war began, and all these "rebels" from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Libya, Chechnya, and so on, began flooding into Syria and attacking our towns and villages, I would turn on mainstream Western media, and they were framing it as some sort of popular uprising for democracy. Nobody was saying a word about the Wahhabi and Salafi filth that the Gulf/Turks and NATO had sent our way - and when they did, they would call them "army defectors", "freedom fighters", "rebels fighting for democracy" - nor did they ever say a word about how our country was being punished because our government refused to bend the knee to the Saudi/Qatari/Turkish gas pipeline...

I really thought it was going to be the end of us - I thought that everyone in the West was going to fall for it the way they fell for the whole Iraq WMD lie...

We're still here though. Still holding on...

You know, the second point you made is very important - very crucial. It actually reminded me of an article (http://www.ecowatch.com/syria-another-pipeline-war-1882180532.html) written by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for EcoWatch back in February called "Syria: Another Pipeline War".

He said:

"As we focus on the rise of ISIS and search for the source of the savagery that took so many innocent lives in Paris and San Bernardino, we might want to look beyond the convenient explanations of religion and ideology and focus on the more complex rationales of history and oil, which mostly point the finger of blame for terrorism back at the champions of militarism, imperialism and petroleum here on our own shores.

America's unsavory record of violent interventions in Syria—obscure to the American people yet well known to Syrians—sowed fertile ground for the violent Islamic Jihadism that now complicates any effective response by our government to address the challenge of ISIS. So long as the American public and policymakers are unaware of this past, further interventions are likely to only compound the crisis. Moreover, our enemies delight in our ignorance."
 
Somebody actually emailed me a video today that address that exact article, and how Western mainstream media never gives their audience the important facts or the full-story (in this case, regarding Syria):
 

 
Perhaps the fall of the Clintons, and their neo-con and elitist cohorts and partners in the mainstream media, is the beginning of the end of the mainstream media...

I can't help but feel that there is a sense of awakening in the air - it seems as though the great majority of people do not trust the mainstream media anymore. For me, personally, I couldn't understand how anyone could trust them after the Iraq WMD debacle - not only the lies and manipulation, but the way the mainstream media cheered on and beat the drums of war was disgusting. F**king disgusting.

I'm glad you are a truth seeker, Matt. It is refreshing to see

Guys and Gals,

I think I can hack an Alexa. Perhaps start a fund to raise me $100K to purchase an Alexa? Just kidding. I couldn't resist.

This Sony hack could open up alot of doors with their line of cameras. Fun stuff.

By the way, the ML can be downloaded for free now. http://www.magiclantern.fm/releasenotes

This is so full of ignorance and straw man arguments that completely cherry picks the facts. 
Actually @Damphousse, I apologize. I think you are slightly misinformed, but you are entitled to your opinions. 

@Ed_David  I will keep in mind this is a film forum
By the way, thank you for your Samung NX1 short...helped me determine it would be a good camera for what I do (film my family)...
This election cycle, the media gave us TRUMP (the "monster you see") versus CLINTON (the "hidden/corrupt" monster).  I voted against Clinton, for Trump.  Bernie may have won, taping into some of the very same "forgotten" middle class anger that Clinton ignored.  But what do I know...I voted for Ron Paul and John Edwards once  
This election cycle, the amount of negativity pushed at you was overwhelming.  No coverage of policies or anything of substance.  Regardless of political view, I feel Americans were short-changed on meaningful content...  Even now, the media is more worried about how their pundits missed "calling" the election right than reporting anything real.  People on the losing side were bound to be hurt, angry and scared...either way.  Even still, mainstream media is doing nothing to bring healing to the land... 
Your call to making informed content, not based on ratings,  is exactly what is needed (how, where to distrubute is another thing altogether)...
I know I'm rambling...just wanted you to know as someone who voted the other way...I share your hatred of the mainstream media and what they fed us for ratings...
 

I'm sorry this is so stupid, I don't even know where to begin. Love him or hate him, he received the worst media bias against him than any previous nominee in recent history. 

Western Union?

Interesting video.......Paul Joseph Watson sends his condolences.   
 
 
 

In this piece it means both ways. This is more clear when you study all the content from both sides. The unconscious mind doesn't do well with negatives. A better form is #wepromotelove and leave out the other party, which is unfortunately a negative implication in today's politics.

Looks great David!
Promoting hate, however, causes suffering. Hating someone is like taking poison and expecting to hurt the other person. The only person hurt is the hater, mentally and physically: stress hormones damage healthy tissue, reduce immune function, etc.
Additionally, look at all the information about what is going on, from both sides, and from other countries around the world if you'd like to get a better understanding of what is really happening. Do you want to be a leader helping to heal yourself, your community, and the planet, or do you want to be a slave-pawn in someone else's selfish game?
We need to focus on loving ourselves, those around us, and everyone else around the planet, and holding those accountable who are promoting division and hate, replacing them with more enlightened leaders.

I know who Breidbart is, I know who Steve Bannon is, I know who Robert Mercer is ...I am not going to argue about this or that person.
I will say perhaps you may like to read what really happened in Libya, Hillarys war (everyone agrees on this on both sides of the fence)
Read about Libya under Gadaffi...what the laws where etc...its out there and confirmed on many blogs (cant really lie about this stuff)
The what happened after Hillary intervened...Point being she has a lot of blood of innocents on her hands,
I seriously doubt wether Bannon, Trump or Mercer could even get close to her on this score.
Perhaps also read the summary of the first 4 chapters of the TPP (the one Hillary wants to fast track thru) Wikileaks has that info.
Also maybe the open borders that Hillary is planning in the US may somehow have a different outcome than Europe...but I seriously doubt it.
Then there is George Soros...interesting to read his history too...an actual genuine Nazi war criminal at 14, and one of Hillarys biggest donors and friends, I am sure he is looking out for all the US's best interests...not!!
 
 

@Flynn
Jeez I have to agree with you.
Just impartially reading this thread ...and FilmMan...sounds like he has a bit of humor about things, but Damphouse and TigerBengal are more or less rolling out the insults and sound hateful and a bit unhinged ...capsLock paragraphs etc...calling Trump "Führer" etc...All right for some tho I guess.
Funny thing that Hillary just stated that she will destroy any conservative website that puts forward views that she doesn't approve of..
Her direct quote "They dont have a right to exist"   does that make her a "Facist" I wonder? I guess not (according to some)...
But if Trump had said it...it would be "HILTLER", "NAZI", Führer, Clown ETC...  makes you wonder.
Cheers
 

I completely understand not liking the guy, but why do the anti-Trump people have to sound so utterly unhinged and irrational? Also, Hillary sucks too.

Damphousse,
"your"    (because I show an alternative point of view, he becomes mine.  He is sexy.  Haven't you seen the statues?) 
" Fuhrer" (the isolated word Führer is usually avoided in political contexts, due to its intimate connection with Nazi institutions and with Hitler personally.  Of course you new that?)
   "your sh-tty $2 video from being copied in China."            China's going to copy my movie?  
"Take a break from the Marvel movies"       (no more Spider Man in tights?)
 "magically boost your movie production career"       "delusional thing"        No delusion here.  I only sleep with sexy actresses to get to the top.
 
With reference to jobs, I was pointing out an area which isn't fair practice by the Chinese.  It potentially could lead to some jobs to the USA - not saying it would.   Note:  "copy movies, ELECTRONICS and SOFTWARE"   You may wish to educate yourself and read this report as a reference.  
http://www.ipcommission.org/report/ip_commission_report_052213.pdf
 My advice?  Get a good well written screenplay, some lights, some audio equipment, and whatever camera you own (Sony, Canon, Nikon, Panny, BM, etc) and make your masterpiece. 
Left field has become the bat boy and the umpire has become the pitcher.    Don't try deciphering, as you should take your advice.  
Who is residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave will have zero effect on how much your film grosses
  So Trump or Hillary will have zero effect on how much my film grosses?  $hit, $hit, $hit.  I need Jessica Jones.   LOL.   My bowling ball is not as sharp as yours.   Cheers.
**************************Of course you KNEW that?   (instead of "new"  - don't want to confuse you) 

tigerbengal,
Not looking for an argument.  I'll say an alternative point of view, however, I don't want to get into the politics.  By the way, my politics lean towards bikini parties on beaches - good eye workout and keeps the mind intact. 
all the trump speeches are the same FULL OF HATE AND LIES LIES AND MORE LIES...?????????
 ....he wants laws followed, what's best for people including LGBQ, etc? Rudy Giuliani, former respected mayor of New York, says he knows Trump well and he'll be a positive for the people.  16500 border patrol agents endorse Trump.    
President Obama and Hillary are not the founders of Isis, read about this terrorist group....and the conclusion is ISIS is there because George Bush lying to the American people decided to remove Saddam Husein from power, and guess what? bush is A REPUBLICAN, THE SAME AS TRUMP. once again trump saying lies all over the place.
Trump is not endorsed by the Bush's.   Here's a differing view as to your Isis statement......http://www.blackagendareport.com/obama_clinton_created_isis
it is funny that trump talk too much about veterans when he is a draft dodger...that means he was called to serve in Vietnam, but his father paid a doctor to get a medical diagnostic saying trump has foot problems and other things and avoid the war, ....so how come his health is 100% (according to him) now  when he is 70 years old, and when he was 20 his health was very bad...sure.
Yes Trump wants to support Veterans better than the support they receive - good idea?  Boxing great Ali was against the Vietnam war and avoided.  Maybe the war should have not been fought?   Interesting Bill Clinton didn't end up in the war either. 
   http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/02/us/politics/donald-trump-draft-record.html?_r=0
 
can you believe someone talking about A TAX PLAN....WHEN HE DOES NOT WANT TO SHOW HIS TAX RETURN? JAJAJJAJA
Doesn't have to show his returns.  Not required.
TRUMP IS A DEMAGOGUE he promise he alone will fix all the problems....can you believe it?...but until today he has SHOWED NO PLANS OR HOW HE WILL ACCOMPLISH ANYTHING
All politicians make promises.    Promises need to be followed through.  Will be interesting.
He is complaining American companies sent jobs abroad....why he didn't move jobs from his owns companies from china to EEUU as an example to other companies?
To be competitive that is the reality due to the current situation?  A lot of Americans out of work due to businesses having left the country in the past decade.  
   can you trust someone who attack a golden mother? trump did it, he is the worst candidate ever, check all the lies he said in this interview...it is funny and sad that so many people believe him
It is very sad the son died.  Interesting and surprising article on the father.  http://www.rense.com/general96/khanshar.htm
 
I'm only presenting a differing point of view.  Nothing more and nothing less.  In film making one needs to see different points of views and keep an open mind - as what is being presented may or may not be factual.   I do see your points of views and I am not looking for an argument.  Just giving some alternative views.  Cheers.

'Against the Republicans' I meant.

I wasn't threatened for showing the Hillary film. It was Inequality for All:
 
 
See above. 

I honestly think it is getting worse than previous elections, the volume of insults being thrown around by everybody is insane.

"Hey did you hear about the ground war in Syria in which the U.S. is funding a democratic based uprising and the Russian government is offering ground support to the country leaders?"  

9/10 people that I interact with on a daily basis don't know about this at all. Because actual political talking points no longer matter.