Mental Froth

When war becomes profitable, you'll see more of it.

He "must be fabulously wealthy, because there is always a war going on somewhere." -- G.B. Shaw, "Major Barbara."

   In his farewell address, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned of the dangers inherent in a military-industry complex.
   Like any business, the goal of the munitions industry is to increase sales. The main way to do that is to sell more guns.
   And if there doesn't happen to be a war going on, the answer is to start one. "You supply the pictures, and I'll supply the war" may not actually have been said by William Randolph Hearst to Frederic Remington in Cuba in 1897, but the purported exchange does illustrate the tendency of corporate titans to foment hostilities to sell more product -- in Hearst's case, more newspapers.
   Today's industrial titans are more subtle, and have learned to employ media management experts to help manipulate public opinion into endorsing their positions.
   It becomes reporters' and publishers' responsibility, therefore, to ask the tough questions and push for responsive answers, then to inform the public of government and corporate activities and the real goals and positions behind the propaganda.
   Otherwise, reporters and publishers are part of the propaganda machine.