 But I guess I can go ahead and introduce Jeff Kohn, huh? Rachel's not there. Okay. I'll just I'll just do it. I'm gonna. Thanks so much, David You're always fantastic Jeff Kohn founder the media a watch group fair and co-founded roots Roots action. He is a columnist the jet there Yes, okay. Yes. He's a columnist. There he is Former TV pundit and author of cable news confidential my misadventures in corporate media He has a new show on free speech TV called just solutions And I also want to mention that you were I believe the producer for Phil Donahue when he was on MBC that whole story where they Dumped the show when you were the number one rated show because they were talking about what we're talking about today Anyway, Jeff take it away. All right Thanks so much Frank and I'm going to talk about the Phil Donahue censorship Thanks to the organizers of this event. I've learned an awful lot Today progressives are valiantly fighting Against racism and inequality in our country But a lot of progressive groups never talk about us foreign policy as my colleague David Swanson's always saying they seem to be ignoring 96% of humanity and I would argue that us that racism is At least as devastating in us foreign policy as it is in us domestic policy And that racism has been an underpinning of us foreign policy certainly through the decades of the Cold War Which was allegedly a conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, but few Russians were killed While us foreign policy Was massacring people of color Largely civilians From Southeast Asia to Southern Africa to Central America and beyond Midway through the Cold War Martin Luther King, Jr. In April 67 came to New York City and Did a speech at Riverside Church? It was Not just a speech against the Vietnam War Indeed the speech was titled beyond Vietnam it was a criticism of the racist and imperial underpinnings of US foreign policy During the Cold War King said that the US was on the wrong side of a world revolution From Vietnam to South Africa to Latin America King criticized what he called our alliance With the landed gentry of Latin America. He asked why is the US suppressing revolutions of the Shirtless and barefoot people of global South instead of supporting these revolutions and then he commented complaining of quote capitalists of the West Investing huge sums of money in Asia Africa and South America Only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the country's unquote That speech is generally not allowed to be heard in mainstream media today But it was heard loud and clear Back in 1967 and it was a reflection of the Cold War hysteria in the US news media That so many liberal outlets denounced King's speech The New York Times had an editorial denouncing the speech the Washington Post patronized quote King has diminished his usefulness to his cause his country his people unquote Life magazine engaged in classic media red-baiting when they referred to the speech as quote Demagogic slander that sounded like a script for radio Hanoi unquote Now as soon as the Cold War started in the 1940s It was accompanied by red-baiting and the blacklist here in the US that deeply undermined US media and did so for many decades including up to the 2003 when I was at MSNBC and Was politically purged from my job alongside Phil Donahue Overseas wars whether they're hot wars or cold wars have always led to repression and censorship here at home The blacklist of course had a devastating impact on Hollywood We heard from an earlier speaker a devastating Impact on unions and union activists, but it also had a devastating impact on the US news media where reporters editors producers had to pledge loyalty against Communism George Clooney made an excellent movie Celebrating Edward R. Murrow for having taken on the red-baiting senator Joe McCarthy late in 1953 But I've never seen a Hollywood movie about the US journalists That were red-baited and purged including friends of Edward R. Murrow that he did not defend and and new and journalists at other outlets television remains a dominant medium in our country and It was Forged it was birthed At the time of the Cold War and the blacklist and that put a stamp on television and Television news that has continued up through the present day. I founded the media watch group fair in 1986 and I immediately started having meetings with executives at television news CNN PBS ABC news and this was decades after the blacklist had ended and with documentation I went to these executives and I said in your debates of the right versus the left You have fire breathing right-wingers like Papu Cannon and Bob Novak But you don't allow any genuine leftist even mild mannered leftist to appear with the fire breathing right-wingers instead The left is represented by these forever back peddling retreating mealy mouth corporate Cold War liberals and These executives knew what they were doing Noam Chomsky, for example, was off-limits at these TV news channels Noam Chomsky who appeared at that time and now in mainstream news outlets across the globe on public television across the globe Except in the country where he lives and the country that he analyzes the most closely at CNN and executive tried to placate me by reminding me that he had once worked in the campaign that was led by Jim Hightower and I had to point out to him, but you don't allow Jim Hightower or other genuine progressives to appear on CNN When I was at ABC, I had this discussion with Ted Koppel where I said fairs research has proven that If you're going to be a US guest That discusses US foreign policy on Nightline you have to have been someone with experience in the US foreign policy establishment So I said given that requirement. I'm wondering why have you never booked a Daniel Ellsberg as a guest Because he was in the foreign policy establishment before he joined the peace movement and Koppel's reaction was I Think Daniel Ellsberg is very brave. He shows a lot of courage But he strikes me as something of an extremist At which point I immediately responded that fairs research had shown that extremism shouldn't bother you at all Mr. Koppel your most frequent guests the ones that appear over and over are Elliot Abrams, Jerry Falwell, Patrick Buchanan, Al Hague and Kissinger now The Cold War continued To narrow the political spectrum And who's allowed into the debate long after the Soviet Union collapsed. I could still feel the Cold War's impact in 2002 and 2003 when I was working at MSNBC run by NBC News and A new war against Iraq was being cranked up and I was the senior producer as as Frank said I'm the most watched program on MSNBC to fill down a hue Primetime show and I want to end my remarks by talking about what I witnessed during that period one night we booked Ramsey Clark The former US Attorney General who talked eloquently Against this push to invade Iraq and the next morning We learned from management how we had screwed up That Ramsey Clark is not supposed to appear on MSNBC This is nearly 50 years after Joe McCarthy And there was some sort of blacklist that no one had told us about and we've made the mistake of booking Ramsey Clark management warned us repeatedly That Phil Donahue was coming across to viewers as Un-American and they actually used that word as the Iraq invasion grew closer Management took over the Phil Donahue show and they imposed a quota system They said if we wanted to book one guest who was opposed to the push toward an invasion of Iraq We had to have two guests that were pro invasion If we booked two guests on the left, we had to have three guests on the right at one meeting a producer said I think I could book Michael Moore for Thursday and Michael was known as a serious critic of the push toward invading Iraq and The producer was told you'll have to have three right wingers For ideological balance. I thought privately about proposing Noam Chomsky as a guest But you can imagine the problem our stage couldn't accommodate the 28 right wingers. We would have needed for ideological balance 10 days after the biggest piece demonstrations in global history MSNBC canceled the Donahue show for purely political reasons Did management say wow? Look at the size of these demonstrations if we unleash Phil Donahue We're gonna have a huge audience. No For political reasons. They terminated our show. How do I know it was political? Well memos started leaking out from NBC news and one of the memos Worried that Donahue would be quote a home for the liberal anti-war agenda at the same time that our competitors are Waving the flag at every opportunity Unquote that memo asserted that Donahue represents quote a difficult face for NBC news in a time of war So Donahue prime time was canceled by MSNBC three weeks before the invasion of Iraq and a few days before we were canceled something weird happened MSNBC announced that they were hiring Someone new to host a new program and the person they were hiring was the far-right racist radio talk show host Michael Savage So think about that this legend of television Phil Donahue was not an appropriate face for NBC news But Michael Savage was and I want to remind you and this is my final comment This was 50 years after five zero 50 years after the rise of Senator Joe McCarthy and more than a decade after the Soviet Union collapsed the Cold War was persisting In US news media and still does to this day. Thank you and thanks for organizing this event Thanks so much Jeff Thank you Main man Okay, well Rachel's not there again, so I guess I'll go ahead and introduce our next Speaker and a testifier being professor Peter McLaren. No, I'm I'm oh, sorry. Okay. Sorry. There you are. Sorry Frank No, I'm sorry. I was muted on the other place. Did you that was devastating? testimony Jeff and do you know Frank that we are passing we're putting Ed to the end Okay, I just want to say that Okay, so people came on thank you Sorry, my bad Frank that we are we are moving Ed Rampel's Testimony to the end, but I want to say give him a shout out that he came up with the first Project we're all looking for what to do what to do. He came up with the first project We are going to help put on a Cold War film festival After this so we don't this is not the end of it We want more and more things to come from this and so far I have three or four things a film festival Ed Rampel Alice Slater has suggested a US Russia Cold War Truth Commission Let's involve the Russians in this Mickey Huff was mentioning congressional action tomorrow or and I say tomorrow and Taking on the the Cold War and mixing it with the January 6th debacle at the Capitol So, thank you very much and continue Frank and then we are going to move into