Robert Parry Rocks!

I hope you're reading Robert Parry regularly. If not, you can find his work here. He's something of a rarity: an American journalist worthy of the name. For those not familiar with his writing, here's a short excerpt from his latest piece, Neocon Amorality:

For a government that wraps its actions in moral absolutes about good versus evil, while deriding liberal relativism, the Bush administration may rank as the most committed in modern American history to an ends-justify-the-means ethos.

Indeed, to understand the administration’s neoconservative foreign policy, one must recognize how this moral framework works: First, it sets out worthy-sounding goals – freedom, democracy, security – and then it applies whatever tactics are deemed necessary – torture, murder, unprovoked invasions – along with an aggressive propaganda strategy at home.

Next, when events take a positive turn, the neoconservatives claim credit, even if they had only a minor role or the events were largely coincidental. Criticism of the bloody means is washed away by celebration of the virtuous ends. Mainstream commentators join in, cheering the neocons’ farsightedness. Those who opposed the original actions are pushed to the political margins.

He goes on and on [and this is a rather lengthy piece by Parry's standards], detailing three instances in which the neocons have recently taken credit for things they did not do, and drawing parallels with the way in which they took credit for bringing about the fall of the Soviet Union [which they also did not do]. I could attempt to give you a brief synopsis, but there is no way in which I could do the column justice. He's too good a writer. Everything is stated as succinctly as possible already. You just have to read it for yourself.

I can't think of the word for what Robert Parry does best. I think of him as a master "de-spinner-izer". He sees through the fog of propaganda as well as [or better than] any writer I know of.

It's getting increasingly difficult these days to filter out the propaganda in a way that leaves facts behind. But the more I read Parry, the better I understand what's going on, and the better equipped I feel for the task of staying reality-based in the midst of the propaganda barrage. I can't give you any better incentive to bookmark his site and to visit it often. He publishes one or two new columns every week. And they are always worth reading.

As with most investigative journalists, his funding comes from contributions and book sales. If you haven't read "Secrecy & Privilege: The Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq", you probably should. If you buy it through his website, he gets a cut. And if you value good investigative journalists, you might consider making a donation to one of the best.

Rock on, Robert.