KPFA Radio 94.1FM presents:
Thursday, September 15, 7:30 PM
Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley
Advance tickets: $12 : brownpapertickets.com :: T: 800-838- 3006or Pegasus (3 sites), Books Inc/Berkeley, Moe’s, Walden Pond Bookstore, Diesel a Bookstore, Mrs. Dalloway’s
S.F. – Modern Times.
$15 door
An Eye-Opening Look at How US Intelligence Agencies Secretly Seduce Journalists and Spin the News.
Did the CIA really track down Osama bin Laden via a complex game of cat and mouse as reported by all the major television networks and newspapers, and eventually depicted onscreen in Zero Dark Thirty? How accurate was the movie Argo? How about the hit television show, Homeland? Journalists covering national security have a tough gig—they need to stay close to sources inside the government, but many of those sources have cryptic agendas. At the same time, the American people depend on and expect a free press to keep a close, impartial watch on the national security operations carried out in our name. As Nick Schou explains in Spooked, in many cases this trust is totally misplaced – as leading journalists get seduced and manipulated by the agencies they cover.
While the press remains silent about its corrupting relationship with the intelligence community—a relationship dating back to the Cold War—Spooked blows the lid off this unseemly arrangement. Schou names names and shines a spotlight on flagrant examples of collusion, when respected reporters have crossed the line and sold out to powerful agencies. For the first time, Schou gets CIA officers, Hollywood consultants, reporters, and entertainment executives to go on record about the ways “true stories” come about and how the CIA has embedded itself in Hollywood to ensure that the agency usually gets the hero treatment on-screen. For the first time we learn about how some of Hollywood’s brightest stars, including Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck, gain unique access inside agency headquarters — what price they pay for that access. Worse still, Schou relates how the CIA vets articles on controversial topics such as the drone assassination program, granting friendly reporters background briefings on classified material, while simultaneously prosecuting ex-officers who release damaging information.
Nick Schou is an award-winning investigative journalist and the author of Kill the Messenger: How the CIA’s Crack Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb, the basis for the 2014 movie. He lives in Long Beach, California.
Greg Bridges is a radio dj and journalist living in Oakland. Currently he can be heard over KCSM and KPFA, where he has a weekly show and is a contributor to KPFA’s Hip Hop and social affairs show HardKnock Radio. Greg has written for various publications including Jazz Now Magazine and Bayshore Magazine.
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