Bush 'planted fake news stories on American TV'

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Bush 'planted fake news stories on American TV'

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By Andrew Buncombe in Washington

Published: 29 May 2006 -

Federal authorities are actively investigating dozens of American
television stations for broadcasting items produced by the Bush
administration and major corporations, and passing them off as normal
news. Some of the fake news segments talked up success in the war in
Iraq, or promoted the companies' products.

Investigators from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) are
seeking information about stations across the country after a report
produced by a campaign group detailed the extraordinary extent of the
use of such items.

The report, by the non-profit group Centre for Media and Democracy,
found that over a 10-month period at least 77 television stations were
making use of the faux news broadcasts, known as Video News Releases
(VNRs). Not one told viewers who had produced the items.

"We know we only had partial access to these VNRs and yet we found
77 stations using them," said Diana Farsetta, one of the group's
researchers. "I would say it's pretty extraordinary. The picture we
found was much worse than we expected going into the investigation in
terms of just how widely these get played and how frequently these
pre-packaged segments are put on the air."

Ms Farsetta said the public relations companies commissioned to
produce these segments by corporations had become increasingly
sophisticated in their techniques in order to get the VNRs broadcast.
"They have got very good at mimicking what a real, independently
produced television report would look like," she said.............Read More about the info war