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I thought you might be interested in the article from the FAIR web site. The following article will be appended to your message: The Return of Otto Reich By Jeff Cohen In totalitarian countries, government propaganda officers wield great power. They're authorized to use the media to stir up state-sanctioned passions and fears through the selective dissemination of information -- sometimes factual, sometimes phony. If you think the United States has never employed propaganda officers, meet Otto Reich. He may soon be our country's chief diplomat in Latin America if the Bush administration has its way. In March, Bush announced his intention to nominate Reich as assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere. If he's officially nominated, it will be interesting to see how journalists handle Reich -- because from 1983 through 1986, it was Reich's job to handle journalists. That's when he commanded the State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy, whose main mission was to inflame fears about Nicaragua and its left-wing Sandinista government that had come to power by overthrowing a corrupt, U.S.-supported dictator. By covertly disseminating intelligence leaks to journalists, Reich and the OPD sought to trump up a Nicaraguan "threat," and to sanctify the U.S.-backed Contra guerrillas fighting Nicaragua's government as "freedom fighters." The propaganda was aimed at influencing Congress to continue to fund the Contras. Take the scary news that Soviet MiG fighter jets were arriving in Nicaragua. With journalists citing unnamed "intelligence sources," the well-timed story surged through U.S. media on the night of Ronald Reagan's reelection. At NBC, Andrea Mitchell broke into election coverage with the story. The furor spurred a Democratic senator to discuss a possible airstrike against Nicaragua. But the story turned out to be a hoax. Several journalists later acknowledged they'd been handed the story by Reich's office. To read the rest of the article, please click on the link below. http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2446 This article was published on Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting's Website (http://www.fair.org).

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