"An editor should have a pimp for a brother, so he'd have someone to look up to." --The late old school journalist Gene Fowler (sometimes attributed to Herman J. Mankiewicz, co-author of Citizen Kane)
MEDIAUNIVERSE--Even if you only casually watch the news on television, or scan the dreck that editors allow to be published in our dying newspapers (dying for a good reason), most Americans understand that they're being fed a smidgen of what's really going on out there. This writer used to believe that it was bad--until he started researching and writing about the Palfrey case and numerous threads attached to it.
My conclusion? It's far worse than you can even begin to imagine. Our media--professionalized journalism--is utterly corrupt and hamstrung by careerism and ethical problems that would make Twain, Nietzsche, or H.L. Mencken alarmed. It's a scary realization to find that things are far worse than your wildest, most cynical suspicions, but it's true. But like Mencken, I can find some amusement in all of it too, the futility of...futility.
My evidence for the contention that the press is asleep, bought-off, lazy, lying, and corrupt are all contained within the articles found within this site. J-7 is no longer a "blog," that pejorative term the media loves to ascribe to all of us with an opinion and the ability to write adequately. It's an effective scimitar poised at-the-heart of the monied press, the corrupt politicians, and all the dubious individuals who protect privilege and unaccountable power. Real journalism isn't nice, isn't always friendly, and it's not supposed to be well-mannered towards the powerful, the corrupt. What's interesting is how afraid all of these professional journalists and McProgressive types are about the democratization of information and the media-in-general. What buffoons, those "booboises," but durned if they aren't entertaining.
The "Roughead" story is a perfect example of the media's complicity in covering-up for corrupt politicians and their handlers (like Ed Norris and Thomas DiBiagio, and that guy in the black hat, Jack Abramoff). Ed Norris is entertaining, he got a show, fancy that. Perhaps Mr. DiBiagio can have his own "Judge Judy" show in the future. Why not?
This site has contacted a stunning array of the mainstream press throughout the Western world, including Al-Jazeera, with virtually no replies on the Roughead lead. Only the Smoking Gun and Inside Edition replied ("Nice work on the records, by the way. Keep it up." from IE's producer, Ned Berkowitz. Thanks, Ned.), while news outlets like the Guardian have been curiously silent, as well as so-called "progressive" blogs like Huffington Post and Rawstory. They won't touch it. Nonetheless, Inside Edition doesn't appear to have done anything with the information at this writing.
Besides the standard stonewalling, the excuses I've gotten aren't valid--they don't want to cover this story for what appears to be selfish reasons. I'd love to be proven wrong, but that's the impression that's being projected. Many of the upper-tiers of the media are, after all, of the same classes as those found in the records. In some cases, they're the same people, and have no class. Perhaps many of them are scared to lose their jobs if they cover Ronald Roughead.The Washington Post is one of them, as is ABC--Col. Roughead's name was posted on one of their boards early-on at 'The Blotter,' though the author is unsure if it 'took.' A Google search will yield all of the posts on other sites by this writer. Get to work. The Roughead story is not new, and this writer has been attempting to get the word out since July 16th of 2007.
The Nation's David Corn informed this writer that he was already aware of the retired Colonel Roughead's name in the phone records of Deborah Jeane Palfrey (see above quote). His comments defy explanation at this point: a quick search of SAIC at a search engine (and a visit to their site, http://www.saic.com/) would have told him that many employee-shareholders retain high level security clearances as a reason for hiring them for a specific job (SAIC employs around 44,000 worldwide--almost sounds like a front company!). It doesn't take that much work to discover these things. SAIC was e-mailed to confirm if the Ron Roughead at 703-836-0522 in Alexandria, Virginia, was the same person. There were no-replies, but it is most certainly the same man. I'm not trying to out anyone for the sake of outing people either, Mr. Corn. That's why I've ignored the numbers of private individuals who are simply-put: doctors, landscapers, and a bunch of other little guys who aren't the Ron Rougheads of this world. They populate the records too, and you won't find them here. Mark Capansky is here because he interned for Pennysylvania Rep. Bob Goodlatte.
Security clearances would apply to Col. Roughead, as he was a Defense Attache during the 1990s and ran IMN (Iraqi Media Network) in Iraq during 2004-2005. He also investigated the embassy bombing in Kenya. What he sounds like is a propaganda/intel chief of some sort, though he could have been in some area of counterintelligence at certain points. He currently works for SAIC, the ninth largest defense contractor in the United States, with their snouts in many government troughs, spending our money.
When he testified before an intelligence committee on May 4th of 2006, he almost wasn't identified due to "security concerns." This alone should have told Corn what the significance of Ronald Roughead's name in the records means: at-minimum, people with such clearances are likely violating the terms of holding them by visiting an escort service. It's an illegal act, or it's not, and was committed while under the terms of a security clearance. That's just one significant fact, the meaning of the Roughead number in the records of Pamela Martin & Associates.
Someone in Col. Roughead's position isn't supposed to have sex with an escort where a transaction has occurred (the illegal act, if it did occur), and especially so when they're someone who has intelligence connections and clearances. What's unknown is whether Jeane Palfrey knew these illegal acts were being committed. Defendants are supposed to be coy, that's the point of our system of due process, but it should be noted that both sides--the government's prosecutors and the defense--are making discovery a "glacial" process. The public should consider the fact that Mr. Roughead called the number of Pamela Martin & Associates three-times on December 17th of 2005, since it's not impossible that he was procuring for someone else. Who were they? Was it himself? Was it for SAIC? Or was it a routine part of his position throughout his time in Washington D.C.? What was going on with these calls? If Mr. Roughead was on the government payroll when the calls were made, the problems (and questions) compound for him. The prosecution has said that "We're not concerned with the clients." Yet they are.
Then there is the issue of the Annapolis officer who worked for Palfrey--she's still working at the Naval Academy. Why? Did she discharge duties while working for Pamela Martin & Associates that were considered part of her work? I'm told she's a "supply officer." Was Ron Roughead procuring for his brother Gary, CNO of the United States Navy, the branch of the military that would be crucial to any attacks on Iran from the Persian Gulf and the rest of the region.
Annapolis football player, Mark Capansky (or his father who has the exact same name) is in the records for September 2005. Did any of these people ever encounter one another, or have any association with each other? Can't a person be discharged from the Navy for as little as having a sexual-relationship with a superior officer? If the "supply officer" engaged in prostitution--as she alleges she did--why then is the she still at Annapolis holding her job? This leads us to...
The "Honey Pot" (generally called "Honey Trap") thesis is only that--a theory, but a pregnant one. It could be true, but will it be found in the discovery process, and will Judge Kessler grant the ability for the declassification of documents involving Ms. Palfrey if they do in-fact exist? It's likely that some answers will be found at SAIC. There is smoke in the case of Shaha Ali Riza (also employee of SAIC, and possible MI6/SIS operative, she's a British national who had a State Dept. clearance) and Paul Wolfowitz, the scorned and humiliated former World Bank president--another one the press is standing down on--but it remains to be seen if an analog exists within Ms. Palfrey's legal predicament.
But the blackmail of national level politicians (possibly by the White House and the RNC) is almost certainly part of these continuum, if not the crucial aspect of what has to be the worst era of political corruption in the history of the United States. History--as they say--will not be kind in her judgement of those who allowed it to continue and fester for whatever selfish reasons they might have had.
The media is hoping the story of "Hookergate" will just go away, but rest assured it won't for years. It threatens too many privileged individuals, and the stakes are very high. What began as a routine case of destroying another woman in the nation's Capitol has begun a life-and-death struggle for those involved--Ms. Palfrey faces 55 years in a federal prison. Guilty or innocent, she will assuredly talk about things she has seen that will be extremely damaging to certain parties. Where are all the journalists investigating this? Sitting beside David Vitter, being ponderous and sad, one would assume. Remember that this is the same press that stood down and allowed the Bush administration to sell their war on a lie. Do you think they're going to aid in the cover-up of lobbyists and Congressmen procuring women for groping--maybe even sex? Let's be honest for a change: Washington D.C. is a whore monger's paradise, and the press is likely in an ongoing-relationship with the powerful to look-away. But enough about Fred Thompson and the press, let's look at Larry Flynt's place in this mess.
Besides the current Congress and the Bush administration, our press are a horrible embarrassment. Larry Flynt underscores this fact perfectly in his "outing" of sundry congressional types like David Vitter, Dan Burton--and coming soon--two presidential candidates, two major news anchors, and a whole gaggle of other politico morons and functionaries who will not walk-the-walk of what they preach for everyone else. If I had Mr. Moldea's resources, the job would be finished already, but perhaps Chicken Larry is waiting to strike at the right moment with the information. Looking at the approval ratings of Congress, one can safely assume that the public is pretty disgusted and hates the current political generation for what they are: hypocritical scumbags, keeping good company with our established press, our consolidated corporate media reality.
Because the media refuses to do any solid investigation into "Hookergate," they lose the de facto ability to control it, and because journalists and their editors refuse to investigate the story, and stories of the same nature that are always floating-around, we're left with Larry Flynt, a pornographer, to do the job. That should tell you everything about established media at this historical moment. It doesn't make Larry Flynt a "great American," he's just incidental to all of the corruption and the uncovering of it--and he's nearly alone in doing so with the kind of resources he's investing in the search for those misbehaving politicians. It's almost like something out the Threepenny Opera, and our human reality has begun to mock itself. Is satire dead?
It's a sign of how corrupt and weakened our national press have allowed themselves to become, but that would never have been possible without congressional approval of media consolidation. Why would they sell us all out? My guess is the bathroom needed new tiling, and certain needs in the bedroom weren't being met by the political marriage wives. It's a thought.Then, there's your usual crass careerism--or did I mention that already? Sometimes, Maslow's pyramid is just Maslow's pyramid, and everyone has some gaps in theirs. For some, it's unbearable, and they have their "moments of weakness," over-and-over again. Meanwhile, while our troops are dying in the dust along with Iraqis and Afghanis, the media is covering-up for this class of scum. What we get are more stories on O.J. and Anna Nicole Smith, just more shibboleths of distraction.
J-7, and sites like her, are doing the job of keeping such stories as "Hookergate" alive, just as others are keeping the stories behind 9/11, the fratricide of Patrick Tillman (a philosophical acolyte of Noam Chomsky), the run-up to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Abramoff scandal, the stolen elections of 2000 & 2004, Enron, and so much more. I salute you all. As for those in the press who have done their best to do the same: I salute you.
When crooks have squeezed all they can from journalism, bleeding the established outlets of all their integrity, WE will be out here waiting patiently to take it all back. That could all be much sooner than you think. We're after the big Puritan fish, alright, and the witch trials and the dunking-stools are back. This time, we have a good chance of trumping them before they get completely out of hand. People have already died, like Brandy Britton, a victim of scarlet womanhood and an ancient patriarchy. She wasn't the first, and she won't be the last. The only reason anyone cares is because she was once a "somebody." Shame.
