Look who is representing us abroad as the voice of America?

The neocons who are planning to 'fix' Bush's messes. Why does this not fill me with confidence?

Neo-cons take spin to US-backed airwaves

By Khody Akhavi

WASHINGTON - As the administration of US President George W Bush struggles through its last two years in office, it appears that the agenda of neo-conservative ideologues has finally lost its appeal among strategic parts of the US foreign-policy apparatus.

But as their influence has waned at the Pentagon and State Department, neo-conservative hawks have taken charge on the battlefield of public diplomacy.

Intent on fixing what American Enterprise Institute (AEI) fellow Joshua Muravchik termed President Bush's "public diplomacy mess", right-wing hawks have gained control of the weapons in the "war of ideas" - US government-funded and supported media outlets such as Voice of America (VOA), Al-Hurra, and Radio Farda, which broadcast to the Middle East and aim to offer an alternative view of the news.

The recent appointment of Jeffrey Gedmin, a veteran neo-conservative polemicist, as the director of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE), and a smear campaign that led to the recent resignation of Larry Register, Al-Hurra's former news director, appears to herald a turn toward more ideologically rigid programming.

As a result, viewers and listeners of US-supported media in the Middle East are being exposed to a tougher ideological line that endorses the hallmarks of the neo-conservative agenda - regime change and interventionist policies in the region.

Lovely. The neocons and their beloved PNAC need to be dragged out into the sunlight and dosed with bleach. There needs to be a public discussion as to why the neoconservative agenda is not American, or else we will be dealing with yet another hijacking of our government in thirty years or so.