The US government-owned media outlet Radio Free was recently used as source material for a Washington Post article written by journalist Adam Taylor, who not only toed the same line as the source article, but also directly plagiarized part of its contents. The Washington Post or Taylor has not informed its readers that it is presenting US government propaganda as news.

Brief background on Ukrainian conflict

Unrest in Ukraine began in November when President Yanukovych decided to forge a trade deal with Russia instead of the European Union. Protests soon began in the capital and efforts to put them down has led to death and destruction in Kiev and the Western Ukrainian city of Lvov. The protests were ultimately successful in ousting the President, who has purportedly fled to the Eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkov.

The official US position on Ukraine is to drive its politics westward and install a puppet regime sympathetic to its interests and against those of Russia (the US government was purportedly paying Ukrainians to protest). The EU’s position is to gain 46 million more slaves for the IMF and Europe’s consumer market. The Ukrainian people’s position is to improve their standard of living and economic prospects after a neverending serious of corrupt rulers. Russia’s official position is to maintain economic ties with Ukrainian industry and allow its navy to be stationed off the Crimea in the Black Sea, which has access to the Mediterranean.

America’s propaganda efforts in Ukraine

The US government has a propaganda media arm in the Europe called Radio Free Europe, which is owned and run by the US government.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a broadcaster funded by the U.S. Congress that provides news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East “where the free flow of information is either banned by government authorities or not fully developed”. RFE/RL is supervised by the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a bi-partisan federal agency overseeing all U.S. international broadcasting services. Founded as a propaganda news source in 1949 by the National Committee for a Free Europe, RFE/RL received funds from the Central Intelligence Agency until 1972. During the earliest years of Radio Free Europe’s existence, the CIA and the U.S. Department of State issued broad policy directives, and a system evolved where broadcast policy was determined through negotiation between the CIA, the U.S. State Department, and RFE staff.

If you’re unsure of where the US government stands on foreign policy, simply visit Radio Free Europe and read what amounts to wholesome propaganda. The recent stories on Ukraine do not hesitate to paint the protests as an organic uprising for freedom and democracy. What Radio Free won’t tell you is that the US has admitted to spending over $5 billion to subvert the Ukrainian government to install a more pro-Western leader after their previous favorite, Viktor Yushchenko, installed after the 2004 Orange Revolution, lost an election to Yakunovych in 2010. The US Assistant Secretary of State was also caught recently on the phone playing puppet master to manipulate the will of the Ukrainian people to install a leader it knows will serve American interests.

Here is one of the videos that went viral in the heat of the protests last week, showing pro-government “snipers”:

Do you see the logo watermark in the lower lefthand corner? Here is the official logo of Radio Free:

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This tells us that the US government was playing an active role in shaping public opinion on the Ukraine issue. In other words, you won’t find videos of protesters shooting at government forces that also contain the same logo.

Washington Post’s sourcing of Radio Free

An article published February 18 on Radio Free Europe was titled Pro-Russian Separatism Rises In Crimea As Ukraine’s Crisis Unfolds. In predictable Russophobe fashion, the writer paints Russia as a meddler that is trying to bully the region. Whether this is true or not, it’s the official US government line that protects its $5 billion investment in effecting Ukraine regime change. Four days later, Washington Post journalist Adam Taylor plagiarized a snippet of the same Radio Free article when he wrote The battle for Kiev may well be over, but is the battle for Crimea about to begin? Judge for yourself:

Radio Free excerpt:

Skirting open calls for separatism, the affable and energetic Podyachy is pushing for Kyiv to lease the entire peninsula to Russia in exchange for the cancelation of Ukraine’s debts to Moscow.

Washington Post excerpt:

RFE/RL’s Robert Coalson recently went to Crimea and spoke to members of the pro-Russian separatist movement there. One politician he spoke to had the novel idea of leasing Crimea to Russia in exchange for a cancellation of Ukraine’s debt to Moscow.

The beginnings of Taylor’s Post article makes it absolutely clear where he stands on the protests, even laying on the propaganda thicker than what we can find on Radio Free:

It’s a heart-warming image. The bloody, protracted protests in Ukraine seem to have achieved their goals: Yanukovych is gone, new elections are due, and Yulia Tymoshenko, a key figure in Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution, has been freed from prison. Ukraine looks as though it might have pulled back from the brink.

The Washington Post and journalist Adam Taylor are reporting “news” that is apparently sourced from US government propaganda. Readers of Taylor’s article may have thought they were reading an unbiased account of the events unfolding in Ukraine when they were actually reading something more in line of a press release straight from the US State Department. Why is Adam Taylor allowed to plagiarize and source US propaganda? Is he being paid by the government to produce such stories? Why is the Washington Post acting as a public relations arm for US government interests? Readers of the Washington Post should demand these answers.

I confronted Adam Taylor on Twitter about the fact that is not only a plagiarizer but a shill for the US government. His response was to call me a “teacher of rape.” Realizing his libel, he quickly deleted the tweet.

Taylor is free to brush off the fact that he was caught red-handed, but the American people have a right to know that when they read Taylor or the Washington Post, they may be reading direct US propaganda. We can only speculate how many others writers for the Post are sourcing from a US government propaganda arm without being as sloppy as Taylor in doing a direct copy-paste job. Taylor receives his paycheck and the US government continues to misinform its citizens, who unfortunately remain in the dark about America’s true intentions in developing countries like Ukraine.

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