Mass Media in Politics

Social media is a kind of technology.  Social networks have not only redefined the Internet, they also proven to be a powerful tool in political processes.

In terms of politics, the main function of the media is to provide information, so people can make decisions and get involved in politics. 
Everyone probably has a sense of what we mean by media, but it is a good idea to break it down into types, because of the forms of media works slightly differently, and the role of the different types has changed a lot over the years. The oldest form of media is print, which means newspapers and magazines.Print is not longer the main source of information for modern nations, as it used to be. Especially in the days when some large cities had papers that would put out a morning and afternoon edition. But just because fewer people aren't reading print media does not mean that they are not very important. For one thing, most of the other news media organisations rely on print for their news. Print media also tend to offer more detail and comprehensive news stories, although this is changing quickly. One aspect of print media that is often overlooked is that it's still the main source of news for educated elites, and these are the people whose opinions tend to matter a lot in making policy.

The second oldest, and in some ways still most important source of political information comes from broadcast media. television still reaches more Americans than any other form of media, and remains an important source of political information. Radio is less important at reaching a diverse mass audience, although talk radio, especially conservative talk radio, matters a lot in the political media landscape. But despite it's massive reach, broadcast media has a significant drawback in shaping public opinion: television stories are very short, usually less than two minutes long, and therefore less informative.A third major media force in politics is The Internet. As a news source, the primary advantage of the Internet is that it can update so quickly. This is great for breaking news, although there's an argument that it pushes news organizations towards creating more stories and hot takes.In the early days of the web, Internet news was mostly just online versions of print newspapers, but that landscape has shifted, a lot. First came blogs about politics, and then sites dedicated to politics. The growth of social media provided new avenues for politicians and parties to get their information to the masses, and now every candidate has at least one Twitter profile and Facebook page. This can be great for lots of information about a candidate or their policies. 

Is media important for politicians? For sure! Politicians use media to push their agenda and grant interviews. By press conferences they try to increase public opinion, to put pressure on lawmakers for the things that they want to get done. Media plays such a crucial role in deciding who are drawn through a lacks to lead our country or state/city. The voting public must consider media bias when getting their news. 

Government officials news, what is known a propaganda, as a way of influencing people. Now propaganda is meant to persuade the people to feel or act a certain way and we often see propaganda campaigns during times of war. Government will play on the public's patriotic emotions to get them to accomplish certain things or feel a certain way, like helping the war effort. So, propaganda use messages, images to work on the public's feelings and this is not just from government. There are different propaganda types, for example: Testimonials- candidates use celebrities to show their support. Another one is Plain Folk Appeal- candidates show themselves doing something that makes them look like an 'regular' human. We can see that Mass Media can have both sides : positive- we can be informed what is happening over the world, and be as a part of the world and politics; negative- you can be a target of propaganda.

Conspiracy theories

Conspiracy theories are often considered to the span from paranoia: the idea that an omnipotent shadowy organising is watching your every move is a common theme, and, of course, a feature of countless dystopian tales. 

Cluttered with rumors and conjectures,almost every major event in the history becomes a mystery.  Conspiracy theories - that's what excites the minds of people, I suspect, that any socially significant event or occurrence may have some underlying reason, hidden from ordinary mortals. They are some conspiracy theories, that you should know:

MIND CONTROL EXPERIMENTS (CIA). The idea of CIA ran secret mind control experiments was treated as an insane conspiracy theory of paranoia axe up until 1995, the same year president Clinton issued a formal apology on behalf of the US government, revealing that the speculations works jus morbid fantasies about unstable individuals. In fact, the experiments even had an official name 'Project MKUltra' , in reality the CIA was experimenting on US citizens from 1950 until 1973. They were using drugs, electronic hypnosis, verbal and sexual abuse, as well as torture to conduct a behavioural experiments on unlucky subjects. Over a hundred projects have this kind were run over 80 different institutions, including hospitals, prisons, pharmaceutical companies and even universities. CIA director Richard Helms destroyed most of the documents, which left a lot of what was actually happening a mystery. The fact, that no one has yet been punished for the committed crimes, shows just how untangle the power play connected to this conspiracy actually is. 

ILLUMINATI. The notorious order of illuminati is not fictional as many today think, it was a secret society founded in 1776. The illuminati movement consisted of secularists, liberals, republicans and pro-feminists. The members were recruited in the Masonic lodges of Germany with the goal the posing superstition, religious influence and state power. In 1785, the order was infiltrated by government agents and allegedly broken down. Action was taken against the secret society for fear of them succeeding in overthrowing the monarchy and state religion. It is believed, that illuminati were blamed for the French Revolution and the reign of terror. People have calmed that the government never fully succeeded in breaking down the illuminati and that they are still operating.

MILITARY CREATES ACTS OF TERRORISM IN US. It is not secret that politics are a dirty game but elaborate conspiracies when they are true- they are usually perfect hidden. It is a rare occasion that a government plot is revealed to the public. One such conspiracy existed in the sixties and its goal was to provoke a War with Cuba. America's top military  leaders join forces in coming up with plan, which would support a war against Cuba, but involving acts of terrorism on US soil, which would take a devastating number of innocent lives. They are existing and available documents which show that US military had an elaborate plan of shooting civilians in the streets of Washington DC and Miami. Bombings  would be initiated an innocent people would be framed and found guilty of these acts of terrorism. 

"Recent History of Japan and Korea" -Economic Miracles

Over the past two decades, humanity had the opportunity to watch some developing countries, to show the world "economic miracles". Of course, we are talking about young most developed countries, which in 60-70 years  stood out and became isolated in a separate group, called "Newly industrialized countries". This group is constantly updated, and now it consists of about a dozen countries and territories. Durable among them is South Korea and Japan.
In the rapid growth of South Korea's economy and provided influenced by a variety of factors: objective and subjective, economic and political, internal and external. In the documentary movie "Recent History of Japan and Korea" were showed aspects how Korea recovered after the War. There are some important impacts:
-Export-oriented, to interact with the outside world development strategy; 
-The strong and effective leadership in the face of authoritarian governments, postponed   democratic and political reforms in favour of economic development;
-Relatively low cost of maintaining the military-industrial complex;
-Attracting foreign investment (financial and technological): Industrial equipment and "now how";
-Ethnic and cultural homogeneity, as well as the Confucian tradition, a special value which gives the hard work, education, success in life and devotion to their nation. 

In Japan, according to the movie, were mentioned such factors of "miracle":

-Low taxation, stimulating business development at all levels;
-Active introduction of new technologies and international experience in various spheres of economy and production;
-The development of trade unions, which provide social protection and support of the population;
-The land reform carried out in 1947, through which farmers could receive previously leased the land in private ownership;
-The regulation of the money supply;
-The large-scale structure formation on the quality control of its products.

Every growth and falls of country depends on their government. Such example we can partly see in the movie "Recent History of Japan and Korea" about the history of these countries and their economic success. The factors explaining the rapid economic growth was a strong and effective leadership in the face of authoritarian governments, postponed democratic and political reforms in favour of economic development.
Government adopts new laws, and thoroughly review the existing, as well as take a variety of policy measures in order to increase savings, expand exports, the promotion of investment of both domestic and foreign private capital, to attract investment and technology from abroad. 

Espionage: terrorism issues

The Cold War is over but secret agents are still being moved across the borders. 
Underground activities are carried out not only by agents, but also  by corporations, terrorists and private detectives. Previously, professional spies mainly assisted governments of nation-states to follow each other, but now their job is mainly to track the activities of terrorists and media monitoring for suspicious statements. In fact, as pointed out by experts on intelligence, the scope of espionage operations after the end of the Cold War, even increased due to the emergence of new technologies and the fast-growing demand for information on the private and public sectors.

What is the main target of espionage? According to Tolerance of International Espionage (A Functional Approach) by Christopher Baker: "The functional theory of international relations comprehensively explains the benefits Of global espionage. According to the functionalist approach, states cooperate internationally to effectively fulfill individual domestic obligations. By minimizing friction with their neighbors, states can direct more resources to maximizing national welfare. Also, international cooperation enhances domestic welfare by yielding conditions and opportunities that benefit trade, the environment, and other functional areas that could not be accomplished by states acting individually".  There are different types of espionage. But I would like to admit the main problem nowadays. How can it influence on terror attacks?! Terrorist groups are outstanding individuals and government agents, military installations , supply chains, transport, national identity and embassies.  Threats to security and safety of nations are terrorist groups with their associated networks (catastrophic  and unconventional tactics) and, on the other hand, industrial espionage, with its commercial consequences.

By espionage, terroristic organisations , trying to find out where and when is the right place and time to make a terror attack by using their tactics. 

Also spying helpful for high security organisation and their government to prevent terror attacks in future, by having enough knowledges about plans and tactics of terroristic organisation (for example: ISIS), also can protect nation with enhance military and monitoring system in the areas, where the terror attack can be made.  When you have enough information, you are more informed and you can do more. 

Tom Clancy said : "The control of information is something the elite always does, particularly in a despotic form of government. Information, knowledge, is power. If you can control information, you can control people". 

Do not sale weapons to Saudi Arabia

As a participant of BEF2016 (Brussels European Forum), I made researches and was shocked. People, why do you support War in Syria? Why do you sale  weapons to Syria through Saudi Arabia?  According to BBC news, there are list of  countries  which involved in this.

Turkey

Turkish government recently increased support for terrorists and the level of supplying them with arms and munitions to continue their criminal acts in exchange for oil and antiquities stolen from Syria and Iraq at low prices, taking advantage of the presence of terrorists whom it enabled to control border areas.

Russia

Russia has continued to supply the Syrian military with weapons and equipment throughout the conflict. Russia has played a large role in Syria’s war by supplying billions in weapons to the Syrian government. An estimated 10% of Russia exported weapons are sent to Syria. Russia reportedly has $1.5 billion worth of ongoing arms contracts with Syria for weapons, tanks and aircraft since the beginning of the Syrian civil war.

Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia is reported recently to have taken the lead in channeling financial and military support to the rebels. Riyadh is said to have financed the purchase of "thousands of rifles and hundreds of machine guns", rocket and grenade launchers and other weapons. Saudi Arabia, thought to be a leading source of arms for rebels by 2013, has partnered with Turkey and Qatar to funnel an estimated $136 million of arms to rebel groups across the border from Turkey.

 

You may think, that Europe is fighting against terrorism, but how about that : 

Several member states led by the UK and France - lobbied to be able to supply arms to "moderate" forces in the opposition. Though EU member states do not appear to have already sent arms directly to the rebels, another European country has been linked to a secret, large-scale airlift. Also, it was noticed that weapons made in the former Yugoslavia were appearing in videos and images posted online by rebels fighting in southern Syria.

What is more, one of the principal buyers of Spanish weapons is Saudi Arabia, a country that bought more than 406 million euros ($460 million) worth of defence materials from Spanish government in 2013.

You can do much more, than you have done today. Stop support the War and stop selling weapons to Saudi Arabia.

Russia- Arctic issues

Russia has interest in the Arctic and petitioned the United Nation for the large peace of Arctic territory. Russia could demand 460,000 square mile area and almost five billion tons of oil and gas.
This region is believed to have more than a fifth of the world's undescovered hydrocarbon resourses. Russia, Canada, the US, Norway and  Denmark - all of these countries have been trying to assert jurisdiction over parts of the Arctic. 
According to the theguardian news:" Russia was the first to submit a claim in 2002, but the UN sent it back for lack of evidence.

The ministry said the resubmitted bid contains new arguments. “Ample scientific data collected in years of Arctic research are used to back the Russian claim,” it said.

In 2007 Russia plant the flag on the botton of the Arctic sea and claimed that from now- this territory is our.  The Conadian foreign minister made a speach on CTV television "This is not the 15th century. You can not go around the world and just plant flags and say that: "We are claiming this territorry".  I am partly agree, because we are living in a modern world and need to do official things in a proper way.
In the coming years, Russian companies are planning to develop more deposits of the Arctic shelf. The country is bulding military bases, involving some troops, aircrafts, ships and submarines.
Moscow is accomplishing not expensive  Arctic projects, much like USA, Canada and other nation which interested in North Pole.

Writing this article, I come up that Mass media is interpretering  this situation in different ways. According to the Russian news-  if Russia's claim is approved by the United Nations, the country could gain rights over supplies of hydrocarbons (it is almost ten billion tonnes). Also, Russia could claim 460.000 square miles of underwater territory.  So, other words, there is nothing to worry about.
But according to the Mass media of USA or other countries- it is could provide the new reasons of conflicts between the countries and , what is more, Putin just wants to annex more territories. 
Who is more right, I suppose that it is the guestion of time. 

Stop fire in Syria

In Washington (USA), February. 22. Russia and the United States agreed to sight up the regime  of the end of hostilities, which starts in Syria on 27 February. This is stated in a joint statement in Moscow and Washington.

The statement said that the conditions of the cease-fire applies to all sides of the conflict, "with the exception of terrorist groups Daishev (the Arabic name of" Islamic State ")," Dzhebhat en-Nusra "(both banned in Russia), or other terrorist organizations.

The US and Russia have agreed that the conditions for "the cessation of hostilities apply to the parties to the Syrian conflict, which have declared their commitment to the implementation of this decision". Countries are going to  work on "the development of procedures to prevent conflicts." In particular, the United States and Russia want to develop effective mechanisms to monitor compliance with the cease-fire.

Lets hope that this step will provide peace in Syria.