China's Campaign To Shape What You Think And How You Behave

Hoover Institution Fellow, Markos Kounalakis, exposes how China is aggressively expanding its state-controlled media operations worldwide to spread propaganda and undermine Western democracies. This information offensive fills the void left by declining Western news bureaus in places like Africa and Latin America, using reporters that also serve as spies. To counter this effort, the West must expose Chinese disinformation, rebuild local journalism, and raise public awareness of foreign influence. Be sure to visit The Hoover Institution at https://www.hoover.org/ and PolicyEd at https://www.policyed.org/

Putin’s War on Ukraine and the Perversion of the Letter “Z”

The Russian dictator has stripped Ukraine bare and stolen a symbol of freedom and hope.

The filmmaker Costa-Gavras immortalized the symbol Z as a protest cry for freedom and against military dictatorship and violence. His 1969 Oscar-winning movie of that name starkly dramatized the 1963 murder of the Greek opposition leader Grigoris Lambrakis by right-wing extremists.

Protests against both Lambrakis’s murder and the sham trial that followed crystallized in the form of a letter: Z. Athenian buildings were spray-painted with Z graffiti; illegal gatherings throughout Greece were punctuated by loud cries of “Z!” When pronounced as zée, the letter in Greek means “He lives.” “Z!” was a raised fist of rebellion, and it also meant “Hope lives.”

No more.

In Vladimir Putin’s Russia, with its perverse up-is-downism, the letter Z has been appropriated to represent ethnonationalist militarism, death, and destruction. READ MORE

How misinformation was spread ahead of U.K. election

Conservative leader Boris Johnson claimed a landslide victory in the U.K. elections. According to The New York Times, both the Conservative Party and the Labour Party spread misleading information online ahead of the election. Markos Kounalakis, a foreign affairs columnist for McClatchy, joined CBSN to discuss disinformation campaigns and electoral politics. VIEW VIDEO SEGMENT

American companies are funding the Kremlin’s info war against us

Consumers have power. Companies know it. Just look at how quickly Keurig pulled its ads from Sean Hannity’s Fox News show over his coverage of Roy Moore’s alleged child molestation. Indeed, strategically spent big media money can take down talk show hosts, cut into the bank accounts of pro athletes and even elect an American president.

Imagine if consumers demanded the same kind of accountability from the American corporations that are bankrolling Moscow’s information-warfare campaign against U.S. voters.

Western advertising has been filling the coffers of Russian propaganda outlets, underwriting a racist, misogynist, anti-American media that keeps Vladimir Putin in place and actively threatens America’s political system. Writing in The Daily Beast, Mitchell Polman states clearly that “without those ad dollars it would be difficult for Russian media to function.”  READ MORE