Judging Freedom - The Hidden Price of War: A Critical Examination, with Matt Hoh

Episode Date: November 16, 2023

#MediaManipulation #CostOfWar #PoliticalSpin #PoliticalDistractions #RealCostOfWar #israel #Ukraine #Netanyahu #gaza #hamas #Zelenskyy Just when you thought you understood the political landscape, we're here to turn it on its head. With the help of our perceptive guest, Matt Hoh, we'll uncover the twisted narratives surrounding the Ukraine war and the shocking toll it's taking on the American purse and Ukrainian lives. As we reveal the clever distraction of the Israel-Palestine conflict, we'll expose the White House's skillful manipulation of the media to control the narrative and keep you blissfully unaware. Now, aren't you curious about the real cost of these political games?Get ready to put on your critical thinking caps as we scrutinize the media's deceptive role in steering public opinion and influencing government response. We'll dissect the harrowing death tolls of children in the Israel-Palestine conflict and expose the calculated language used to paint a particular picture. From the intriguing influence of Christian Zionists in the US to the declining support of Israel due to Prime Minister Netanyahu's actions, we're laying it all out on the table. As a parting shot, we'll delve into the First Amendment, the role of judges and professors, and how media framing impacts political discourse. Prepare to be enlightened!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Thursday, November 16th, 2023. Matt Ho joins us now. Matt, it's a pleasure. Thank you very much for coming back on the show. You and I have discussed at length your view in which you argued persuasively before October 7th that the Ukraine war was the most propagandized in the modern era. When you made those arguments, what did you mean by that? The full weight, the volume, the resources available to pushing the narratives of the war, because this applies also to the Russian side as well, it's just not the Ukraine, Western, NATO, American side. It was just such

an overwhelming wave of information on people that it was unlike anything we had seen before. The way it was not just how forceful it was, but how concerted, coordinated, how deliberate it was, and I, how concerted, how, how concerted, coordinated, how deliberate it was. And I think in many cases planned as well. You don't have the same view now that it's the most propagandized view in the modern era in light of what has happened from and after October 7th. Yeah. I think we had that conversation judge on, uh, you know, September 30th or October 1st, right? So whatever pronouncements I made were quickly undone by the events that came from, and what we see now is something even greater than that, because it ties into very real political and cultural phenomenons that have existed in the U.S. and the West for decades. So whereas the propaganda campaign in the United States for the Ukraine war

depended in large part on the Democratic Party's demonization of Russia and Vladimir Putin connection, you know, trying to connect it to Donald Trump and the Republican Party, et cetera. So that had a big impact on the propaganda for the Ukrainian war. What we're seeing with what's occurring in Israel and Palestine goes back even farther, is even deeper, has very real roots within American society from which it can draw, from which it can play upon emotions. And it connects even on a spiritual level with people. So what we're seeing with

this propaganda campaign for this war really is unlike anything I think we've ever seen in our history. It has a lot to do with technology, certainly social media, the fact that everyone has cell phones and can record video and everything else. However, it also has to do with some very real, deep, social, and religious, and spiritual connections that people have. And those social, religious, and spiritual connections are basically American domestic politics and the influence of the Jewish people in American domestic politics, which has resulted in a propaganda campaign even more one-sided, as you view it, correct me if I'm wrong, than what we witnessed in Ukraine. Of course, we don't witness any more. Ukraine's more or less forgotten about. I don't

know what Victoria Nuland is thinking, but she's not speaking out. And I think the White House is happy that Ukraine has largely disappeared from the media conversation because it helps get them out of that hole, basically. All right. Hold the question that I asked you, and I'll restate it for you. Let's spend just a little bit of time in Ukraine before we get to the propaganda campaign here in the U.S. Do your sources tell you that either the White House or NATO or Western Europe or some of them have recognized the inevitable finally in Ukraine? Yes, absolutely. And we've seen this in reporting. We've seen this in reports of the United States approaching its allies to discuss peace plans, to discuss potential negotiations. What would Ukraine have to give up to settle this thing and put this thing behind us. I think there was a faction in a very strong, deliberate, well-grounded faction in the sense of people like Tony Blinken and Victoria Nuland, who saw the war in Ukraine as an extension of their ideological pursuits, right? Their extension that this was all part of, of the wars like this are going to occur when you are the indispensable

nature, you're going to go, have to go forth and defeat monsters. You're going to have to confront tyranny. You're going to have to defend Liberty. You know, all that, all that nonsense, all that dangerous, dangerous nonsense. And I think that those narratives, those tropes, that emotional hyperbole produce these types of policies. Also, too, this is the nature of empire. When you're an empire, you are forced to make decisions, make choices to maintain and defend the empire as well as try and expand it. And so what we see, I think, are just culminations of bad choices, bad decisions because of the consequences of previous ones. And so now you're at the point where you have run out, where there is absolutely nothing left you can do. You're literally running out of money to support this. And so I think that the reality is setting on even those

who are so fervent in their beliefs. What do they do or say now that A, the money is running out, because B, I don't think the House of Representatives controlled by Republicans is going to give Joe Biden another dime for Ukraine. see what do they say. These people live in the world of molding popular opinion. They created a disaster, a monumental, catastrophic disaster that cost the American public $113 billion. It cost the Ukrainians a half a million young men's lives. What can they say? Well, they can distract, right? So thankfully for them, they have this war in Gaza, which is incredibly unpopular among the American people, as we see with more public opinion polling that has come out. But they

can distract with that. So they can choose to push one unpopular war instead of another unpopular war. They can pretend it's not happening. And I think they're very happy to see the fact that, you know, CNN, MSNBC, Fox not talking about the war in Ukraine. I get the feeling that it's that those networks are not receiving telephone calls from American viewers asking them, where is the coverage? So I think the White House is happy to see that as well. And then the other aspect is that they can always just double down. They can always just misrepresent. They can always just pretend that something else happened. So whereas this was a complete catastrophe for the Ukrainian people, the way it will be spun by the White House,

by the DNC, by the president's reelection campaign is that we stood up to Vladimir Putin. We met tyranny and we stopped it. We prevented Putin from marching further west. Poland and Germany and France are safe because of us. You know, so they'll spin it in a way that they still come out as the heroes of our age. How one-sided is, and now we're going to get to Israel and Hamas, how one-sided is the propaganda campaign from the government or from private media, I mean, media not owned by the government, here in the U.S. and generally in the West?

Well, we have some statistical analysis that shows exactly that, how the bias is very real. And it's almost overpowering when you look at the numbers. And this comes from a journalist named Adam Johnson, who, among other things, has a substack called The Column. And I would encourage people to go and look at that. But what the statistical analysis finds is that over the period of a month from October 7th to November 7th on the big three cable news networks- Hang on a second. Here's the chart that you gave us. So what are we looking at, Matt? What are the

numbers going up and down on the left and what are the numbers going up and down on the left? And what are the numbers going left to right on the bottom? So the vertical axis is the number of mentions in a 30 second spot by CNN, Fox and MSNBC over a 30 day period, October 7th or a month period, October 7th through November 7th. Numbers on the bottom are the dates. It starts October 8th, it goes to November 8th. Correct. And the line, the darker line, the top line is the mentions of Israelis. And the lighter blue line, the lower line, is the mentions of Palestinians. So you can see starting October 7th, the number of times that MSNBC, CNN and Fox mention Israelis or mention Palestinians, you can certainly see the disparity. And for you know, if you look at the actual numbers, it comes out to a disparity of basically five to one.

So for every time Palestinians are mentioned by the big three cable news networks. Israelis are mentioned five times. So the mentions, the mentions of the Israelis are positive for the Israelis. The mention, and correct me if I'm wrong, the mentions of the Palestinians are positive for Palestinians. It's just five to one on these major networks, one of which is my former employer for 24 years. Right. It's just a question of even talking about them. So if you look at it, it comes out to roughly 83% of the time that this war is being discussed, the Israelis are the ones who are

being spoken about. So whether it's what the Israeli military is doing, what the Israeli government is doing, what the Israeli people have endured, what they suffered, et cetera, the hostages, you know, and only about 17% of the time are the 11,000 plus Palestinians who have been killed being mentioned. What's important too, that what they go into in this is how they're talked about. How are they talked about? Well, you know, there's a real disparity in terms of, you know, words matter, right? So when you hear about the deaths that occur there, say the word massacre, they looked at how often is the word massacre used to describe what is occurring in Israel and Palestine. And what they found was that over this period of time, the news networks used massacre to describe what happened to the Israelis 1,655 times, while only 78 times was the word massacre used

to describe what was occurring to the Palestinians. So that's 21 times as much the Israelis are prescribed of having endured massacres as have the Palestinians. You know, so the descriptive words, though, you also see are, what is this one here? Israelis are mentioned more than Palestinians every day on CNN, MSNBC and Fox. This remained the case even as Palestinian deaths networks after two or three weeks start to

talk about it less that disparity remains in terms of israelis being spoken about palestinians not being mentioned you know one of the things about the massacre thing as well i want to get back to when that term is used they looked at how the language is used when using the word massacre. And very often the newscasters would say very definitively in very determinative language regarding the Israelis. This was a massacre. While very often with the Palestinians, it was the words used were things like what the Palestinians are calling a massacre. The Palestinians are saying it's a massacre. So you see just even in the way the language is used, right, that there is there is a bias there as well. The Israelis were massacred. The Palestinians say that they are a massacre, meaning that, you know, that may not be true.

You know, but you see it as well, too, like in terms of when you get into some of the more sensitive things, the things that really horrify us and sicken us and aggrieve us, such as the children. And there are 30 Israeli, roughly 30 Israeli children killed on October 7th. Absolutely horrible. During the. In the data set they had here, they looked up until October 27th in terms of how the children were spoken about. And at that point, 3,000 Palestinian children had been killed. And you can see that almost the mention though of Israeli child deaths compared to Palestinian child deaths, it's almost two to one. So almost twice as often

did the newscasters talk about 30 Israeli children being killed. What is the effect of this one-sided reporting on the war itself? Well, you know, the effect is meant to shape the discussion. It's meant to shape public opinion, right? I mean, one of the things you can look at that they pull out is the words that are used to describe how the children were killed. And when they're talking about Israeli children being killed, they use the word atrocity five times more often. They use the word slaughter 15 times more often. And in the children themselves, more than two and a half times, Israeli children are called innocent as the Palestinian children are. And that's all meant to shape the debate, to set the windows of the parameter for how we discuss this, how we view this, and ultimately how our government responds. But what we've seen is that it has not been effective.

That this propaganda campaign has been shown through public opinion polls, first with the public opinion polls from the week of around October 20th to a Reuters poll that was just released yesterday. How have the polls changed? Well, the polls, actually, the polls have not changed very much. And, you know, so a few weeks ago, the polls showed that 66 percent of Americans were in favor of a ceasefire, while you have polls this week showing 68 percent of Americans supporting ceasefire, which is a large majority, particularly when you look at the way the war has been framed by the media, as well as the way that our political leaders

are responding. You look at this march for Israel that occurred this past week in Washington, D.C., where you had the Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, many other Democrats and Republicans up there in front of a crowd chanting no ceasefire, pledging to give Israel everything it needs to finish Gaza. And, you know, so just completely out of step, the dissonance between what our political leaders are saying and what the American public is saying is vast. It's very wide. So the new speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, who is what he calls himself a Christian nationalist, when he was asked about the ceasefire, said, out of the question, out of the question, he is completely out of sync with the American public. And there's, you know, these Christian Zionists

who actually, we have more Christian Zionists in the United States than there are Jewish people in the world. And not every Jewish person, as we well know, is a Zionist. I mean, so the tens and tens of millions of these Christian Zionists just here in the US, and Mike Johnson is one of them. And what do they believe? Well, they believe that Israel is necessary to bring about the end of days, to bring about Armageddon, to fill the prophecies that are contained in the last book of the New Testament, Revelations. You need Israel to create this situation where the Messiah can return. And what does that mean for Jewish people, though? It means either they convert to Christianity or they go to hell. So all these Christian nationalists, these Christian Zionists who are such big supporters and fans of Israel,

when you actually pull apart and look into what do they actually mean? What are their intentions here? Well, it means that they want Armageddon. They want the apocalypse. And what does that mean for their good friends in Israel? Well, that means either they accept Jesus or they go to hell. I'm not sure. How does any of this affect the criticisms of Prime Minister Netanyahu,

either for failing to protect the state of Israel and the Jewish people on October 7th or for engaging in war crimes? I think the Israelis have to be nervous because even though they're able to carry out this ethnic cleansing, they're able to carry out these war crimes and these slaughters and the United States sends weapons and bombs and material on a corner or Pentagon a near daily basis to Israel to allow them to do this, they must be looking at the public opinion numbers and seeing that the support in the United States is slipping and that this blank check may not be forever. And have we gone too far? Because this is not just because of what's happening now. Support for Israel has been slipping for years. And a lot of it is because people can see what's

happening. People can see videos. They can see reporting of how it is apartheid that's occurring there. This is a brutal occupation. People are being subjugated and that these war crimes of the last 41 days are just the latest rendition on top of that. And so support for Israel has been declining. And I think it accelerates because what you have now is you have people have heard this criticism about it, and now they see it right in front of them and there's no getting away from it. So what you see is you see in the latest public opinion that less than, you know, only 31% of Americans say that the United States should be sending weapons to Israel. Only 32% of Americans say that we should be supporting Israel. Most Americans are saying we should either be supporting the Palestinians or we should be a

neutral arbitrator. So if you're the Israelis, you have to be aware of that. And you have to look at it and say, you know, it's not just because of this last month, but it's because of how we have conducted ourselves, including how Netanyahu has so pompously and arrogantly strutted around the world for the last couple of decades, alienating people with his smugness as they we will as people watch what we have been doing to the Palestinians so the the Israeli people have had a compact with the government of Israel that it would have their backs figuratively and literally that it would protect them and it appears that that compact was shattered on October 7th. Here is Prime Minister Netanyahu last Sunday, so five days ago, on CNN being asked the very simple

question, as you can imagine, he's asked it several times because he doesn't give a direct answer, but his response is very telling. Will you take responsibility for October 7th? The one thing they want to hear from you is that you take personal responsibility for failing to prevent the October 7th attacks and protecting your people. I know you say the time for that will come after the war. Why won't you take responsibility now? I've already addressed that many times. And I said this whole question will be addressed after the war. Just as people would ask, well, did people ask Franklin Roosevelt after Pearl Harbor that question? Did people ask George Bush after the surprise attack of November 11th? Look,

it's a question that needs to be asked. And these questions will be asked. And I've said that one thing that is important, and I've said we're going to answer all these questions will be asked. And I've said that one thing that is important, and I've said we're going to answer all these questions, including me. I'm going to be asked tough questions. Right now, I think what we have to do is unite the country for one purpose, one purpose alone, and that is to achieve victory. That's what I did. We formed a unity government where the country is united as never before,

and I think that's what we have to pursue. And what the people expect me to do right now is two things. One, achieve this victory and bring the hostages back. And second, assure that Gaza never becomes a threat to Israel again. And to Israelis who are disappointed that you still won't take responsibility, you say? Well, I said that I'm going to answer all the questions that are required, including the questions of responsibility. There'll be enough time for that after the war.

Let's focus on victory. That's my responsibility now. A true leader would say, I dropped the ball. It won't happen again, and I'm going to take care of it forever. But he's not. It's not in his character. No, no, he won't and and and uh i think a lot of us uh suspect that he hopes after he has finished with gaza that he'll be able to do something else to keep him from having to answer those questions so that once

he has to answer those questions, he's out of office. Correct. Yeah. I mean, I think. And maybe we'll lose his personal freedom depending upon how the government that succeeds him views this. I mean, he is widely disliked, except that he is well-liked within this far right coalition that he's been able to assemble. So is he going to be able to push forward things? Say there is, aside from what's happening in Gaza, there's a third intifada, say, in the West Bank, and things get very unstable and dangerous, violent there. It already is, but say it gets to the point where Israelis feel very threatened,

say something happens with Hezbollah, increased tensions with Syria and Iran. Turkey is saying, we're going to get a nuclear weapon now because we can't be in a position in the future to not be able to intervene in something like this. I mean, would that be the type of thing he's looking for to solidify his position, make it so that he can push forward. I'm talking about him pushing forward things just like the judicial reforms last year, things for him to keep himself in power. Whereas you can't remove the prime minister, we can't have elections as long as we're in this state of emergency. So similar to say what Zelensky is doing in Ukraine, there will not be elections in 2024. As long as this crisis is going on, as long as this war is going on, we will not have elections. I mean, that may be the type of thing he's thinking

of, but he certainly has no interest in what never will based upon not just we say now, I think, but if you've been observing him for these decades, will ever put himself in the position where he has to answer for what happened October 7th. And very clearly, the majority of Israelis seem to feel that he is the one who's responsible. Haaretz, which is, I don't believe, the largest newspaper in Israel, but I believe it's the oldest newspaper in Israel, immediately after those attacks on October 7th came out and said, this is the responsibility of the prime minister, not just in terms of what his duties are, you know, as the prime minister of the country, but because of Netanyahu's specific policies over these decades, that is what brought us to this point. And I think most Israelis agree

with that. Because he held himself out as that he and he alone could protect the state of Israel and the Israeli people, and he failed to do so. Right, and you see it, it's almost messianic, you know, in a way that, again, Zelensky was described. So in the way that he talks about civilization versus barbarism, and the way he speaks to the West, he seems to be appealing more to the West than he is to his own people. Again, similar to Zelensky, hoping that we're the ones who are going to keep him in power. If I am not here, he is saying these barbarians, these hordes will attack you next. So they are in effect a modern Sparta. And he sees himself as the person who is holding back this terror, this evil, these hordes of barbarians from the West, in language that is remarkably similar to

what we hear from Zelensky. Would not the Israeli people, probably half of whom are secular Jews, have approved overwhelmingly surgical incursions into Gaza to get the hostages out and to kill the Hamas leaders, rather than this massive carpet bombing, killing of civilians? There was a poll last week from an Israeli newspaper that showed more than two-thirds of Israelis supported pauses to conduct a prisoner exchange, a hostage swap. And I believe that that's where the Israeli sentiment is, is that they want to see the hostages returned. I want to see the hostages returned. I think unless you're a fairly depraved person, you want to see those people brought back to their families and their families relieved of that suffering. Just as I say that, just as I want to see the

thousands of Palestinians who are being held in Israeli prisons, that they be free, that they be returned to their families. I think everyone who is not depraved feels that way. And so certainly, I think the Israelis looking at what's occurring to their hostages, understanding what brought them to this point, and then seeing that the concern of the prime minister, the concern of this cabinet, of the Israeli military is not getting the hostages back, but is punishing the Palestinians, launching this punitive expedition, trying to subjugate them and eradicate Hamas. And I think many Israelis who've lived through decades of this also understand the complete folly of that. There is no eradication of a resistance by military means. All you do is strengthen it and make it more extreme. So Hamas 2.0 that follows this will be worse than what they have now. I think that's how many Israelis look at it.

And so that all adds up into this animosity, this anger and his hatred toward Netanyahu. And remember that, you know, it wasn't so long ago, several months ago, the Israeli people were going out on the streets. They have about eight million people in Israel and about a million of them were going out on the streets to protest Netanyahu and his government's judicial reforms. So he was already incredibly unpopular. It was already a very unstable government. And that's why I think that he is going to do everything he can to stay in there through whatever types of legislative reforms or mechanisms or tricks he can to keep himself in power because he's certainly, people don't want him there any longer. Matt Ho, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for joining us. Thanks for your insight and for your courage. We'll

hopefully see you again. We have a short week next week, but hopefully we'll see you again. Thank you. Thank you, Matt. All the best. Thanks, Judge. At 3 o'clock Eastern, Professor Michael Rechtenwald on whatever happened to the freedom of speech in America. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thanks for watching!