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PunkinPi

(4,875 posts)
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:09 AM Sep 2020

The Pentagon has ordered Stars and Stripes to shut down for no good reason

The Pentagon has ordered Stars and Stripes to shut down for no good reason
Trump wants to pull funding from Stars and Stripes, a newspaper for American troops that began in the Civil War and has been serving our soldiers.

Even for those of us who are all too wearily familiar with President Donald Trump’s disdain for journalists, his administration’s latest attack on the free press is a bit of a jaw-dropper.

In a heretofore unpublicized recent memo, the Pentagon delivered an order to shutter Stars and Stripes, a newspaper that has been a lifeline and a voice for American troops since the Civil War. The memo orders the publisher of the news organization (which now publishes online as well as in print) to present a plan that “dissolves the Stars and Stripes” by Sept. 15 including "specific timeline for vacating government owned/leased space worldwide.”

“The last newspaper publication (in all forms) will be September 30, 2020,” writes Col. Paul Haverstick Jr., the memo’s author.

...

It’s also arguably one of the most powerful weapons our soldiers have carried into battle with them. As a publication that’s underwritten by the military but not answerable to the brass, Stars and Stripes embodies that most American of values: the right to speak truth to power.

More -> https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/09/04/trump-and-stars-and-stripes-attacking-american-icon-column/5706859002/


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FBaggins

(26,748 posts)
9. It's a DOD field activity
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:25 AM
Sep 2020

They're all government employees.

If it was a business going bankrupt you could buy up the name and remaining assets and decide to continue publishing... but it isn't.

SamKnause

(13,108 posts)
15. Thank you for the explanation.
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:34 AM
Sep 2020

So there is no way private donations can keep the paper going.

I was trying to come up with a way to keep the paper going because the

asshole is defunding it.

Thanks again.

Tanuki

(14,919 posts)
12. Why can't Rapist45 forego 5 golf trips to Mar-a-lago? At $3 million a pop,
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:30 AM
Sep 2020

that would cover the $15 million cost of keeping the presses running for another year.

SamKnause

(13,108 posts)
13. Excellent idea.
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:32 AM
Sep 2020

I don't think he will go for it.

If the asshole is going to defund the paper maybe citizens could fund it.

underpants

(182,830 posts)
4. I read it when I was in. Pretty good.
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:12 AM
Sep 2020

I don’t know how it’s staffed - I’d guess this means some GI’s are losing this as job training.

Blue_playwright

(1,568 posts)
11. It's considered high-level training...
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:27 AM
Sep 2020

...I’m a pacifist and dislike the military machine but when I left school with my journalism training, even I looked into it a bit. Great gigs and you don’t have to be on the front lines (my specialty was feature story and human interest writing).

notinkansas

(1,096 posts)
5. It's gonna be a helluva job
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 10:14 AM
Sep 2020

putting this country back together again after 45 is gone. He seems determined to wreck everything.

peggysue2

(10,832 posts)
19. I was just about to post this
Fri Sep 4, 2020, 12:41 PM
Sep 2020

Stars and Stripes has been around since the Civil War. But now Trump is in a snit over the Atlantic article and the bad military press, so his goons order that the newspaper be shuttered.

Voice of America has been poisoned by Trump's enablers. And now this. Anything to stop criticism/truth about what's happening in the country, anything that Trump feels is not Trumpian enough.

Time to shut Trump and his shit show down!



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