The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-08-22

mania, manufacturing fakes about
alleged uprisings and assassinations
in the Union Of Soviet Republics, in
stead Of robberies at the corner
jewelry store that does not exist.
Donald Day and Floyd Gibbons, two
of the best news fiction writers on
the Chicago Tribune, know what they
write is untrue, the editors of the
Chicago Tribune know it is untrue,
but it is good stuff from the view
point of the defenders of capitalism
and SO it is carefully manufactured
for public consumption. When the
truth comes along and blasts these
fakes sky-high, it gets very little, If
any, space. The Chicago Tribune
runs beg Your Pardon" column,
that is devoted almost exclusively to
the correction of misspelled names
and wrong street addresses. No cor
rection is ever made that will dyna-
mite the giant fakes that often get
the headlines On the first page and
that pass for the truth among the
tens of millions Of newspaper read
ers over the country.
Just now the United States is
being flooded with news fakes about
conditions in Mexico. Most of this
fiction originates in the barrooms
and cafes of Mexico City where the
h~,or;onu rourc On 81, aro-o assam, bIa
to coin their own versions of what
is happening over the Mexican re-
public. Back in New York City the
Columbia University amateur faxed
the story about the office catching
fire, in order to explain a late edi-
ton, but now he is an American pro-
fessional journalist in Mexico and
his stories tell of burnings and pill
lagings by the enraged peasantry,
revolts here, uprisings there, all
fakes, alleged events transpiring at
places that do not exist. But the
American newspaper reader never
has a Mexican map available, so the
kept correspondent does not worry.
The same spirit of newsgathering
is carried into all phases of capital
ist journalism. The worst lie is ped
died as the truth in order to advance
American imperialist interests in
the Philippines or in China. The
vilest propaganda muddies the rela-
lions between the United States and
Japan, for instance, in the interest
Of the American dollar. Since cap
italist Japan copies American cap
italism the same is true Of its sub
sidized press.
Only recently the American press
stood aghast when Leon Trotsky
criticised the Soviet press for some
misstatements of facts that were
surely not intended. The press in
the United States Immediately con-
cluded once more that the pillars
supporting workers rule must sure
ly be crumbling. They heralded
Trotsky's criticism as another indi-
cation of Communist decay. Instead,
however, it is the surest indication
of the strengthening of the Soviet
press that does not let the word
"fake" creep into its vocabulary, and
tests every news source for correct
ness even as to its slightest detail.
The Soviet press faces the world
without single fact to misinterpret
or cover up. II was created and lives
to speak for the great working class.
The capitalist press is decadent
with every disease of the disappear
ing class for which it speaks, and
which rules only thru the power OF
the few to tyrannize over the many.
This is another lesson on the neces-
sity of a class press for labor that
must be learned thoroly by the
whole working class.