First, mainstream media outlets in the United States (a fact that is equally applicable to most capitalist countries) are largely privately owned. Let us take the case of Television news. The facade of diversity created by hundreds of news channels breaks down with the realization that most channels are owned by a few major media houses such as CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox. These television networks are in turn owned by bigger business corporations such as General Electric, Time Warner, AOL, etc. Some of these major business corporations also have sister concerns that serve directly or indirectly as military contractors to the American government. The massive deployment of military weaponry and equipment had undoubtedly resulted in windfall profits for these companies (even as the economy was reeling under an acute recession). In the case of the Bush presidency, his Administration had several former energy company employees such as Dick Cheney and Condaleeza Rice, whose loyalties were stronger with former employers than with majority of American citizens. Also, for media conglomerates such as NBC, CBS, etc, bolstering their bottom lines is of primary importance, for after-all they are privately owned and are driven by the profit motive. In this framework, it is easy to see why their editorial policies and news selection guidelines would reflect these imperatives and preoccupations. This analytic framework makes it easy to see how major media companies in the country implicitly aided (if not prompted) the government to invade Iraq and take control of its energy resources. As a result of this inherent advantage, a list of misconceptions was perpetrated by the Bush Administration during the war. (Johansen & Joslyn, 2008, p.591)
Coming to media’s funding sources, we see that major advertisers are themselves business corporations whose profit-motive makes little allowance for issues of propriety and justice. This is why the business community largely remained silent in the lead-up to the Iraq war. Sourcing of news content is another key filter that aids propaganda efforts. Since the misinformation campaign about the presence of WMD in Saddam Hussein ruled Iraq was hosted by Bush Administration officials, the permanent presence of correspondents and reports in government offices like the White House, Capitol Hill and the Pentagon made it difficult for alternative views to be presented to the citizenry. (Kampfner, 2003, p.12) For example, while all major news media outlets gave extensive coverage to the utterances of Bush Administration members such as Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Paul Wolfowitz, etc, none of them gave an iota of news time to dissident views such as those offered by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Robert Fisk, John Pilger, Amy Goodman, etc. From news production point of view, it is cost-efficient and less cumbersome to station correspondents in major government centers as opposed to places like academic departments and public squares. More importantly, getting information from such obscure places is not going to serve the interests of the government or media corporations; and hence editors reflexively avoid alternative or dissident points of view. (Edgley, 2000, p.78)
This brings us to the manifestation of the concept of ‘flak’ in the build up to the Iraq War. Those criticizing the government initiative were either branded as unpatriotic or treacherous or siding with the evil. This includes dissident intellectuals mentioned above. But prominent popular cultural icons are not pardoned either, as the case of the shunning of Dixie Chicks clearly shows. Immediately after their open criticism of Bush Administration’s imperialist policy, Dixie Chicks band was ostracized and outcast in most of the radio and television stations; so much so that their music careers have been derailed in the process with little scope for a comeback. By making such outspoken icons into scapegoats, the government-media nexus deters such tendencies among prominent celebrities and intellectuals. So flak had proved to be a major disincentive for those who disapproved of the Iraq war. Consequently, the government was able to proceed with its plan to secure oil resources in Iraq at the cost of tax-payer funding and the cost of innocent civilian lives in Iraq. (Casey, 2010, p.565)