Alan Macleod

Alan MacLeod is Senior Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent, as well as a number of academic articles. He has also contributed to FAIR.org, The Guardian, Salon, The Grayzone, Jacobin Magazine, and Common Dreams.

Documents Reveal US Gov’t Spent $22M Promoting Anti-Russia Narrative in Ukraine and Abroad

The National Endowment for Democracy can claim it is in the business of democracy promotion. In reality, it does anything but that, unless “democracy” is entirely synonymous with elite U.S. interests.

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
Ukraine NED Feature photo

KIEV, UKRAINE – Amid soaring tensions with Russia, the United States is spending a fortune on foreign interference campaigns in Ukraine. Washington’s regime-change arm, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), has spent $22.4 million on operations inside the country since 2014, when democratically-elected President Viktor Yanukovych was

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1 in 3 Big Defense Contractors Profit from US Prisoner Suffering

There exists a situation whereby prisoners earning pennies per hour are making multimillion-dollar weapons fired by individuals being paid barely $20,000 per year at civilians who might not make that much in their lifetimes.

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
Prison Labor Feature photo

WASHINGTON – America’s largest arms companies are increasingly finding lucrative new ways of profiting from the prison industrial complex; in many cases, weapons of war are directly manufactured using coerced prison labor. A new MintPress News study of the 100 largest private Defense Department contractors found that 37% of them were also profiting

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MintPress Study: NY Times, Washington Post Driving US to War with Russia Over Ukraine

This MintPress study reveals that ninety percent of recent opinion articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal have taken a hawkish view on the Ukraine conflict written by pundits tied to the national security state promoting NATO as a defender of the free world & describe Putin as Hitler incarnate.

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
Putin Russiagate Feature

WASHINGTON – Amid tough talk from European and American leaders, a new MintPress study of our nation’s most influential media outlets reveals that it is the press that is driving the charge towards war with Russia over Ukraine. Ninety percent of recent opinion articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal have

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Graphika: The Deep State’s Beard for Controlling the Information Age

Semi-state actors play a very important role in today’s online landscape and in the 1970s, Graphika employees would likely have been working directly for the CIA.

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
Graphika Feature photo

NEW YORK – Graphika is the toast of the town. The private social-media and tech-intelligence agency that tracks down bots and exposes foreign influence operations online is constantly quoted, referenced and profiled in the nation’s most important outlets. For example, in 2020, The New York Times published a fawning profile of the company’s head of

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ASPI – The Gov’t-Funded Conspiracist Think Tank Now Controlling Your Social Media Feed

That ASPI is now partially in charge of Twitter’s moderation, influencing what hundreds of millions of people see daily, is a grave threat to the free flow of information, as well as to the chances for a peaceful 21st century. 

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
ASPI Twitter Feature photo

CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA – Social media giant Twitter raised many eyebrows recently when it announced that it had partnered with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) in its fight against disinformation and fake news. ASPI, Twitter revealed in a blog post, had helped identify thousands of accounts that “amplified Chinese Communist Party

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J.K. Rowling’s Hypocrisy: The Author who Smeared Jeremy Corbyn Gave Us Books and Films Full of Antisemitic Stereotypes

Rowling has proven herself a very loyal supporter of Israel, so she is given a free pass, despite the blatantly antisemitic caricatures, the likes of which have rarely been seen in popular culture since the days of Nazi filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl. 

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
J.K. Rowling antisemtic Feature photo

LONDON – Star author J.K. Rowling has again made headlines, this time after comedian Jon Stewart took her to task for the antisemitic portrayal of goblins in her “Harry Potter” books and movies. Stewart joked that the goblins were indistinguishable from representations of Jews in the infamous conspiracy text “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”

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Closer Scrutiny Reveals How Close To State Power Sacha Baron Cohen Really Is

MintPress reviewed documents and spoke to a former CIA agent who worked with Sacha Baron Cohen to reveal how the famed actor worked with the national security state to sell America’s wars.

Alan Macleod
By Alan Macleod
Sacha Baron Cohen Feature Photo

MINNEAPOLIS – Sacha Baron Cohen is widely hailed as a comedic genius, using his sheer audacity to mock the absurdity of his targets. The creator of Ali G, Borat and Brüno has become one of Hollywood’s hottest commodities. Yet his outrageous stunts often belie his agenda and his own proximity to state power. Baron Cohen is often reluctant to make

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