Pentagon Outsources Fake News to Lincoln Group
by URI DOWBENKO
The Pentagon has awarded the shadowy Washington, DC based Lincoln Group a psychological warfare operations (PsyOps) a/k/a propaganda contract worth $100 million to plant fake news in Iraqi newspapers -- even though the principals of the company have no experience in public relations or marketing.
The principal of Lincoln Group, Christian Bailey, is a 30-year-old Oxford graduate with no public relations experience. "Christian Bailey may not be his real name: a number of student associates said at some point during his four years that he changed his name from Yusefovich - an unlikely surname for someone called Christian," reports the UK Independent.
(http://news.independent.co.uk
Is this another fake news payoff, like the gay hooker/ journalist "Jeff Gannon" for "services rendered" to the Republican elite?
From all accounts Bailey moved to the United States in the late 1990s,working in hedge funds in San Francisco and New York.
More importantly Bailey was the co-chairman of the New York chapter of Lead21, a networking group for young Republicans.
"How and when did Bailey make the switch from hedge funds to private intelligence and PR? One clue is provided by the Alternative Investment News newsletter of 1 March 2003, just weeks before the invasion of Iraq. It reported Bailey's hedge fund, Lincoln Asset Management Group, had launched a buyout fund to start buying companies in the defence and security industries. Bailey said he had obtained commitments of $100m from six institutional investors, whom he declined to name," reports th Independewnt.
Bailey then formed a subsidiary of Lincoln called Iraqex, which formed a partnership with the notorious Rendon Group, which promoted the Iraqi conman Ahmed Chalabi and his front group called the Iraqi National Congress.
The UK Independent reports "At some point Bailey also went into business with Paige Craig, 31, a former US Marine who served in Iraq and elsewhere.
"[Bailey and Craig are flatmates in a fashionable part of Washington, close to U Street. The flat is just yards away from Café Saint- Ex, popular with young professionals.]"
(Young Queer Republicans? Log Cabin Boys watch out...)
The Independent makes no mention, however, of a gay Republican call boy network -- the next logical move for entrpreneurial young Republican scammers like Bailey and Craig.
Iraqex then was granted a $6 million Pentagon contract for "an aggressive advertising and PR campaign that will accurately inform the Iraqi people of the Coalition's goals and gain their support."
Bailey's company, having again changed its name to the Lincoln Group, then received a $100 million contract for Psychological Operations, or PsyOps i.e. placing fake news stories in some of the 200 Iraqi-owned newspapers.
"According to reports from former Lincoln employees, their main task was to take news dispatches, called storyboards, which had been written by specially trained psy-ops troops, have them translated into Arabic and then distribute them to the newspapers. They would also deal directly with members of the Iraqi media through something called the Baghdad Press Club, a group of journalists who were paid to write and publish positive stories. Typically, Lincoln paid newspapers between $40 and $2,000 to run the articles as either news or adverts," the UK Independent wrote.
(It's not as lucrative as Hollywood but what the hell... When you're an (alleged) Republican whore like Christian Bailey, who's counting?)
The Lincoln Group even lies in its own press release, saying "Lincoln Group has consistently worked with the Iraqi media to promote truthful reporting across Iraq. We counter the lies, intimidation, and pure evil of terror with factual stories that highlight the heroism and sacrifice of the Iraqi people and their struggle for freedom and security."
"Pure evil of terror"? That sounds like the Pentagon itself.
Hyperbole then must be perfectly acceptable -- especially when you're working for that bastion of peace and love called the Pentagon.
* URI DOWBENKO is the author of "Bushwhacked: Inside Stories of True Conspiracy" and "Hoodwinked: Watching Movies with Eyes Wide Open." He can be reached at u.dowbenko@lycos.com His website is UriDowbenko.Com For more information on Dowbenko's articles and samples of chapters from his books Bushwhacked & Hoodwinked"
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