Of course, the title of the show was 'Peter Jennings Reporting…' - if only that were so. This is the story of how, once again, the corrupt Big Media has defrauded the American people, from one who had a front row seat to the spectacle.
In the summer of 2004, as founder and director of The Disclosure Project (www.DisclosureProject.org) I was approached by Jennings Productions producer Jordan Kronick. He explained how ABC News was going to make history by doing a serious expose of the UFO matter - for the first time on network news.
Initially skeptical - we have seen and heard this song and dance before - I agreed to meet with Kronick at our offices in Washington DC. Over the course of several hours, we discussed the subject and how The Disclosure Project had identified several hundred top secret military and government witnesses to UFO events and projects.
Kronick expressed great interest and repeatedly stated that this is exactly what Jennings, chief producer Mark Obenhaus and he were looking for. I offered to provide, pro bono, ALL Disclosure Project digital videotape interviews and full access to ALL Disclosure Project witnesses willing to cooperate with ABC News - including those witnesses not yet taped by us.
The reader at this point needs to know that these are not fuzzy, blacked-out deep throats anonymously telling stories of the night. These are hundreds of military, government and corporate insiders who have been identified by us over the past 14 years. They range from Generals, to Astronauts, to senior FAA officials who were privy to events, projects and cover-ups involving UFOs. Additionally, we have thousands of pages of uncontested official government smoking gun documents and physical evidence, photos, videos, landing trace events and other unambiguous proof.
The ABC News production team claimed to want exactly this type of evidence - and especially the high-level government and military insider whistle-blowers who could credibly blow the lid off of decades of secrecy.
As a two-hour news special, ABC claimed that they could, at long last, give the subject the focus and rigor needed to achieve this objective.
But as discussions continued, it became more and more clear that Obenhaus and Jennings really wanted to do a human interest story - including anecdotal civilian witnesses, man-in-the-street interviews and the general silly season and carnival atmosphere surrounding most things ufological.
We agreed to cooperate with the filming of a CSETI (Center for the Study of Extraterrestrial Intelligence) research expedition to Mt. Shasta in August of 2004, at which time we were able to have discussions with Obenhaus, the senior producer in charge of the project.
We were incredulous as Obenhaus revealed to us that he was sure the matter was not really being kept secret but had just 'fallen through the cracks' due to lack of follow through, laziness and so forth on the part of the government! It was clear he had not studied the data or evidence given to him, and had his mind made up to do a 'light', human interest piece and not a real expose or research project.
This was later confirmed when, as summer turned to fall, the long promised serious research and interviews they claimed they wanted to do with these top-secret government witnesses were never followed up. I spoke a few more times to Kronick, who promised a sit down interview and follow-up with these high-ranking and conclusive witnesses. They never did.
Instead, the final ABC News show was weaker in evidence than most tabloid cable channel pieces on the UFO subject - with the bulk of the 'documentary' being interviews with UFO personalities, debunkers and the carnival atmosphere of UFO hotspots like Roswell.
They fraudulently appeared to be ' balanced' by having both skeptics and 'believers' - with the clear implication that the skeptics were 'real scientists' and the 'believers' were misguided flakes. Using the ruse of media 'objectivity', ABC News would asymmetrically show, say, a Harvard scientist skeptic juxtaposed against a civilian who thought he had been sexually assaulted by aliens!
The few, very brief interviews with pilots and military people were overwhelmed by the spurious, carnival-like pseudo-ethnography of the UFO subculture mixed in with long segments of scientists pooh-poohing the entire matter.
While appearing objective and 'balanced' to the general viewer, the project was, rather, a disinformation piece, carefully crafted to give the mere appearance of objectivity.
Otherwise, why spend so much air time interviewing UFO personalities, media figures and the like - while completely leaving out ALL high-ranking military, government and scientific witnesses and evidence given directly by us to them?
In light of the range and scope of material that we personally gave them, it is incomprehensible why ALL of it would be omitted - unless it was their intent from the beginning to do a disinformation and cover-up piece.
Why else would Peter Jennings state that the US Government has been out of the UFO matter since 1969, when Project Blue Book was closed, even though he and his team were directly given by us official US government documents, senior government whistle-blower testimony and physical evidence - including radar tapes - to the contrary? Why would Jennings feature uninformed scientists rhetorically asking 'where's the physical evidence' when abundant physical evidence is available and was offered to him?
Why indeed. We have received a CIA document from 1991 that clearly states that the CIA has contacts in the Big Media to change, kill or spin stories. From this document, dated 20 December 1991, and released 1 April 1992, to the Director of Central Intelligence from the Task Force on Greater CIA Openness, on page 6:
"PAO [the Public Affairs Office] now has relationships with reporters from every major wire service, newspaper, news weekly, and television network in the nation. This has helped us turn some intelligence failure stories into intelligence success stories…In many instances, we have persuaded reporters to postpone, change, hold or even scrap stories…"
And from a CIA document regarding the psychological warfare implications of UFOs, we find a reference to Disney Studios, now the parent company of ABC, being used as a source for doing cartoon-like portrayals of the subject for psychological warfare purposes. Can we be surprised ABC News has, again, defrauded the American people - only pretending to do news and real investigative reporting when in reality they are purveying disinformation to an accepting public?
Obenhaus, without any research or foundation in fact, went so far as to personally assert to me that the hybrid government - corporate complex is not keeping new energy, propulsion and related technologies hidden from the public! His prejudice on the matter was profound and unwavering: forget the facts, my mind is made up.
It is hard to reconcile ABC News' claims to doing a serious expose and investigative report when the senior producer of the project, without any investigation or research, espouses such closed-minded conclusions at the outset.
Those who know me know that I like to stay positive, present the affirmative facts and present the promise of an advanced, sustainable civilization on Earth benefiting from the knowledge of these new technologies. But it is time for the American people to wake up to the fact that the Big Media and their corporate masters are the central problem blocking the truth from coming out. As a former board member of Time Warner told me, the Big Media has become scribes taking dictation from the right hand of the king - and the fourth estate is essentially dead.
A CALL TO ACTION
The American people must demand that ABC News correct its fraudulent assertions - and do a real investigative report on the serious evidence, government documents and courageous military whistle-blower testimony that The Disclosure Project and others have identified. The reader may obtain much of this evidence from www.DisclosureProject.org.
Write Peter Jennings and ABC News at: PeterJennings@abcnews.com or abc.news.magazines@abc.com or support@ABCNews.go.com and demand an honest investigative report.
Additionally, please contact the FCC and register your complaint regarding the transparent fraud perpetrated by ABC News on the American public. Remember: ABC News, as a broadcast network, is given by the FCC access to the public airwaves. In exchange, we have the right to hold ABC News, as well as the other networks, to fairness, accuracy and honesty - and certainly to avoid blatant fraud and corruption. This was not the ABC entertainment division that perpetrated this fraudulent report on the American people, but its news division. That they would sanitize such an important two hour report of nearly all credible evidence and government insider witnesses requires that we demand a hearing on the matter by the FCC immediately. Who induced Obenhaus and Peter Jennings to cover up this important evidence? Why? ABC News cannot claim ignorance on the matter as they were directly given extensive testimony and evidence, none of which appeared in the program.
Contact the FCC at www.fcc.gov/cgb/complaints.html and demand an immediate investigation into this matter and demand that the FCC require ABC to retract its false statements and present the evidence which they possess but are hiding from the American public.
And lastly, support Disclosure in any way you can. Help us get the truth out. Tell people about http://www.DisclosureProject.org where they can find the truth about this important matter. And help us identify backers who will help us start a new - and honest - news outlet that will truthfully report on these and related projects that are illegally kept secret from the public. Is it not time for us to form a news network - The Disclosure Network - that will produce and air real investigative reports on a wide range of government and corporate corruption? Matters now left completely hidden by the complicity of Big Media need to be known by the people if we are to renew and protect democracy and disclose the technologies now hidden and suppressed that could replace oil and nuclear power and give us a sustainable, peaceful world.
We can no longer trust ABC news or the rest of the Big Media to do this. We, the people, must take on the task of getting the truth out - and salvaging what is left of our democracy and planet. Big Media, who have become shills for their corporate masters, are incapable or unwilling to tell the truth. It is time we did it for them.
Steven M. Greer MD
Director and Founder
The Disclosure Project
Albemarle County Virginia
March 2005
http://www.DisclosureProject.org