The drug maker Pfizer earlier this decade manipulated the publication of scientific studies to bolster the use of its epilepsy drug Neurontin for other disorders, while suppressing research that did not support those uses, according to experts who reviewed thousands of company documents for plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the company.

Pfizer’s tactics included delaying the publication of studies that had found no evidence the drug worked for some other disorders, “spinning” negative data to place it in a more positive light, and bundling negative findings with positive studies to neutralize the results, according to written reports by the experts, who analyzed the documents at the request of the plaintiffs’ lawyers.

One of the experts who reviewed the documents, Dr. Kay Dickersin of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, concluded that the Pfizer documents spell out “a publication strategy meant to convince physicians of Neurontin’s effectiveness and misrepresent or suppress negative findings.”

To anyone who has studied the nature of mass media, "news" like this are not really news, but indicators of a mechanism in society. The media exists as an advertisement space for political, religious and social groups who want to influnce the crowd through symbols and messages. While democracies typically define their state media as unbiased and self-critical, the truth is that the media is managed by private interests behind the scenes, just like our elections basically depend on corporate funding and world economic realities.

The media would never publically criticize the platform of our society. That would be the same as anarchism. True, we do see political scandals and such being brought to light, but ask yourself this question: Does this criticism question the fundamental values and direction of the system, or does it serve as entertainment and distraction (Lewinsky scandal) from tangible issues? Pfizer obviously knew the game of media politics when it basically used the media to lobby through its products. We can later sit and chit-chat about how corrupt that is, but the truth is that it has nothing to do with corruption per se; this is how democracies work. We vote for candidates that in turn depend on corporations to stay in power. Why would we expect otherwise?

And for those of you who are not convinced that the media would lie about critical governmental issues:

Federal regulators have launched an inquiry into whether broadcast networks and military analysts violated federal sponsorship identification rules as a result of an effort by the Pentagon to increase favorable news coverage of the Iraq war.

The FCC's rules prohibit broadcasters and employees who prepare shows from accepting money, goods or services in exchange for on-air promotion without disclosing that arrangement to viewers or listeners.

Radio broadcasters have mostly run afoul of the FCC's payola rules over the years, but last October, the agency proposed combined fines of $76,000 to two broadcast companies for not telling viewers that columnist Armstrong Williams had received money from the Department of Education in exchange for promoting the No Child Left Behind Act on his shows and other programs.

Again, this is nothing new under the sun. Of course the government made sure the media gave the public a positive image of the war. Wars usually fail because of lack of support at home. The growing anti-war sentiment in the West against the Iraq war is due to a conflict between the ideological motives stated by the Bush Administration, clashing with the now-obvious corporate exploitation and American realpolitik of dealing with growing radicalism in the Middle East.

People figure they've been duped because they sent their beloved ones to a war motivated by false evidence, and figure Bush and his Administration is to blame. Well, it's not about ideology and the media knows it too. Money talks, not in ideology, but through it, using it as a tool to exclaim whatever "rights" it has on the globalist economic battlefield to grow, and finally land in the pockets of the few who control the game. And the media is its third party servant.

Read more:

How The Media Confuses Our Lives