Lis­ten: One Seg­ment

Review­ing mate­r­i­al about the use of genet­i­cal­ly engi­neered ade­n­ovirus­es for “gene ther­a­py” which uses virus­es to intro­duce DNA into cells in order to cor­rect genet­ic defects. (The ade­n­ovirus caus­es the com­mon cold, and neu­tral­izes the p53 gene, which helps to pre­vent can­cer.)

The can­cer-caus­ing mon­key virus SV40 also neu­tral­izes the p53 gene. Mr. Emory has rumi­nat­ed about the pos­si­bil­i­ty of genet­i­cal­ly engi­neer­ing an ade­n­ovirus that could cause can­cer. In light of the fact that the Mer­ck firm has been involved in genet­i­cal­ly alter­ing ade­n­ovirus­es, this is not a pos­si­bil­i­ty that should be too read­i­ly dis­missed. The pro­gram reviews infor­ma­tion about Mer­ck­’s involve­ment in bio­log­i­cal war­fare and mar­ket­ing the hepati­tis B vac­cine, appar­ent­ly impli­cat­ed in the devel­op­ment of AIDS.

Next, the pro­gram updates the trag­ic progress of physi­cian assist­ed sui­cide in Ore­gon, the only state to leg­is­late the pro­ce­dure. The pro­ce­dure is being con­sis­tent­ly abused, lead­ing to the death of inno­cent and cur­able peo­ple.

Next, the pro­gram high­lights the role of U.S. intel­li­gence in alter­ing the pre­sen­ta­tion of jour­nal­ism and cul­ture. Dis­cussing a review of a book on the CIA’s manip­u­la­tion of cul­ture dur­ing the Cold War, the pro­gram sets forth the Agen­cy’s alter­ation of movies, such as the film ver­sion George Orwell’s Ani­mal Farm and 1984. Oth­er films, books and peri­od­i­cals were sim­i­lar­ly mod­i­fied by “the Com­pa­ny.”

The pro­gram then looks at a U.S. Army “psy-ops” team and its work with CNN. This col­lu­sion con­sti­tutes direct involve­ment of the mil­i­tary with the cov­er­age of the Balka­ns war. The broad­cast con­cludes with analy­sis of “ex-” CIA offi­cer Tom Braden’s role as the “lib­er­al” in the Cross­fire pro­gram, oppo­site Pat Buchanan. (Record­ed on 4/2/2000.)