What does "The Mighty Wurlitzer" mean?

[...of J.Temperance]

You know when someone says that the media is "cranking up the Mighty Wurlitzer"?

What do they mean? How does a Wurlitzer get into this?

[FormerDittoHead]

1. Why, it's an orchestra at your fingertips! n/t

[...of J.Temperance]

3. Stop

Teasing me :spank:

I already know what a Wurlitzer Wurlitzer is ;)

[spinbaby]

11. It IS an orchestra at your fingetips

A Wurlitzer band organ, complete with percussion section. You can see one at the Kennywood amusement park in Pittsburgh where it still plays for the carousel.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. A huge, powerful organ.

No, not the Clenis. A pipe organ.

http://www.tennesseetheatre.com/default.aspx?typeid=21&main=main

[...of J.Temperance]

4. Not the Clenis

But considering you used the phrase:

"A huge powerful organ" in your subject line, I'm giving you a

:bounce:

On Edit: I had to change what I awarded you, after I discovered that you're a girl.

[Dances with Cats]

6. What is worse than a lobster on your piano?

A crab on your organ. :-)

[...of J.Temperance]

7. 'Um...

No, I'd have to go with a lobster on your piano.

I couldn't deal with having a crab on your organ...and neither could you in either way ;)

[eleny]

5. It's a metaphor

[...of J.Temperance]

9. Ah-ha

The Oxford Dictionary official defination of:

Metaphor: "The application of a name or a descriptive term or phrase to an object or action to which it is imaginatively but not literally applicable."

:cry:

[eleny]

17. According to Wikpedia..

...it's a comparison of things that aren't really related. So the one thing being compared takes on the charactaerisitcs of what it's being compared to. A neat device! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphor

Bernie Ward always refers to KGO radio as the mighty Wurlistzer.

[...of J.Temperance]

24. Okay

Thanks. I've learnt something today which is good...actually I've learnt TWO things today. 1. What The Mighty Wurlitzer is and 2. Not to go out without your swimming goggles on whilst there's a HUGE hailstone storm going on ;)

[Clara T]

8. The Mighty Wurlitzer

Journalism and the CIA: The Mighty Wurlitzer
by Daniel Brandt
From NameBase NewsLine, No. 17, April-June 1997


Alongside those Greek morality plays and Biblical injunctions, we are also reminded by history itself that the use of unethical means to achieve a worthy end can be self-destructive. Power, by definition, is isolated from the correcting signals of external criticism. Or perhaps the feeling of fighting evil fits so comfortably, that it's difficult to shed even after objective circumstances change.


The history of U.S. intelligence since World War II follows both patterns. The Office of Strategic Services, the CIA's predecessor, had jurisdiction over wartime covert operations and propaganda in the fight against fascism. OSS chief William Donovan recruited heavily among social and academic elites. When the CIA was launched in 1947 at the beginning of the Cold War, these pioneers felt that they had both the right and the duty to secretly manipulate the masses for the greater good.


<snip>

Wisner created the first "information superhighway." But this was the age of vacuum tubes, not computers, so he called it his "Mighty Wurlitzer." The CIA's global network funded the Italian elections in 1948, sent paramilitary teams into Albania, trained Nationalist Chinese on Taiwan, and pumped money into the Congress for Cultural Freedom, the National Student Association, and the Center for International Studies at MIT. Key leaders and labor unions in western Europe received subsidies, and Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty were launched. The Wurlitzer, an organ designed for film productions, could imitate sounds such as rain, thunder, or an auto horn. Wisner and Dulles were at the keyboard, directing history.

The ethos of the fight against fascism carried over into the fight against godless communism; for these warriors, the Cold War was still a war. OSS highbrows had already embraced psychological warfare as a new social science: propaganda, for example, was divided into "black" propaganda (stories that are unattributed, or attributed to nonexistent sources, or false stories attributed to a real source), "gray" propaganda (stories from the government where the source is attributed to others), and "white" propaganda (stories from the government where the source is acknowledged as such).<1>


http://www.namebase.org/news17.html

[...of J.Temperance]

10. Merci

I read that, I'll click the link and read the rest :toast:

But I did like the amusing comments as well :)

[annabanana]

20. Why, thank-you Clara T.

and welcome to DU! :toast:

[Clara T]

22. Hello

We can reduce the effect of the mighty Wurlitzer through our own actions. Becoming your own media service and distributor on your local level works wonders.

Here's to better days to come for all the world's children.

:toast:

[BrotherBuzz]

12. In radio, the 'Mighty Wurlitzer' is

the control panel that the engineer use to keep the program on the air. Like the organ, there are (pre digtial) lots of knobs and controls. A radio talk show host that drives the Mighty Wurlitzer is also a licensed engineer, like Ray Taliaferro at KGO radio.

[eleny]

18. Thanks!

I just gave that as an example. But I didn't know it was used in the industry. Nice to know!!!

[...of J.Temperance]

27. Thanks BrotherBuzz

Not being technical myself, yet I always like to be explained technical stuff too :)

[Clara T]

13. Propaganda Machine

The Mighty Wurlitzer
(the CIA's propaganda machine)
from the book
The CIAs Greatest Hits
by Mark Zepezauer




Deputy Director Frank Wisner proudly referred to the CIA's worldwide propaganda machine as "the mighty Wurlitzer." And indeed, the agency's skill at murdering people is matched only by its ability to murder the truth.
The CIA has published literally hundreds of books that spread its party line on the Cold War. It was particularly proud of The Penikovsky Papers, supposedly the memoirs of a KGB defector but actually completely ghostwritten by CIA scribes. A bit more embarrassing was Claire Sterling's book which advanced the now-discredited theory that the Russians were behind the 1981 attempt on the life of Pope John Paul II. Even the popular Fodor's Travel Guides started as a CIA front.

<snip>

In 1977, famed Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein revealed that over 400 US journalists had been employed by the CIA. These ranged from freelancers who were paid for regular debriefings, to actual CIA officers who worked under deep cover. Nearly every major US news organization has had spooks on the payroll, usually with the cooperation of top management.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA%20Hits/Wurlitzer_CIAHits.html

[...of J.Temperance]

26. Very interesting, yet disturbing

I thank you for taking the time to post those links for me :)

And I bid you a warm welcome :hi:

[Clara T]

14. Call it the Conservative Echo Chamber

Conservative Echo Chamber

But these ad hoc propaganda tactics of the 1980s didn't go away.

With the investment of billions of dollars over the next two decades, the strategy grew into the permanent conservative media machine that we know today, a vast echo chamber to amplify conservative messages on TV, in newspapers, through magazines, over talk radio, with book publishing and via the internet.

This media machine gives conservatives and Republicans a huge political advantage both during elections and between elections. It has even changed how Americans perceive the world and what information they rely on to make decisions.

<snip>

Thousands of conservative "journalists" are dependent on its perpetuation for their livelihoods. There are mortgages to pay and school tuitions due. It's much easier just to continue doing the job and keeping the assembly lines of propaganda humming, rather than trying to shut the operation down or dramatically change the product.

In that way, the conservative "journalists" are like workers in a factory that's polluting a river which flows through the neighboring countryside. If the pollution is stopped, they fear they will lose their jobs. So it's in their interest to fight environmental controls, keep the factory running and leave it to someone else to clean up the mess.

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/21149/

[depakid]

16. That's the definition most often applied these days

in political contexts.

Thanks for that....

[nicknameless]

15. Original definition:

Theatre organs produced by the Rudolph Wurlitzer Company:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wurlitzer_organ

[Ladyhawk]

19. We had a Wurlitzer Organ in the gym at our college. n/t

[NNN0LHI]

21. NYT n/t

[...of J.Temperance]

23. They're part of The Mighty Wurlitzer? Well I can understand that

What with the Jayson Blair thing and them employing Judy Miller and that Adam Nagorney (sic?) and Elisabeth whatshername, surname begins with a B.

[NAO]

25. The CIA had a project where they bought and influenced the media

"Project Mockingbird" the CIA played the media to influence public opinion and fed false (and sometimes true) info to foreign media to get it leaked back to the US.

[mcscajun]

28. The Real "Mighty Wurlitzer"

http://www.nytos.org/lafayette.htm

No kidding...this is the real deal, complete with full pipes, percussion, and a connected player piano on the Other Side of the Movie Theatre that can be controlled from the Wurlitzer's console. :)

Gets played every Saturday morning at Big Screen Classics.