Political pornography

bill moyers...

There’s an interesting study out from the University of Michigan about how people don’t want to listen to the facts. Even if they know a fact is authentic, if they know it’s true, but if it offends their—or insults or undermines their belief system, they don’t want to, they don’t accept it; they reject it. That’s one reason, the explanation for the solid support the right-wing and conservative media have. Unless there’s an alternative to Fox News, to Rush Limbaugh—unless there are guys like you [Robert Scheer], Thom Hartmann and Amy Goodman out there, continuing to press the evidence to the contrary, continuing to do forensic journalism, deeply researched journalism—really we’re going to live in that smog of propaganda, sentimentality and frankly, pornography, which has—political pornography has transformed our discourse into an ugly and grotesque version of what should be a good conversation of democracy.

there's a lot of folks that i run across who fall in to the "don't want to listen to the facts" category... i have to say, however, that there's always somebody who surprises me...

this 28 year-old aussie private security company guy who has been helping out at the place i live in kabul is one of those... he only has a high school degree (level of education, as i learned long ago, is FAR from an indicator of intelligence) but his level of intellectual curiosity is remarkable... he knows more about what's going on in the world than a lot of much older, much more highly educated people and, what's more, he has a knack for putting the pieces together, an even rarer ability... it always gives me hope to unexpectedly find somebody like that...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 3 comments

The unrestrained power ... enjoyed by oligarchs is the single greatest political problem the country faces

glenn has a very important post up that captures the essence of what is happening in the u.s. and, indeed, in many places in the world where our super-rich elites are fighting to extend their privileged anhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifd largely unfettered access to power and money at the expense of any notion of the common good and, most nauseatingly, painting themselves as victims in the process...

Billionaire self-pity and the Koch brothers

[...]

I'm not someone who sees the Koch Brothers as some sort of unique threat. I mostly regard them as little more than a symbol of the death of democratic values in the U.S. -- the way in which the possession of vast financial resources is an absolute prerequisite to making any impact on the national political process, and conversely, how those without such resources are politically inconsequential and impotent (short of their fomenting serious social unrest).

[...]

There's no question in my mind that the unrestrained power over the political process and both political parties enjoyed by oligarchs is the single greatest political problem the country faces -- the overarching problem -- but in the scheme of corporate and oligarchical dominance, the Koch Brothers are a small part of that dynamic. Nor do I believe that they're motivated in their political activism by personal profit: for people with a net worth of $20 billion, there are vashttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giftly more efficient ways to convert one's wealth into greater wealth than spending money to influence public policy; I think they're True Believers.

[...]

The political power of America's richest has never been greater, and the level of their responsibility and collective burden has never been less. Meanwhile, for ordinary Americans, the remaining remnants of their financial security and middle class comforts rapidly erodes. It's true that the U.S. Government has little regard for the free market: they intervene constantly in the free market on behalf of the nation's wealthiest and most powerful business interests; it's crony capitalism, corporatism: government run by corporations (or, as Dick Durbin said of the Congress in which he serves: "the banks own the place").

For billionaires to see themselves as the True Victims, to complain that the President and the Government are waging some sort of war against them in the name of radical egalitarianism, is so removed from reality -- universes away -- that's it's hard to put into words. And the fiscal recklessness that the Kochs and their comrades tirelessly point to was a direct by-product of the last decade's rule by the Republican Party which they fund: from unfunded, endless wars to a never-ending expansion of the privatized National Security and Surveillance States to the financial crisis that exploded during the Bush presidency. But whatever else is true, there are many victims of fiscal policy in America: the wealthiest business interests and billionaires like the Koch Brothers are the few who are not among them.

[...]

This strain of delusional self-victimization is not uncommon. One commonly finds those who are the strongest and most powerful convincing themselves that they are the oppressed and the marginalized. Many Americans believe that -- as they invade, bomb and occupy countless Muslim countries -- that they are the ones being victimized by the Muslim world, while many Israelis and their loyalists believe that the nuclear-armed, constantly invading, occupying and bombing nation is the real victim of aggression and militarism in the Middle East.

one of the things i like best about glenn is that he is almost always able to connect the dots... that he can place the koch brothers in the bigger picture of what is happening in the u.s. is invaluable... it's precisely the same thing that noam chomsky does so well and it's precisely that skill, ability and perspective that is in such short supply at a time when we so desperately need it...

being able to put the pieces together not only requires the skill of pattern recognition, it also means the ability to put things in a larger context... picking on the koch brothers without that understanding is only railing at symptoms and not the underlying disease...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

"Tweet, tweet, tweet and then they puke down your throat"

scott ritter on how to get the information we need to function as responsible citizens...



brasscheck tv...

The US has - hands down - the most propagandized population in the world.

Even people in North Korea have a firmer grasp of reality.

Why is this so?

It's the news media. They've mastered the art of reporting nothing and making it seem like it's something.

They're also very creative and convincing first class liars. Kind of like Bush Republicans.

What's the solution?

Scott Ritter has an answer and thanks to the Internet, more and more people in the US are breaking free of the info-lock.

what ritter is really talking about here is how we need to hone our skills in pattern recognition... if we truly want to be informed in this day and age, it is vital that we dedicate ourselves to the acquisition of solid information, information that it is OUR responsibility to make sense out of...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Pattern recognition, conspiracy theory, and the Bush administration

i am so sick and tired of people (like me, for instance) who see larger patterns and look beyond the micro of day-to-day events perenially discounted when the patterns they see emerging are potentially disastrous... the patterns exhibited by the united states during the time i have been an observer (going on 40 years) have been disturbing at best, but the patterns that have emerged since i have been a CLOSE observer (since 1995), and a VERY CLOSE observer (since 2000), are positively frightening...

let me be clear... i see a real difference between conspiracy theorists and those who recognize patterns... conspiracy theorists, i believe, have a profoundly negative and, to be blunt, paranoid worldview... they LOOK for things to be wrong... people with pattern recognition skills, on the other hand, look for things that FIT... they try very hard to make connections, to see how one puzzle piece fits with another...

pattern recognition isn't a very rewarding skill on which to base a career... i know that because i've been attempting to do it all my life without what i would call great success... in organizations, people with pattern recognition skills could be valued for being able to grasp and articulate the reality of the big-picture organizational environment... i say "could" because most organizations, as most societies, live either in a state of ignorance or a state of willful denial about the reality of their dynamics, and those who attempt to describe those dynamics with clarity and accuracy are rarely welcomed by senior management, the very ones who could most benefit from their skills... most often, the organization either marginalizes those people by putting them in positions where they can do "no harm," or by simply grinding them up and spitting them out...

which brings us to the current day, 2007, in the united states... there are a few of us - damn few - who look at the macro pattern of what has been taking place since the coup d'etat was ratified by the 12 december 2000 scotus decision, and see an extremely disturbing picture... a great many of my posts are created precisely to highlight various pieces of that picture... i have learned the hard way that, for those who are not of the pattern recognition persuasion, there is a strong tendency to dismiss our macro descriptions as conspiracy theory... there was a tut-tut, pooh-pooh post in daily kos just the other day that, with barely veiled ridicule, took issue with those waiting for "black helicopters..." well, be that as it may, i still believe the united states is teetering on the edge of a very dark abyss...

rather than attempt to re-visit all of my previous rants and raves on this subject, let me refer you to a current daily kos diary by cskendrick, entitled "Why It's Now or Never, Right Now, For The Republic..." had i the time or the patience, i might have written it myself, albeit in my own inimitable style... it's a bit long, but i strongly recommend you read it in full... it's an excellent summary of precisely where i think we are at today in the united states...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments