Maybe Americans aren't stupid after all
Submitted by gjohnsit on Tue, 01/10/2017 - 5:54pm
I'm going to simply list/quote a bunch of polls from the last couple months, and you can decide for yourself who are the dummies.
An even 50 percent of frequent Fox News viewers agreed with a followup question, “Do you trust the political news you are getting?” By comparison, 43 percent of frequent MSNBC viewers and just 33 percent of those who mostly watch CNN said they trust their political news...
In April, Bernie Sanders supporters protested outside of CNN’s offices in Hollywood, claiming the network’s reporters ignored their candidate. In October, CNN cut ties with frequent contributor-turned-interim Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile after WikiLeaks’ archive of Hillary Clinton’s emails revealed Brazile gave Clinton advance notice of debate questions.
Since the election, CNN has been quick to embrace President-elect Trump. On Dec. 2, CNN reporter Cristina Alesci praised Trump’s advisory board of wealthy CEOs, calling it a “historic” gathering.
Who do you believe America?
— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) January 6, 2017
Even before the Putin surprise, however, few Americans trusted the honesty of their elections. A Gallup poll two weeks before Election Day found that only one-third of Americans (35 percent) were “very confident” that their vote would be counted accurately. Even worse, when people around the world were asked how confident they were in the honesty of their elections, Gallup found that this year the United States ranked 90th out of 112 countries.
Only one-third of Americans think Russia influenced the presidential election, according to a Politico/Morning Consult poll released Tuesday.
Thirty-two percent said Russia influenced the election's results, while 44 percent said it didn't, and 24 percent said they were unsure or had no opinion.
A poll by the Economist indicated Wednesday only 29 percent of Americans want to see National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden prosecuted for stealing secrets, and 30 percent would support pardoning him....
The Economist poll is just the latest in a series. An online Denver Post poll in September indicated 53 percent of respondents supported a pardon. A similar poll by Heavy.com put those favoring a pardon at 86.14 percent.
Comments
Nailed it
A very well written piece about our so-called newspaper of record.
HOW THE TIMES FAILED YOU
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
My favourite part about two old frauds who need to STFU
and go away.
SNIP FROM Daily Caller article buried as a link in OP's original post
In September 2014, Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen noted that the bottom 20 percent of America’s households has a median net worth of only $6,400, according to USA Today.
Thus Krugman, who has long criticized substantial wealth inequalities in the United States, has a net worth that is over 39,000 percent of the net worth of the poorest quintile of Americans.
The $225,000 Krugman receives from taxpayer-funded CUNY is 312 percent more than the $54,620 average salary of a plumber in the United States, 453 percent more than the $40,620 salary of an average locksmith and 780 percent higher than the salary of a typical baker. (Figures come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.)
Krugman’s financial situation is somewhat similar to — though far better than — the one in which ultra-progressive economist Robert Reich has found himself. Reich (who is actually just a mere law school graduate) raked in an impressive income of $242,613 from the taxpayer-funded University of California. Berkeley in 2013 despite teaching just a single course during one semester of the school year. (RELATED: Robert Reich Sticks It To Poor People With $242,613 Salary For Teaching ONE CLASS This Semester)
http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/01/paul-krugman-sticks-it-to-poor-people-...
END OF CLIP FROM DAILY CALLER
Both these guys need to go into the Old Frauds Trickle Down Retirement Home.
I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks
Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa
The Daily Caller?
Really?
" In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry, and is generally considered to have been a bad move. -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy "
I'd be pleased if Americans were
far more more skeptical than they are, of all the "news" that is presented to them -- no matter who presents it, or why. "News" does not equal truth, regardless of how professionally or how widely it is dispersed.
Mediated reality, in whatever form or for whatever purpose it is produced, is not the same thing as actual, physical reality. Of course actual reality needs to be filtered, simply in order for it to be communicated -- this being the primary function of language itself. But in "consuming" or "internalizing" mass-media-filtered narratives, it would behoove us to become aware that what we are perceiving is not in fact, anything actual. It is rather a manufactured construct, or product, or interpretation of events, that has been created for some specific purpose or other.
If we could recognize the artificial nature of all news products, it would lessen the risk of being seriously misled by any of them. As it is, people end up at loggerheads with one another purely because their respective mediated versions of reality contradict one another.
native
The Times is still promoting the Russians did it
via an opinion piece. Fake news, anyone?
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I probably should have warned everyone
that the op-ed published by the Times was written by none other than Robby Mook.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
A possible scenario:
I proposed this scenario when the Patriot Act was passed, but back then I thought the Republicans would be the villains.
President Obama utilizes the powers in the Patriot Act to declare that Trump, all the (R) House and all the (R) Senate part of a Russian terrorist conspiracy to overthrow the government, arrests them all and sends them to Guantanamo for "interrogation". Possibly Trump is killed resisting arrest during a shoot out with his guards.
The remaining House elects Nancy Pelosi as Speaker and declares that their being no candidate with 270 EV's the House will elect voting by state. Trump being ineligible due to (take your pick) being under felony arrest or dead. Voting by state (with all Republicans absent), the House elects Hillary Clinton as President and the Senate elects Tim Kaine as vice-President.
To prevent the states from appointing new Representatives and Senators to replace the arrested, both Houses of Congress go on extended recess.
Clinton makes recess appointments for every office and rules unopposed. If the SCOTUS gets hinky, they are "revealed" to be part of the Russian conspiracy also.
This works even better than the original "every Democrat is a Muslim terrorist conspirator" since the Republican=Russian agent hypothesis has been bleated out by the MSM, particularly CNN.
All perfectly legal, assuming the Patriot Act is legal and anyone who says it is not must be a Russian agent.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Thu, 01/12/2017 - 11:55am —
Thu, 01/12/2017 - 11:55am — The Voice In th...
They have been taking
a page fromThe Totally Insane Dictator's Handbook, aren't they? Thanks for providing tonight's nightmare... I could see either side trying this and the American people standing still for it because Simon Says he made it 'legal' by saying so.The US Constitution lays out the principles on which the country's governance/legal system is to be run - and the country and government belong to The People, who are all entitled to equal treatment, rights and opportunity, with no-one 'above the law' .
Public servants at any level are 'empowered' (by powers delegated by The People to office-holders, who must maintain their oath to uphold that Constitution in order to hold/retain such office) in no way to abuse their office, oath, people or country. If they are not serving the public good to the best of their ability - or that ability isn't good enough, as with some ideological pathology creating a bias against the public good - they cannot form part of any legitimate government.
No way could the 'Patriot Act' be legal in any democracy. The only terrorists to justifiably fear in America are members of what's taken over/created by what passes for most of the US government, and they've come to bring a hell. Regime change is clearly needed...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
That's not much different
than the process of the Enabling Act in Germany in 1933. They could certainly try it, but unlike the German scenario, the Dems lack strong popular support, and the backing of the military. I would imagine that the US military may counter-coup in such a scenario.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Could be.
And then they could be called out for coup. It's like the end of the Roman Republic. They continued the form and not the substance. Augustus claimed to be just another Senator, publicly.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Ironically we feared Bush II would stage a coup in 2009,
but it turned out he was too lazy, and just wanted to get back to being a celebrity for doing absolutely nothing.
There's more value in being a former President these days, than in actually holding office.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Mrs. B has taken to getting a physical copy of the NYT delivered
I look at the front page and think that there needs to be a 'Read with a Pound of Salt' disclaimer.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
I know us c99ers are a teeny minority
but does ANYONE here trust MSM?
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
there are of course 2 possible answers
NO and HELL NO.
pretty sure that covers it.
With their hearts they turned to each others heart for refuge
In troubled years that came before the deluge
*Jackson Browne, 1974, Before the Deluge https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SX-HFcSIoU
Unfortunately my friends in CA seem to.
They are older intellectuals and still trust the NYT. So they are all nervous wrecks.
I have such a cadre of friends.
They are deep worshippers of the NYT. I once felt that way, but reality… happened.
Anyway, these are well connected friends, although they were friends before they were really well connected. It was comfortable and casual.
Now that they have developed special needs, I treat them with extra kindness.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
The extra kindness strategy
for that particular special need is a good one. I will have to adopt it instead of ranting.
DC native and I learned to read the WAPO.
It's such a miserable rag now that I barely recognize it. I only read the arts/enertainment sections of the NYT. Rec'd!!
Inner and Outer Space: the Final Frontiers.
Brainwashing prevention tip:
Mute the msm and turn on the closed captions. Then put on some music and do stuff as a refuge for your eyes.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Not at all.
So sad, I read the Times and Post for years. Now, they have become nothing but propaganda rags. Maybe they always were? It's just too obvious anymore.
Did you ever?
The US media has ALWAYS been this way - check the news reports from US, Iraq, Ireland during Gulf War I for example. But growing up in Ireland, they've always been obviously corrupt.
I do.
I trust them to deceive, obfuscate and outright lie in service of their masters.
Let's see, people who watch Fox news, MSNBC,
CNN and the like know it's dishonest but watch it anyway? I don't know if that's stupid or something else.
something else = light entertainment
Like the Daily Show, but with less talent.
From talking to some of those type people, I think that between
'stupid' and 'something else' that it's pretty safe to say that the correct choice is NOT 'something else'.
I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks
Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa
I wonder if these numbers are like congressional approvals.
Congress has a 10% approval rate and yet people will endlessly vote for their incumbent. 50% of Fox News viewers don't trust MSM, but may not lump Fox News in with the rest of them.
Great point.
and I think even the ones who DO watch the MSM would say they don't trust it, but they watch or read it anyway. And that's where the insidious nature of propaganda comes into play. I read the headlines in the NYT every day to check on the daily does of propaganda. That said, there are moments when even I am taken in by some of them, even if its just for a moment. Now I know better than to believe those headlines, but they do induce an emotional response. And it does influence people. And I totally agree that most Faux Noise viewers don't view that as MSM but many of those are completely lost at this point anyway. The ones who sort of worry me are the ones who say they don't trust it but watch it anyway - a few of my friends qualify for that.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Question for gjohnsit
Hi
I linked Alagator Ed's article about Hillary running for mayor of Gothan
Got lots of negative comments but not enough to get me a skull and crossbones
One of the comments noted that you had a skull and crossbones and they were trying to find out when it happened
The fact that DK/TOP kicked you off is but another example of how far they have fallen.
It seems that they, like the dem establishment, are hoping for miracle that somehow the Trump inauguration will not happen
They are sticking to their failed policies
AT A TIME WHEN THE COUNTRY AND THE EARTH ARE IN THE BALANCE
and the dems can't get organized
Chris Hedges was on this evening "On Contact" Don't know exactly when the weekly show is run, but it is at the top of the page here.
https://www.rt.com/shows/on-contact/
He interviewed the organizer who I had not noticed before, Michael Gecan. His point was that you have to build organizations. He has been doing it for decades.
He commented on the demonstrations in WI when they got 80, 60, 90K people and he said now that you did that, you need to organize all kinds of groups and in neighborhoods. I don't think that was done and still the money and the rigged press continue to deliver WI to the republicans.
My hope is that the election of Trump will scare the shit out of people
My wife was at a meeting this evening and a young woman with 2 young kids and a husband retired from the military -- she is literally concerned that Trump will start a nuclear war so she is taking her kids out so they can have a few good experiences before the war in a couple of years.
My take is that it is an outside chance that we can get our country back and expect things to get worse and expect crackdown on protesters with some Water Protectors murdered, but I have not considered a nuclear war.
Wandered off a little ....
I'm on permanent TO
It happened here, when I said they were acting like peasants.
I just checked...
your profile over there, it shows you as bojoed.
I'm happy
he got bojoed.
I couldn't rec him anymore as of last week.
We're off to a great new year.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
I am not happy for that
One more step to TOP turning into to one big echo chamber, wherein they reassure themselves that all is well with the remains of the Democratic party, and Bernie and his supporters are merely a rude inconvenience. Never mind they got beat by a guy who was universally condemned as unfit for office, and that they are an endangered species in most statehouses.
You should be happy for that.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
That ship sailed a long time ago
Kos officially turned it into a Clinton fan club when he decreed that everyone had to bow down to Her Inevitableness.
They don't, however, think that Bernie and his supporters are merely a rude inconvenience. They believe we are responsible for the failure of Her Inevitableness to receive her rightful place and enjoy her coronation as planned. They don't care and won't even think about why she lost or why democrats have been losing ground election after election. Fingers in ears, la-la-la-la.
I'm not happy anyone got banned from there, but I sure don't understand why people keep bothering to post over there only to get shouted down, called names, and finally booted out. Seems like a big waste of time to me. Looking in once in a while, to observe the ongoing slow-motion train wreck, might be interesting from a sociological point of view perhaps, but engaging with them is an exercise in futility.
Just checked OT, still NR, not BOJOed.
I felt rejected. But now Allstate rejected renewing my car insurance. So screw them. I changed my Homeowner's, Car and Umbrella to another company. And removed the spy device they sent me to check my driving habits, and no doubt GPS tag my auto. I have received 2 emails indicating my device is not plugged in, I have 9 more DAYS with Allstate.
OTOH, I just began a wire transfer of repatriation funds, round 2 from HSBC.ca First went within 24 hours to my credit union. They will love me.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
Looks to now be bojoed. Meh. All those recs, too.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Allstate Does Not Pay
A cautionary tale of two drivers.
One fine day my cousin driving a small pickup was involved in a collision with a small sedan. Both drivers were insured by Allstate. After way too much time waiting for Allstate to do its job my cousin walked to the body shop and proceeded to rip the damaged front parts from his vehicle.
He then drove the now NOT-street-legal wreck back to his house. Once there he proceeded to fabricate the necessary parts to make it "safe" to drive. It looked rather like a military jeep in front. In the back he constructed a rather large "Allstate Does Not Pay" sandwich board.
He drove this contraption around for a few weeks before, one morning, he discovered his sign had been stolen.
Bobby was never known for being subtle. Unfortunately, he was never known for being particularly effective. But we all agreed, life with him was always "interesting", and he always spoke his mind.
WTF was wrong with Kos's brain? Her Heinous lost for the VERY
same reasons that he trashed her in the primaries against Obama eight years ago. Did he really think he could recycle her one more time?
IMHO she bought him lock stock and barrel
Money can buy anything nowadays. Or anybody. Well, almost anybody.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
TOP was turned into a big
TOP was turned into a big echo chamber because it was once an influential site, valued by many for the great writing (both in the diaries and commentary), and as a source of political information and discussion. It's long since made itself irrelevant as a propaganda site, thwarting the intention to disinform the better-informed who won't fall for the sort of crap spewed out by the propaganda mills.
The Diaspora thrives.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Marks of Honor
We should honor our fighting veterans. Perhaps we need honor badges and medals or something.
Maybe those receiving the high honor of being kicked the hell off TOP should have a special honorary medal next to their user name. Even those chased out during the Ides of March purge could have something akin to a military campaign insignia placed next to their user name. These would be C99P Marks of Honor.
I would have preferred
to have deleted another 4-500 diaries first, but at least I went out the way I wanted to - with one of my better diaries full of truth on the wreck'd list (like greywolf did).
It's a shame that the GOS is now a lost cause, but then the game was always rigged.
It's a shame that all my efforts there have gone to waste, but then all the best causes are lost causes.
Your efforts have not gone to waste one bit.
The people who actually read your diaries with thorough and critical minds are all here. Or at least the vast majority of them have left TOP.
But you have to stop linking to GOS without warning. I don't want them having my clicks. I've followed your links many times and end up commenting but I want their traffic to approach zero as soon as possible.
Possible for others
still hiding in the woodwork to at least copy and send your posts to you, or would that be of no interest?
Site owner seems to have a death grip on the "we keep a complete archive of all posts" idea.
This is the first time
I have heard of someone being bojo'd for deleting the diaries that he wrote.
What an evil little site.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
What a puerile petty asshole Markos is.
Whoever's reporting back to them--and apparently somebody from TOP comes here so they can report back to Markos et al what we're saying about them--may quote me.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Over and over
Markos comes off as being a very thin skinned and juvenile ass hole. He has been destroying his own site for some time now. It was his play pen, not his primary income source. So maybe he is getting tired of it and letting his shitty personality show full blown.
I have never seen any site bojo one of its best and most prolific writers willy nilly.
And yeah, I do not care who sees this either. They have had folks reading us from way back. It must mean that they are scared and/or jealous of us. As far as I am concerned, let them be so. It does not bother me.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Oops, that means the full extraction of previous diaries
was not completed. So sorry. Really was hoping you could get them all.
You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again you did not know. ~ William Wiberforce
If you can donate, please! POP Money is available for bank-to-bank transfers. Email JtC to make a monthly donation.
The diaries can still be copied...
by using this great little browser extension, Easy Copy.
All you need to do is open the diary page and highlight all the text, videos, images, everything and then right click and select the "copy HTML source" menu line and it will lift all of the HTML code from the page. All of it, images, video, everything. And then it's a simple matter of pasting the copied code into the text editor here, and then "Publish". Or the code can be saved to a text editor on your computer and can be used later.
The whole operation can be done in a matter of minutes.
Thanks JtC. Good to know. I have a few I'd like to get out.
My gut is telling me two things:
Kos may pull the plug at some point, and then we really will have a hard time getting our writing out.
Trump may say "I quit" if things get too tough for him. He really didn't sign up for all the crappola.
You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again you did not know. ~ William Wiberforce
If you can donate, please! POP Money is available for bank-to-bank transfers. Email JtC to make a monthly donation.
If Trump quits, I hope he fires Pence first :-)
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
I never wrote diaries over at TOP. I'm sure that's why I'm
not bojo'ed. I will wander over there cos of:
).
**bobswern and MB
**environmental diaries
**animal/personal diaries (I'm a big dog person
Inner and Outer Space: the Final Frontiers.
Oh, you can get TO'd
for comments. I've qualified twice. And likely bojo'd.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
I used to be good at seeing Big (but not-big) Picture
the Money statement from you
"It seems that they, like the dem establishment, are hoping for miracle that somehow the Trump inauguration will not happen"
Thus the 20th invasion of Dc and the 21st(?) Women's March on DC and elsewhere.. I have heard rumors (unsubstantiated)
that Soros is funding the buses. I will not be going, so no opinion.
Somehow as I see this an equivalent of half the kids not getting dinner because of perceptions of parents.
There may be blood. And then things get more strange. Dystopian novels read well as survival manuals recently.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
I consider myself
the most ignorant person in the world. Really.
There is so much I don't know.
I never considered americans at large to be stupid.
Ignorant is another question.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
Ignorance is only a problem when it's willful...
And the Establishment Dems (and their worshipers) seem determined to maintain a state of willful ignorance to the state of their party and the popularity of it's positions.
You can forgive ignorance, but for those that choose to embrace it rather than risk puncturing their nice comfy bubble I have nothing but scorn and disdain...
They are not just a part of the problem, they are the problem.
Screw every last one of the cowards that are too afraid to face the reality of their actions and decisions.
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
And sadly, willful ignorance
is something Americans are really exceptional at.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Indeed. It may be the last bastions of American Exceptionalism®
That and projection...
"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me
People living busy. And distracted by that.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
I've noticed in the midst of all this chaos
…that Americans have been surprising me this past year. I've been looking at a lot of polls, but I also make a habit of looking at the comments attached to any essay I read. After years of my own people studies in the US, I definitely saw an uptick in the number of aware people among Americans this past year — people with really astute opinions where I would not expect to find them. Some armed with facts they could cite. Many others noticed this, I believe.
This is true in the real life world, as well. There were random encounters during 2016, in places like Home Depot, that I would have not thought possible. People were really on the ball, many more than I would have thought. They were spontaneously volunteering their political impressions, and I got the idea that it was new to them to do so. It was nice. I attribut it to Bernie power. As the year went on and Election Day approached, there was less and less of that.
I may as well add that people out in the world don't seem to talk at all since the election. That's my personal impression, of course. There's a lot of free-floating anxiety. The rhetorical narratives that now pass for news could be the cause of that. After the Party conventions last summer, I thought the propaganda became psychologically abusive. Ethical boundaries became fuzzy. Americans were terrorized by their own election. Even small children now have fears that are political in nature. They hear things….
I do not think that the situation will settle down. Something essential to society has apparently been damaged beyond repair.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Hi Pluto,
I would like to endorse your personal impressions, and add that I also regret, that “something essential to society has apparently been damaged beyond repair.” I still have some hope that we reach what is not beyond repair, before it’s all in vain.
That is a change
For some reason it seemed like there was a period over the last decade or 3 where it wasn't so socially acceptable to have a strong interest in politics and the world. Maybe I was hallucinating.
Beware the bullshit factories.
You are nudging around the edges of something
that I think needs some more fleshing out. You are an astute commentator - I need to give this some thought.
On the other hand, I haven't shopped at Home Depot for a decade or so because their CEO was a rabid right wing nut job. Mostly I shop local, but Lowe's gets my business when I have no local resource.
I also never buy Sketchers shoes, which are manufactured using slave labor in the United States Commonwealth of the Mariana Islands. I learned all about this when the Jack Abramoff stuff was going on but it seems it has all been whitewashed when you do google searches. I remember this well because I learned my own rep, Don Young, was a frequent visitor to these islands where women were not only forced into prostitution but frequently were subjected to forced abortions. Human trafficking is alive and well and apparently endorsed right here in the American Territories.
Sketchers. Good to know.
I do not buy products made by slave labor in US prisons. Home Depot is not a necessary store, so good point. The first time I had a political encounter was there a year ago, so I mentioned it. I had asked another customer a question about something we were both looking at, and he helped me then fell into a discussion about a political rally he had been to. I responded in a positive way with another question, and we were off to the races. He was excited about political possibilities, and I beheld my first Sanders fan in the real world. I knew immediately he would never vote for Hillary. He was experiencing something she could never give him. Empowerment. I had several such encounters over a six month period. It stopped when Bernie left the race.
In the Fall, even the nice Democrats began a white hot campaign of terror about Donald Trump. It was pure, policy-free, identity-based terror. Hillary's name must have been mentioned, but all the people took away was the stark terror of Trump. No one had the will to talk anymore. All the campaign paraphernalia disappeared. No one talks now.
The fear remains. It's now bigger because so many live on the edge that nationalism doesn't help. It offers no sense of personal security anymore. That's what is broken.
The Democratic base is never coming back again. Maybe fifty years from now they'll come in from the cold, but they've been abused. The trust is gone. That's what I sense.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Empowerment
I posted here several times that Bernie's campaign was about empowering the voters. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, Bernie jumped on the Clinton bandwagon so it appears that the momentum from the Sanders campaign has been stopped.
I do not believe that it has been stopped, only slowed. Social movements are not straight line progressions but are a series of stops and starts. The Sanders campaign was only another iteration of empowering people that has started with Occupy and will continue forward.
We may not see it now, but I believe it is happening. The rejection of Clinton was simply a step in people seeking to free themselves from the economic serfdom they have been experiencing. It may not have been understandable to those who are partisans, but it was definitely an act of rebellion against the status quo.
I do have faith in the people to see just how badly they have been deceived and to take back the power over their own lives.
Thank you for this comment.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I pretty much have the same faith:
This makes sense. We know this has played out this way since the beginning of more complex societies — for the past 5,000 years, or so. It's human nature.
But never has a population been subjected to the most insidious and constant and personally destructive government-sponsored propaganda — like Americans have. The propaganda drum is pounded 24 hours a day and broadcast into their brains using every imaginable input device. It began around the time of McCarthy, and never stopped. The first thing to go was the people's moral compass. Then empathy. Situational ethics and nationalistic or blatant personal bias took charge of the people's minds. They forgot that a nation is essentially a commune and began defiling their own nest.
Human nature has been effectively neutralized and disengaged from the analytical process of making making policies. In fact, human nature is now largely criminalized in the US.
So, while I share the belief that the solution is there for the people to see, I am not confident that it will possible synaptically. The brain damage may be too great.
I cannot think of a way to stop the propaganda. Perhaps if a system of mental hygiene were quickly developed and handed out in booklet form, that might work. Afterall, in 1890 or so, people were told that there were invisible animals on their hands and they needed to wash them all the time, especially midwives. Even though they couldn't see the microbes, people all over the world started washing their hands. Within 10 years, the human lifespan doubled.
So, propaganda is like those invisible microbes. People just have to keep their minds clear of them and learn to guard against them. A universal self-evaluation checklist would be invaluable. The majority of mental illness can be prevented. Humans should probably start doing that.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
I hope you repeat-post that
I hope you repeat-post that comment and comparison all over the universe. It's brilliant, basic and offers a chance for people to try to take back their perception of 'the real' from the propagandists.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Such excellent observations, Pluto.
The whole thread here could really be developed into a powerful essay.
From your personal observations of interactions with folks who have awakened n the past year (no doubt in large part because of Bernie, but also an increasingly more discerning citizenry not fooled by the fakeness of "fake news") but are now in stunned silence as Drumpf actually takes center stage for real, to the linchpin of propaganda and the history of as perhaps the strongest force impeding the working and middle class citizenry of the world from coalescing into a global movement of the 99%.
Very astute and edifying, as always.
Thanks, friend.
"If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC"
- Kurt Vonnegut
Chilling, crazy, that anti-septic practice increased lifespan
Like removing well-spigots. But that is being repeated, or attempted , at shutting off pipelines to keep water Protected. Echoes from the past. Or memes (hate that, but we are still in meme-land) eventually coming back to a Biblical Ten Commandments. Some of which seem to be on a negotiating scale, but Golden Rule and No Murder works for me. Except for Pro-life, my bad feelings grow stronger. #Pizzagate is real. I am convinced.
Alarm (moderate) about teenage runaways, some of whom may have been sex-trafficked away, should be on high alert. Any poorer countries have families unable to care for all their children. My grandparents in Indiana came from farm families of 8-10 offspring. Some died young. Infectious diseases, etc.
My mother's parents were born in the 1880's to Hoosier farm families. The big uplift at the time was discovery of natural gas, close-in drilling. One set of my ggparents had outside illumination 24/7 at the farm compound. That gas discovery literally illuminated processes like glass-making, tin-rolling. Manufactories. At the farm, all gone in 20 years.
I think both my grandparents made it through at least 8th grade. Grandmother Floy was a housewife for my mother, required on her relatives to give much outside-the-house attention. Very clear agoraphobic to me now. My mother never caught that, and she was college-educated. But adrift. I think. I cannot go on as to how I tear out my family dynamics to make it work: unlikely. And at the same time, quite usual. Helps me to try to write this out, i read the obit that I wrote in the Louisville paper. I wrote it 6 moths ago. Short and OK. Good feelings. If such is possible now.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
We are a haunted people.
And the haunting is fairly contagious. Airborne, perhaps. There are many real world events and details that I can weave into what I write here, but I am reluctant to do that. It adds to the background hum of desperation without lifting anyone out. It adds to the fragility of the human psyche.
A psychologist once described the condition this way: The mind is like a desk, surrounded by filing cabinets that we design and build during our lifetimes. Every day we experience things. At the end of the day or event, we file the experiences that are left on the desk into a drawer of like-things. Sometimes, when we are very young or when the experience is traumatic or when it makes no sense to us, we do not or cannot create a place to file it and we leave it on the desk.
Over time, the desk can get cluttered. These un-filed things are always in plain sight. Unresolved. Some people stop filing anything just to avoid the discomfort. Others read or experience the thing-not-filed over and over every day. Disorders emerge, like phobias or compulsiveness or paranoia, or sociopathy. Generally, we develop workarounds and sometimes manage to untangle the mess.
Cultures have a shared, or collective, mind like that. I call it the "Cloud" or "Cloud-think." Americans have a particular problem with their Cloud. I have a hunch it started with the Great Genocide of America, but in looking at modern history, I can also pinpoint a critical mass that occurred during Vietnam, with the slaughter of a generation of young American men for a lie. The ensuing psychic crisis opened a door to denial in the Cloud, and that's where you'll find most Americans today.
This psychological issue is unique to Americans, and evolved as it did in the geographical isolation the US provides. Propaganda works astonishingly well on this population, which I consider fragile and isolated. They are easily beset by the monsters they groom to be their leaders. The monsters quickly learn to divide them into two equally polarized parts. The ball of plasma magnetically suspended between the two opposing parts (or parties) is their complex system of government.
I bring this up because the people reflect this macrocosm in their own inner workings. It's malware from the Cloud and I believe being mindful of it can help heal individuals and protect them. Apart from that, I don't know how to fix it. No doubt the issues laying on the big desk in the Cloud need to be redressed and filed away, but that's an idea whose time has not yet come.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
what a great comment
and
This is excellently expressed. I can relate. Having seen phobias, compulsiveness and paranoia developing, but not being able to understand really where they came from, aggravated through cross-cultural non-understanding. I hope you are right that being aware of the "Malware"in the cloud can help and heal and protect. I have seen that not happening despite a degree of awareness. It's very difficult to "put things behind you and file them away". I am amazed how much of what you describe has been happening during the last thirty-five years to people relatively close to me.
There's a story that Elvis Presley
shot out his television with a pistol one time. I think it would be wonderful for all of America's patriotic gun owners follow his example.
native
I'm hearing lots of talk
in many places I frequent. People are upset about Herr Drumpf and are being vocal about it. What I overhear confirms your point that "something essential to society" has been damaged, but I ask, "can it be repaired?"
Perhaps this election got many more people's attention and the fact that they have NOT been paying attention and now they have concluded they WILL start paying attention and talking about it to everyone, including their children. Perhaps there will be a push to get civics lessons back in our K-12 education system. I cannot accept the damage is beyond repair. I have to have hope in humanity.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
a found graphic i thought i'd share ;->
fake news outlets.jpg
Missing The Guardian?
I was reading that for a while. Then aborted reading.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
What's left to read? /nt
The Guardian definitely is now a perveyor of false news
Fortunately, there is a web site dedicated to setting the record straight about articles now found on The Guardian. So if you are still interested in viewing The Guardian, I suggest the following site:
Here's how The Guardian changed under its new financing:
I osmosed when I was young
My father, a buyer of knowledge, got the Manchester Guardian Weekly, delivered to our address in Louisville, KY. I am not sure I read it then, high school studies may have interfered. I did read his Ramparts. Also Aviation Weekly. He taught me to be a plane-spotter. Connies were clear. Now I have lost the ability, generation jump and my son is in the aviation industry. He can plane-spot. He also gets to exit Security to go on tarmac, that is his job. Check water contamination in Avgas, check parts supplies for the airline on site. Check mechanics' creds, having somewhat third job done engine rebuilds on the Brazilian version of Canadair. I think he has flown in (at least seen) the landing of the first-off-line 787.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
I guess you need a much larger graphic
to include them all. For example, missing are NBC, NPR, and of course, GOS. I'm sure there are more. I'm not sure about the Guardian.
The polls are encouraging
but I think we still have a way to go. Maybe its like the Churchill quote, Count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else.
churchill's comment
very true, so therefore:
the extremely shocking nature of mr. trump's ascension and the billionaire cronyism of his choices to run the country
will have made a dent in the mentality of the average voter
this is a smack in the face to the electorate, hopefully with consequence
But will the State Department
But will the State Department and Homeland Security allow those potential anti-corporate-party votes to count/be counted, assuming pretend-elections continue in America? This may have been the last chance to vote against both corporate parties and have at least some of it counted...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Reply to: boriscleto: Yeah, really. Got some kind of comment to
counter that article? Does anything there jump out at you as being false? Because I sure can't see anything like that. Should we stick to citing Jeff Bezo's vanity press TWP? Or the equally untrustworthy NYT? (Somebody in question even writes for one of those noted purveyors of crap. What a co-inky-dink.)
Plain fact is both those old tools have decided to go down with the Clintons. To hop on the "THEM DIRTY COMMIES DID IT" is just the pathetic, pandering end to a couple of old guys who's economic theories generally tilt toward 'if Corporate America is okay, everything is right in the world'.
SNIP FROM ARTICLE IN 'THE NATION'
The facts did not fit the professor’s theory. Yet influential voices like Krugman grossly misled the nation’s political debate for a generation. He was the bell cow for a herd of ambitious young academics who mimicked his sharp-tongued style and worshiped at the same shrine of macroeconomics that’s now a shambles.
Krugman hasn’t lost his snide manner (he accuses Senator Sanders of “the luxury of irresponsibility”), and he pretends not to have reversed himself. But here is his white flag:
It’s also true that much of the elite defense of globalization is basically dishonest: false claims of inevitability, scare tactics (protectionism causes depressions!), vastly exaggerated claims for the benefits of trade liberalization and the costs of protection, hand-waving away the large distributional effects that are what standard models actually predict.
After that mouthful of a correction, Krugman turns uncharacteristically modest about his own performance as an economic prognosticator. “I hope, by the way, that I haven’t done any of that,” the professor wrote. His students who know better should respond with spitballs.
https://www.thenation.com/article/paul-krugman-raises-the-white-flag-on-...
END OF ARTICLE
I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks
Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa