Open Thread - Friday, March 11, 2916

Some news, opinion and tunes to start your day.

The New Mastersounds - Monday Meters

The New Mind Control. “Subliminal Stimulation”, Controlling People without Their Knowledge

The internet has spawned subtle forms of influence that can flip elections and manipulate everything we say, think and do

Over the past century, more than a few great writers have expressed concern about humanity’s future. In The Iron Heel(1908), the American writer Jack London pictured a world in which a handful of wealthy corporate titans – the ‘oligarchs’ – kept the masses at bay with a brutal combination of rewards and punishments. Much of humanity lived in virtual slavery, while the fortunate ones were bought off with decent wages that allowed them to live comfortably – but without any real control over their lives.

In We (1924), the brilliant Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin, anticipating the excesses of the emerging Soviet Union, envisioned a world in which people were kept in check through pervasive monitoring. The walls of their homes were made of clear glass, so everything they did could be observed. They were allowed to lower their shades an hour a day to have sex, but both the rendezvous time and the lover had to be registered first with the state.

In Brave New World (1932), the British author Aldous Huxley pictured a near-perfect society in which unhappiness and aggression had been engineered out of humanity through a combination of genetic engineering and psychological conditioning. And in the much darker novel 1984 (1949), Huxley’s compatriot George Orwell described a society in which thought itself was controlled; in Orwell’s world, children were taught to use a simplified form of English called Newspeak in order to assure that they could never express ideas that were dangerous to society.

These are all fictional tales, to be sure, and in each the leaders who held the power used conspicuous forms of control that at least a few people actively resisted and occasionally overcame. But in the non-fiction bestseller The Hidden Persuaders (1957) – recently released in a 50th-anniversary edition – the American journalist Vance Packard described a ‘strange and rather exotic’ type of influence that was rapidly emerging in the United States and that was, in a way, more threatening than the fictional types of control pictured in the novels. According to Packard, US corporate executives and politicians were beginning to use subtle and, in many cases, completely undetectable methods to change people’s thinking, emotions and behaviour based on insights from psychiatry and the social sciences.

The Organized Left and the Death of “Pragmatic” Politics

Shifting political winds are battering the establishment, as the breeze flows to the back of the populists. The left-populist Bernie Sanders didn’t conjure the hurricane but adjusted his sails to it. As the political storm grows apace with rising income inequality, new social attitudes are bringing fresh expectations, transforming politics as we know it.

What seemed impossible yesterday is suddenly necessary. This newfound urgency is testing the establishment, that looks unsteady in the face of Black Lives Matter, 15Now, climate justice, tenants rights, and opposing the public service cuts that devastated Flint Michigan and destroyed public education.

The populist-fueled organizing helped expose the wide gap in the establishment’s politics, whose corporate interests prevent the satisfying of such demands. Bernie recognized this was happening and seized the moment, running on a platform that connected with the emerging mood.

He’s far from perfect, but the Left could learn from Bernie’s approach. This political moment is a precious gift, but to receive it you need an open mind and a change of habit. The thousands of new activists across the country engaging in the above issues are largely being ignored by the organized left — Labor, progressive and even socialist groups, most of whom seem too timid to get their hands dirty organizing with the new movements.

Shocker: WaPo Investigates Itself for Anti-Sanders Bias, Finds There Was None

On Tuesday, FAIR published a straightforward recapping of 16 hours of Washington Post stories that displayed a remarkable run of negative articles about Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. The FAIR post and a corresponding tweet went viral: retweeted thousands of times, shared on Facebook and Reddit thousands more, and written up in TruthDig, The Young Turks, USUncut and the Daily Caller.

Due to this surge of coverage of our coverage of its coverage (yes, media criticism gets somewhat meta), the Washington Post (3/8/16) decided to respond to our criticism, staffing out the unenviable task to The Fix’s Callum Borchers, who gave us:

Has the Washington Post Been Too Hard on Bernie Sanders This Week?

Right off, the framing is inaccurate: The scope wasn’t “this week,” it was a 16-hour period after the Flint, Michigan, debate—and following a weekend in which Sanders won three of four state contests with Hillary Clinton. The do-or-die stakes for Sanders in Michigan couldn’t have been higher, and how one of the most influential newspapers in the United States covered his debate performance and his primary showing was important.


Politics and the Golden Rule

"What I’m not trying to do is just pass legislation. I’m trying to change the face of American politics.”

Pull these words out of the context of “the news” and let them pulse like the heartbeat of the future.

The words are those of Bernie Sanders, of course — engaged last week in a confrontational interview with Chris Matthews. Free college tuition? Matthews loosed his skepticism on the presidential candidate, who pushed back:

“You and I look at the world differently. You look at it inside the Beltway. I’m not an inside the Beltway person.”

“But the people that vote on taxes are inside the Beltway,” Matthews retorted.

“Those people are going to vote the right way when millions of people demand that they vote the right way on this issue. I have no doubt that as president of the Untied Stated I can rally young people and their parents on this issue. . . . As president of the United States, I would have the bully pulpit. What I’m not trying to do is just pass legislation. I’m trying to change the face of American politics.”

DONALD TRUMP, AMERICA’S OWN SILVIO BERLUSCONI

AS A WRITER who has covered Silvio Berlusconi since he became Italy’s prime minister in 1994, it has been difficult not to be overcome with a powerful sense of déjà vu all over again watching the presidential campaign of Donald Trump.

Some of the resemblances are obvious as well as uncanny. Both are billionaires who made their initial fortunes in real estate, whose wealth and playboy lifestyles turned them into celebrities. Both have had ugly divorces and brag of their sexual prowess. Trump notably defended his manhood at the debate last week, while Berlusconi once said, “Life is a matter of perspective: Think of all the women in the world who want to sleep with me but don’t know it.” (This was before Berlusconi began holding “bunga bunga” parties with prostitutes.) They are masters of media manipulation, Berlusconi as Italy’s largest private television owner, Trump as the star of his own reality TV show and creator of the Trump “brand.” Entering politics, both have styled themselves as the ultimate anti-politician — as the super-successful entrepreneur running against gray “professional politicians” who have never met a payroll and are ruining their respective countries.

The strategy worked well for Berlusconi — he won three national elections and served as prime minister for nine years between 1994 and 2011. Will it do the same for Trump?

Mass incarceration in America, explained in 22 maps and charts

America is number one — in incarceration. Over the past several decades, the country has built the largest prison population in the entire world, with the second-highest prison population per capita behind the tiny African country of Seychelles. But how did it get this way? Although it may be easy to blame one specific event, the US's path to incarceration was decades in the making — involving politicians as varied as Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton.

Funk it, with The New Mastersounds.

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stevej's picture

An interesting and unusual way to get the word out about censorship:

Ai Weiwei, Edward Snowden, and Pussy Riot have partnered with AdBlock and Amnesty International on an online campaign to protest censorship. The campaign will launch at 4PM ET today and will only be visible to AdBlock users, with messages from the activists displayed where advertisements would normally be placed.

The global campaign will run throughout the day on March 12th, which is the World Day against Cyber Censorship. It also comes amid heightened concerns over government surveillance, which have been magnified during Apple's ongoing standoff with the FBI over encryption and national security. Amnesty International, a London-based rights group, has joined other privacy advocates in supporting Apple, arguing that allowing the government backdoor access to encrypted communications would threaten free speech and security.

Article

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“To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.” -Voltaire

kharma's picture

Ai Weiwei, Edward Snowden, Pussy Riot, AdBlock and Amnesty International - nice, I hope a lot of people become more aware because of this campaign

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There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams

stevej's picture

Good people and a really important campaign. The Adblock element should give it massive reach.

The fact that it will give the authoritarians heartburn is an added bonus

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“To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.” -Voltaire

shaharazade's picture

I love it teh coalitions that form on the net. I have adbllock the geeks who set my new computer put it on. Sometimes it does weird things to videos and photo so I turn it off. Another reason I like this site no ads and no weird cookies. Yahoo who owns a lot of sites won't let me back on flickr because I don't have a cell phone. When I tried to reregister they asked for my cell number and wouldn't let me on. Fuck em. Interesting combination of orgs and people. Snowden really opened peoples eyes to the spooky NSA. A hero no doubt about. It pisses me off when authoriatarain brainwashed people start with 'He's a traitor.' Same with Julian Assange, the propagandists have really done a number on both these traitorous 'enemies of the state'.

I like Big Al cannot handle what the Obama administration has done to expand our murderous police security state and our endless bloody war on terra. It's one of the reason's I am not a partisan or a Democratic party party member anymore. It's also another reason why I left dkos in spirit and go there less and less.. I have absolutely no desire to argue or deal with people who support and believe these war criminal's and warmongering pols. When Shah or I want to get our daily dose of hate and fear we say I think I'll go over to dkos and see what the idiots are up to. This place has been a boon to my mental health as even though I'll go to dkos it no longer influences my thoughts, it doesn't move me no more and it has become irrelevant to my politics. . Maybe someday I'll even stop going to get my 'two minuets' of daily hate. Here at caucus99 I can hone up and practice practice my thought crimes. they give me the hopies.

Google is another corporate neocon nasty giant. Here's a book review by Julian Assange from the NYT of The New Digital Age written by Google's Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/opinion/sunday/the-banality-of-googles...
The Banality of ‘Don’t Be Evil’

“THE New Digital Age” is a startlingly clear and provocative blueprint for technocratic imperialism, from two of its leading witch doctors, Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen, who construct a new idiom for United States global power in the 21st century. This idiom reflects the ever closer union between the State Department and Silicon Valley, as personified by Mr. Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, and Mr. Cohen, a former adviser to Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Clinton who is now director of Google Ideas..........................

“The New Digital Age” is, beyond anything else, an attempt by Google to position itself as America’s geopolitical visionary — the one company that can answer the question “Where should America go?” It is not surprising that a respectable cast of the world’s most famous warmongers has been trotted out to give its stamp of approval to this enticement to Western soft power. The acknowledgments give pride of place to Henry Kissinger, who along with Tony Blair and the former C.I.A. director Michael Hayden provided advance praise for the book.

A good read. I love the ending

“What Lockheed Martin was to the 20th century,” they tell us, “technology and cybersecurity companies will be to the 21st.” Without even understanding how, they have updated and seamlessly implemented George Orwell’s prophecy. If you want a vision of the future, imagine Washington-backed Google Glasses strapped onto vacant human faces — forever. Zealots of the cult of consumer technology will find little to inspire them here, not that they ever seem to need it. But this is essential reading for anyone caught up in the struggle for the future, in view of one simple imperative: Know your enemy.

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lotlizard's picture

In case there was ever any doubt about what kind of power distribution Google and its owners stand for . . .

http://thenextweb.com/opinion/2016/03/02/uhh-alphabets-eric-schmidt-is-j...

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hecate's picture

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stevej's picture

With all the political stuff it it is easy to forget that they make good music too Smile
I Can't Breathe is a personal favorite

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“To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.” -Voltaire

And I didn't think it was possible but I now have an additional reason to vote for him. The question was "Led Zeppelin or The Rolling Stones"

Bernie without hesitation "The Rolling Stones"

Love it!!! Don't get me wrong Physical Graffiti is on my top ten album list but Exile on Main Street is top 3.

Let it loose, let it loose
Let it all come down!

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jiordan's picture

Finally caught up on all the debates last night (wasn't able to watch any of them in real time) rather than just a few clips here and there, and I have to say, Bernie's debate performance is improving. He still stumbles once in while or misses a chance for a knockout punch, but he's doing much better at holding his own against Clinton.

In other news, the boy pictured stage right busted his lower lip on something last night (no idea what he actually got into, just came back in the house with a busted lip), so today, every time he looks up at me, he seems to be pouting about something. Probably his empty food bowl (he's like a hobbit that way).

Interesting music this morning..I am really expanding my musical horizons lately--thanks NCTim.

Hope everyone is having a great Friday!

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supenau's picture

Good morning. As a note Leipar Destin is asking for reccs, retweets, and FB shares. On another topic, no wonder I love Bernie, politics aside. The Stones are still my all time favorite. My best friend and I were juniors in high school when they came to the Sacramento Auditorium. 3rd row center seats in front of the stage. Of course that was when folks stayed in their seats ( sort of). Never will forget that one, the first of many concerts and artists

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gulfgal98's picture

He has committed an enormous amount of his time and energy to bring them to us and we should share our love for him.

On another note, I was in high school when the Stones came to Clearwater Florida at Jack Russell stadium (baseball field) and I went to see them. Their set was cut short when some of the kids rushed the stage. The folks on the left coast were apparently better behaved than the rowdy teens in Florida. Lol

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

Raggedy Ann's picture

I continue to tip, rec, and make my morning comment in the BNR. He's worked so hard for us, I will not stop supporting him.

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"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

NCTim's picture

The New Mastersounds make it tough to sit still.

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

did johnathan capehart conduct the investigation, by any chance? his partner works for hillary's campaign. just sayin'...

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NCTim's picture

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

kharma's picture

Google is way too powerful. If anyone hasn't tried it yet, DuckDuckGo is an excellent search engine and they don't track you.

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There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams

NCTim's picture

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

duckduckgo(?).

they claim that searches are not tracked.

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detroitmechworks's picture

To judge by the horrible ways the South has continued to influence our policies over the years.

Dividing folks into camps, setting groups against each other, etc.

Hell, I've read historical articles that suggest that the reason Hitler thought he'd get away with it is the world's reactions to American Genocides of the past.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

jiordan's picture

and I live in the south. The mindset of too many here needs some serious bleach.

Isn't Hitler the one who said "no one remembers the Armenians?" when people warned him the world might get angry about the extermination plan? I'm sure America's genocide-with-impunity history also made him shrug off the warnings, I mean, there aren't too many examples better than us, are there?

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detroitmechworks's picture

However, that may be apocryphal as I've never seen the source on it.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

NCTim's picture

Makes me want to move to Benton Harbor or Flint.

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

detroitmechworks's picture

Confederacy was at its heart about rich assholes wanting to keep their power, and for the masses to like it and not have equal say in the vote.

Less of that would have been good for everybody, including the areas the mentality ended up migrating to after the war.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

what day is it? Oh yeah, it's Funk Friday!

Some B-3 goodness, baby!

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NCTim's picture

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

gulfgal98's picture

going to get into dueling music videos. I love it when you do that. Wink

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

NCTim's picture

For the right shift diary.

B3 of 3.

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -

enhydra lutris's picture

I keep c(( open in a tab, so the menu I loaded off of was on the left. Now, I'm trying to get back to it to post some appropriate support and can't get it open because we've maxxed out Johnny's server again. SO, this comment goes over there

cheApproves1

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

'Hasta la Victoria Siempre'

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jiordan's picture

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/03/10/congress...

Seems Hillary's buddies are trying to put some pressure on the email investigation folks to shut it down until after the elections, because, you know, might make her look bad. And the list of people seems to be...superdelegates?

The letter's authors include Senate Intelligence Committee member Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and House Intelligence Committee member Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). Other signatories were: Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Sen. Tom Carper (D-De.), Sen. Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.), Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.)

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gulfgal98's picture

They noted too that the The Hill publication reported last week that an unnamed staffer in the State IG's office had accused his or her superiors of having an "anti-Clinton" bias. In addition to the email review, the State IG also issued a subpoena last fall to the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation, seeking records related to one-time Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Abedin for a time served simultaneously as Clinton's deputy chief of staff at the State Department and also worked for the foundation.

I still think this email investigation may end up with the Clinton Foundation.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

jiordan's picture

It stinks of pay-to-play/influence peddling. I'm gobsmacked that Clinton supporters still brush this off like its no big deal...the suggestion of ties to the Clinton Foundation have been floating around for months and I'm pretty sure they're going to pan out.

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enhydra lutris's picture

has been on my mind a lot during the pst several months. Zeitgeist, I suspect. I take a tonn of polls and a huge amount of the content centers on brands and branding. Given that Packard's book had an extremely illuminating effect on me when I read it in High School in the early sixties, this focus on brands kept bringing the manipulation of peceived reality by marketing, advertising and PR specialists to mind. T

o a large extent I've recently been contemplating electoral politics, for example "how can people vote for Hillary", and coming back to the fact that they aren't. They are voting for Hillary's brand, and cannot get past the illusion of the marketing wallahs and spinmeisters. If you could get people to compare their agenda the the agenda of a mythical candidate x, purely hypothetically, a great many of her supporters would not support candidate x where x was based on Hillary's positions and actions, her behavior, and other elements of the real Hillary. This could maybe be an approach to promoting Bernie, but it is best done one-to-one.

So, with all that going on, I wake up and find today's Ot, and discover therefrom that The Hidden Persuaders is now re-released in a fiftieth anniversary edition. It is about time, as I have advocated that it be required reading for our youth, who, one hopes, would then be inspired to sporadically re-read it.

Zeitgeist.
Thanks, compadre.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

NCTim's picture

to connect the dots back to how DKos is being run.

The amount of marketed BS is extreme and most people do not realize they are being manipulated.

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The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -