Reflections on Human Tendencies towards Self-Delusion

"Okay, so it ain't Bertrand Russell – but whaddya want? I'm a lizard." (adapted from Peter Boyle as The Wizard in Taxi Driver)

I'd like to think the Birther tinfoilers are harmless, what with their delusions and/or their patent frauds and lies. Some are obviously flat-out insane people who cling to delusions because they give meaning to their unhappy, fearful lives, while others are just as obviously going along for the ride for their own dark reasons. "Le coeur à ses raisons que la raison ne connaît pas."

But the numbers, if accurate, are jaw-dropping amongst the Republican Party. "Shameful" is another word we might use. And what about the 7% of Democrats and 13% of Independents who aren't sure Barack Obama ist ein Amerikaner? (At least, those are the numbers I recall from a column this morning -- subject to correction.)

It's fair to say that there have always been people who believe crazy things and that crazy beliefs thrive in numbers. We probably don't need Nietzsche to tell us that a large amount of information-gathering and transmission has a lot to do with establishing community and asserting rank, etc. and not a whole lot to do with a genuine appreciation for truth. So in this sense, there's nothing surprising about foolish people giving vent to their foolish ideas in common and then, on that basis, feeling that they have been engrafted into a community of right-thinking citizens.

Still, this dino finds it hard to shake the feeling that the numbers indicated may be a harbinger of something more sinister – perhaps as dreadful as the approaching end of our long, mostly successful experiment with self-governance. I've long felt that we are in something of a late-Roman-Republic decline, wherein our leaders increasingly apprehend the majority of the citizenry's utter incapacity to think beyond an elementary-school level on any subject, no matter how important or fraught with peril it may be, for us and for others subject to our massive military and economic power. And have we not begun to be cynical about the very possibility of thinking beyond this level? And have our politicians not begun to understand this from the cynical sneer on our collective face whenever someone dares set forth a rational proposal to solve our problems or alleviate our misery? Forms of government die when those who dwell within and by them no longer believe they are worthy of them. We may be reaching that point. I hope not, but the feeling is often with me that we are – it persists in spite of the healthy results of the 2008 election, wherein a clear majority rejected a continuation in power of a party that had obviously compromised our institutions and betrayed our ideals. For that result, at least, I am thankful: there may be a few of Lincoln's "better angels of our nature" hovering about us yet.

Still, it doesn't take a majority of goons to wreak havoc in a community – a relatively small number of crazies who come to work 100% prepared to cause mayhem will do. Would a city be liveable if, say, even 15% of its inhabitants were hell-bent upon causing trouble for the peaceable, sane 85%? I doubt it. I don't see how a republic is sustainable if 30% of its citizens are hopelessly and determinedly misinformed, often disruptive and even potentially violent. We forget that civilization itself – quite aside from democracy or republican self-governance – is a fragile thing, that its strength and perpetuity must not be taken for granted, and that it demands patient cultivation and education if it is to remain viable from one generation to the next. The so-called "birthers" are an ominous piece of evidence that we have in fact forgotten this truth.

HOW ASTROTURFING AND TOWN HALL HOOLIGANISM WILL DESTROY AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

What Rachel Maddow describes is called “astroturfing,” the subject of this hastily prepared post. I say “hasty” because this is an important topic deserving of immediate and sustained discussion in the blogosphere.

The goal of astroturfing is to create the illusion of public opposition to pending legislation or reform. Astroturfing is organized by professional public relations firms financed by corporations, their lobbyists, and trade associations to oppose any legislation that threatens corporate interests. Astroturfing creates the illusion of a popular and spontaneous uprising but, in fact, is a carefully orchestrated and covert operation that utilizes deception, disinformation, scare tactics, fear-mongering, and outright forgery to achieve its goals.

Examples of astroturfing are the recent Tea Bag protests; the “Death to Seniors” campaign designed to sabotage healthcare reform; and the “Birther” movement that seeks to undermine the legitimacy of an elected president.

Astroturfing is sometimes called “stealth” marketing, “viral” marketing, or “ambush” marketing. Cynical and unethical in the extreme, it is specifically banned in the Code of Ethics published by the Public Relations Society of America and the International Association of Business Communicators. However, ethics never bothered former House Majority Leader Dick Armey or the billionaire lobbyists who pay him to sabotage pending legislation and reform.

Recently, astroturfing has taken a more sinister form reminiscent of the violent street tactics that gave rise to the Third Reich. A rightwing organization called Right Principles has published a “political action” memo that shows supporters how to disrupt town hall meetings, harass and heckle members of congress, and shout down and drown the opposition:

"pack the hall... spread out" to make their numbers seem more significant, and to "rock-the-boat early in the Rep's presentation...to yell out and challenge the Rep's statements early ... to rattle him, get him off his prepared script and agenda ... stand up and shout ... "

According to Rachel Maddow, this memo is a prescription for hooliganism and intimidation. Dick Armey’s client list includes major pharmaceutical firms such as Bristol-Myers Squibb, a trade group representing major insurance companies, a front company representing fossil fuel interests, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum (Prime Minister of the UAE), and Freedom Works (the tea bag protest organizers), among others. Astroturfing represents a threat to democracy because it serves the interests of corporations but NOT the interests of citizens and voters, thus undermining the meaning and purpose of elections.

This is my greatest fear: A rabble minority employs stealth and guile to thwart the will of the majority. Better to rule in Hell than serve in a democracy.

Sometimes when I lay awake at night, I think of how our culture pushes the boundaries of taste and decorum further into the wilderness, and wonder about the tipping point beyond which there is no return, like those who cross an abyss and sink forever into tyranny, the point where “the falcon can longer hear the falconer.”

When my daughters were growing up, I taught them this: Freedom and responsibility are two sides of the same coin. Responsibility earns freedom, not the reverse. I am afraid we are reaching a tipping point where we lose both.

Hail Satan!

look, folks!
Right here in River City.
Trouble with a capital "T"
And that rhymes with "P" and that stands for pool!

Yes sir, Crooks and Liars has the story behind all our troubles. Barak Obama is the anti-Christ and "the Bible" proves it, at least it does if you're a demented, ignorant and dishonest idiot. Proof of course, to people who deny reason itself and prefer to believe what they're told by professional liars like World Net Daily, isn't what proof is to the fully rational -- but I digress.

What is or is not in the Bible of course has always been at issue, wars being fought and people being exterminated over such questions and for my part, although I know it's no more an accurate account of real history than the Gilgamesh Epic, I count the Gospel of Luke as a twisted derivative of some other book written by someone who was nowhere near Jesus of Nazareth in time or place or theology.

None the less, there are people who insist that God wrote it although which of the three it might be I don't know. Worse yet; there are people who insist that the book written long after Jesus' life on earth and in a foreign language in a foreign place and selected for the canon by a Roman high priest, predicts that US President, Barak H. Obama is in that nauseatingly idiotic Aristotelian tradition where things create their opposites: the Anti-Christ.

Of course if one doesn't believe there ever was a Christ, whether it be King David or Jesus H. it's a hard sell, but it's a hard pile to peddle if one simply knows a thing or two about certain languages and isn't situationally psychotic ( or a Fundamantalist if you prefer.) There is a word in Hebrew: (בָּרָק‎) usually transliterated as Barak and meaning Lightening. There is a word in Hebrew usually transliterated into English as Bimmah meaning amongst other things a platform from which scripture is read. It's sometimes translated as a High Place or ritual platform or altar.

Now comes the "proof" part. "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven." (Luke 10:18) Put Barak and Bimmah together and you guessed it. QED. Our president is lightening from a high place ( if you leave out his middle name) and the antithesis of the man, whatever that means, who somehow, in some illogical way, was the heir to the throne of Judea.

Of course Luke isn't written in Hebrew or Aramaic but in Greek and the man who wrote Luke was a Greek ( the traditional names weren't assigned to these books until many years later) and so one has to wonder why he was speaking about our President and if somehow he was thinking in a language he didn't understand can we be sure he wasn't writing in code about the Commander of the prophetess Deborah's Biblical army, the late blues man Lightnin' Hopkins or a character from Amos and Andy? There is no way to get from the Greek Astrape to the Swahili/Arabic Barak or even a flash of light from the altar to the kind of Satan that crept into Christianity in the late first century. It's enough like logical progression for the legions of the unwashed however and a great reminder that half of Americans have double digit IQ's and little education.

Mr. Obama was, of course, named for his Kenyan father and in Swahili, a language filled with Arabic borrow words, the word means "blessed" as it indeed does in pure Arabic. Its cognate in Hebrew is Baruch, also a common name amongst the Jews. We see it in both languages used that way: baarak Allaah fiik or baruch ata hashem -- ( Borchu et Adonai in Aramaic as every Bar Mitzvah boy knows) God bless you or blessed is God, respectively.

There is no logical or honest progression through which we can pass Barak Hussein Obama,"blessed and beautiful Obama" as it means, and transform it into the metaphorical source of all evil with his origins in Babylonian and Persian mythology. Indeed one would have to pass it through that source of evil itself and that's just what has been done. What else in the phenomenal world can transform beautiful and blessed into ugliness and evil but the Republican hate machine?

There is no Devil but the devil in Man and no more devilish men than the men of the Republican Party, WorldNetDaily and the Religious right. Think about this when you listen to them crying about "Character assassination" of Sarah Palin. Look upon them and despair. If you're a Christian, think about the people that have made Jesus into a dirty joke and say something about it. If you don't think our government should be based on lies and the product of hate and stupidity wake up and never vote for a Republican again.

Glenn Beck is the Anti-Christ

These are wicked, crazy, frightening people says Glenn Beck and he's right -- absolutely right. Anyone who would broadcast a story that WWW.cars.gov, the site that explains the government's cash-for-clunkers program will trick you into signing away the rights to all the information in your computer is wicked, crazy and frightening.

“They can continue to track you, basically forever, once they’ve tapped into your system … it’s so broad that they can do just about anything.” says Beck's vampiric foil Guilfoyle.

“I know who our czars are now, and this collection of these czars, these are evil people. These are wicked, crazy, frightening people.” replied Beck on his Fox News program.

The show went on to have Jonah Goldberg lie that if you log onto the site with Skype, you're giving them permission to listen to all your phone calls - something their hero Bush did with Fox's blessing.

It's a lie of course, says Kos and I'd like to think that by now someone in the Foxhouse would have bothered to notice that the privacy statement Beck showed us wasn't from Cars.gov at all but from a system registered dealers use to report the sales. you couldn't log into this system if you wanted to. I'd like to think there would be some kind of apology - in fact I'd like to see some kind of criminal prosecution, wouldn't you? I'm sure we won't. I'm sure we will see and hear more and bigger and more outrageous lies and no one will do a damned thing as we slide into ruin.

Poor little Palin, part II

"I continue to be surprised at the vicious attacks on her. I've never seen anything like it"

says John McCain on CNN.com. Of course that's not nearly true or credible and of course "viciousness" is not what distinguishes the many criticisms of Palin from the criticism McCain himself endured; criticism that he handed out and that he observed being handed out to people like John Kerry while standing by saying little or nothing. Indeed the hypocrisy of anyone in any way part of the Republican establishment of the last decade who is still crying about how poor Sarah has been treated is something the like of which I've never seen. What distinguishes complaints about her ethics with accusations that McCain sired an illegitimate, black daughter or that Barak Obama was born in Kenya and is a Marxist who wants to destroy the country, are the facts behind them -- or not behind them.

McCain and his party would very much like you to think that what really sours people like me on candidates like Palin are her daughter's pregnancy or some details of her private life that should be beyond public scrutiny. Indeed the campaign was complaining about such things far in advance of public awareness, making it apparent that they intended to make her an antihero and to run on sympathy rather than on any strong capabilities she might have. Of course any suggestion that anything in a candidate's life should be beyond scrutiny when made by a Republican is so hilarious as to be horrifying while there is ongoing hysteria about things that are not part of Obama's life being treated as controversial by people who know better.

That Palin lied about refusing earmarks, about being opposed to running up debt, is a small matter compared to the accusations of treason she smilingly made againstBarak Obama in her pedantic sing-song tones and nothing said against her suitability compares with Republican accusations against McCain made by the Bush camp. Of course complaining about criticism alone and without reference to the content and the facts of the matter constitutes deliberate misrepresentation. Is it vicious to accusePalin of ethical violations when there are legal proceedings based on formal accusations? Is it vicious to mention misstatements, to mention lifelong dedication to witch hunters and heretic persecutors or other things which are incontestably true?

If so, what then are accusations based on lies and distortions? If so what do we do with a candidate whose entire campaign was run upon such things while she whined about how unfair it was to criticize her at all?

It's rare enough for a governor, even a governor under indictment, to simply walk away from the job without explanation, yet Mr. McCain would like us all to believe that she was forced out by the nefarious and vicious Liberals who just can't stop asking why she did it. It's an insult to the electorate, of course, but no more of an insult than the McCain/Palin campaign was. They've been getting away with insulting and assaulting us for a long time -- because we're stupid, because we're emotionally and tribally driven and too often only informed by those who insult us.

That McCain is still playing the victim game; the poor, suffering and forgotten hero game, doesn't speak well for him. That he's still viciously attacking efforts to fix the problems his party created while offering no other suggestions than the same policies that caused them and the same policies that turned the crash of '29 into the Great Depression, doesn't recommend him either, but his misplaced loyalty that drives him to cover up for the VP candidate who may have cost him the election all by herself certainly suggests self-delusion, a total lack of independence and the kind of situational honesty that makes me so very glad he lost.

WHAT MY BRAND NEW 2010 PRIUS TAUGHT ME ABOUT BLOGGING

My new Prius Hybrid is two months old and I am pleased to report: It performs as advertised. Your eco-friendly Octopus gets 50 miles/gallon on average, about 40% more fuel-efficient than my last car. There is one more benefit I did not anticipate: Fewer traffic violations. That’s right!

According to a recent survey, hybrid drivers get 78% fewer speeding tickets, 75% fewer violations for running lights and stop signs, 82% fewer violations for failing to yield, and zero citations for driving the wrong way down a one-way street. Zero. Zip!

For years, I have been a PhD candidate in the Professor Henry Louis Gates School of Driving, earning myself a perfect grade-point average of four violations per swear word. What I have learned: A beer and a teaching moment can turn careless drivers into instant law-abiding citizens.

All is not perfect, however, in the world of hybrids. Driving one will not dissuade bloggers from posting too much text or replying “me too” in response to a “me too” comment. Furthermore, if you are “recklessly clueless,” chances are your posts will have 400% more reader comments than if you are “cluelessly reckless.”

One caveat - the bipartisan model (pictured above) has been discontinued … Octopus got the last one. However, Toyota has announced a GOP model that will be even more fuel-efficient. It has no engine but two trunks, which means you will have to get out and push.

The sickness unto death

Dealing with the morning e-mail hasn't been a pleasure for a long time and it is certainly getting worse now that Obama is in office. Yesterday was something of a record for Obama Derangement Syndrome messages but remarkably, I got the chance over lunch to confront the jovial fellow who sent me a number of them. I had already sent detailed refutations of all of them and I asked him why he didn't bother to check out the fantastic claims before sending them to his large mailing list -- particularly after I had debunked virtually 100% of what he'd sent me over the last few months.

"I just don't like what this administration is doing,"

said he. Of course I don't either, but I'm sure we're talking about different things.

"Oh well, I've never heard of a N*gger keeping a job for 4 years anyway."

said he with a smile as we parted. I've known the man for years, a retired engineer for GM. You wouldn't think him a stupid man or in any other way unusual. Well anyway, I thought I knew him. What evil lurks in the hearts of men? If the Shadow knew, he'd commit suicide.

Among yesterday's viral outbreak was the story warning me about the "secret" House bill: HR1388 "they don't want you to know about." Shortly afterward the outraged notice that it had just passed (back in January) "behind our backs" and that Obama had added on (what?) a provision providing tens of millions to settle thousands of Hamas terrorists in the US. Of course it wasn't broadcast by the Liberal media, always trying to pull one over on us.

It's a small matter to look up the bill which actually was signed in April and read that it has to do with summer jobs for teens and veterans benefits, but who looks? Not the ODS sufferers.

Then there was the one about the millions and millions and millions "Queen" Michelle was wasting on various repugnant and narcissistic projects.

Next came the one on Henry Louis Gates, whose CV was blended together with W.E.B. DuBois' to show that Gates is a Communist Insurgent bent on a black takeover of the United States and of course the conclusions -- why should we care about his civil rights or the Constitution at all and why does Barak Obama love this man so much?

Then there is the nefarious Page 425 of the Obama health care bill which forces every citizen to undergo forced counseling about the suicide option so as to reduce the surplus population.

The rest of it? Well I have my limits. I deleted it all but I can't delete the feeling that The United States of America cannot survive. Certainly the party that creates this psychotic mythology and refuses to disown it doesn't deserve to survive, but what force can counter this kind of well funded and fanatical evil?

Regulation is bad for business

One of the favorite targets of libertarians and "smaller government" arguments is the FDA. The market should, could and would preserve us from tainted, unsafe and worthless products, just the way it didn't in the 19th century. Perhaps there's some truth to that, but the store window where the idea is sold doesn't contain a display of all the poisoned, sickened and fleeced consumers waiting to be redeemed or resurrected while the market forces grind on in the darkness of unregulated capitalism.

Of course the FDA, or what remains of it after years of Republican misrule can't do much better it seems and the free press that's supposed to be an agent of illumination in a libertarian utopia doesn't care to try. Witness today at CNN.com an article telling us that products widely being sold as steroid free, body-building aids do actually contain dangerous synthetic steroids and can, in several ways, kill you. Thanks CNN.

Of course prominently displayed on the home page is a photo of a grotesquely, steroidal male torso which links to an ad for the very things the FDA is telling people to avoid like the plague they apparently are. "Safe, natural, legal!" Never mind that little liver failure thing.

The solution is clear. We really need to get rid of the FDA and that damned government regulation - bad for business, don't you know.

Angertainment

It's the biggest thing in America and Fox News is the dominant purveyor. Their sole purpose is to select, modify, slant and sometimes create stories to make you angry at people or things selected by their owners and sponsors.

Using animatronic devices like Britt Hume, whose synthetic skin hangs from it's metal underpinnings which in turn no longer have the ability to mimic human facial expressions, Fox sells anger and unlike our automobile industry they can come out with a finished new product in minutes.

The current angertainment opera has to do with President Obama's seemingly hasty and harsh comments about the Cambridge Massachusetts police force. That occurrence has been welded together with another twisted work of fiction in which he has been touring the world "apologizing for America" to come up with the logically contradictory premise that he is "arrogant" and too arrogant to apologize even though he apologizes too much.

The subtext is that the country never has done anything it shouldn't have and we are always perfect because of our military strength and number of privately owned Hummers and that of course is a position broadcasting megawatts of arrogance like some annoying beacon.

Of course that Obama actually has apologized and in addition arranged to mediate between the two contestants goes unnoticed by the corpse-faced Hume and to the Fox Flock who only listen to the Fox product, that never happened and so presto chango, the wimp Obama becomes the arrogant Obama all at the same time. It's all angertainment.

Who cares that self contradictory arguments based on little but manufactured tribal anger are by nature false and in effect are crippling and disuniting our country? It's angertainment and it makes money and it takes power and it feels so good to be part of an angry tribe with an enemy to be attacked!

“The president could have said ‘that was a stupid thing for me to say,’ but he can’t say that for some reason"

said Hume yesterday. It could also be that Obama's actions speak louder than Obama's words and it could also be tragically humorous since he follows the most arrogant president in our history who admitted no fault while dragging us all to ruin and lawlessness. Of course Hume and whoever runs his software never wanted you to be angry at Bush who apologized for nothing. They wanted you to be angry at his critics and they remain far too arrogant to sum up their entire malignant war on truth by saying "that was a stupid thing for me to say."

Fox 2

The call for CNN to fire Lou Dobbs has been spreading, from SPLC to Media Matters and of course The Swash Zone. Although there have been a few encouraging signs, like a memo from CNN President John Klein to Dobbs' staffers saying that:

"It seems this story is dead- because anyone who still is not convinced doesn't really have a legitimate beef."

Dobbs is still far from being dead and far from being fired.

As Greg Sargent writes in Plum Line, Klein's position is that CNN is off the hook since they've already reported the truth on other programs -- and even on Dobbs' show while he was gone. What he's apparently saying is "we report, you decide." As at Fox News, it appears that the technique is to give you some lies, some distortions and some truth - just enough to make the political point of view seem valid -- and then "let you decide." In short it's just fine to broadcast anything, even if proved false, even if it jeopardises the country and aids it's enemies. They don't feel they have to side with honesty at all. You decide. Enquiring minds want to know.

John Klein pals around with terrorists and Lou Dobbs was born in Guatemala and is not a citizen and both are registered agents for North Korea -- I can't be sure they're not, after all. You decide.

In an interview with Klein, Sargent was told the objection to CNN's repeating scurrilous, unfounded lies with respect was all political.

“I understand that people with a partisan point of view from one extreme or another might get annoyed that certain subjects are aired.”

Truth is an extreme position and truth is partisan and so lies should be equally respected. Maybe it's not enough to fire Dobbs. I'm taking advantage of my television's ability to block channels and as of now CNN is outta here. I also think it's worth writing everyone that advertises there.