Posted on 08/06/2011 9:56:20 AM PDT by Winged Hussar
All citizens in a free society need to understand psychological warfare to protect their property, their freedom, and possibly their lives from tiny self-serving minorities and even lunatic fringe organizations. "Scientists discover tipping point for the spread of ideas" explains how a handful of Nazis could gain control of an advanced, civilized, and educated nation like Germany. "Researchers have found that minority rules; when only ten percent of the public holds a firm opinion, the majority will always follow." Linebarger, however, set the figure at two percent:
The Communists had shown that an organization calling itself a party, actually a quasi-religious hierarchy with strong internal discipline, definite membership, and active organizational components, could control fifty times its own membership. ...such a movement needed to have youth branches, women's organizations, labor sections, clubs of its own, and so on, calling this "mass organization."
The structure of Barack Obama's 2012 campaign bears a certain uncomfortable resemblance to such an organization. Henry Ford's publication of The International Jew, meanwhile, shows just how easily dishonest propaganda can victimize decent, honorable, and intelligent people.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Look at the gay issue...if that’ not proof I don’t know what is.
The real problem is that the Left with its cultural Marxist agenda has a near-monopoly on information fed to the masses. They control academia, to which fools send their kids to be brainwashed, and they control broadcasting, which is where most of the sheeple get their ideas. They are totally responsible for 0bama being in the WH.
Please protect me from people who incessantly spout phrases that include the words “millionaires and billionaires” and “with incomes over $250,000.00”.
Most people just want a good paying job, etc.—a live and let live, so to speak. Others—want to control everybody.
Am I wrong to think obama regime has passed more regulations in one month then Republicans have passed in several years?
For some reason pictures of N. Korea and it’s poor pathetic people keep coming to mind, if this regime stays in power.
- Jeopardy! clue:
- The Associated Press
- Correct Jeopardy! response:
- Who is the man behind the curtain?
The AP invented "objective journalism" as we know it. But if someone calls a wise man "wise," the wise man distances himself from that accolade for fear of being arrogant. In the same way, if someone calls a person who is trying to be objective "objective," the person who is trying to be objective will distance himself from that claim because it is impossible to associate oneself with a claim of actual objectivity and simultaneously to take full account of the reasons why it is impossible to know that one is being objective.
It follows that "objective" journalists aren't even trying be objective. Nor is anyone who agrees that journalism is objective actually trying to be objective - else, they would not risk the association: He is objective, and I agree with him, therefore I am objective.
OTOH there is no conflict between being openly "conservative" and trying to be objective. Being openly conservative entails having the humility to admit that your perspective has a legitimate label which is not the name of a virtue.
"Wisdom" and "objectivity" are virtues, but there are other virtues in the American political context. Consider "liberal" (which only became an euphemism for socialist in the 1920s, according to Safire's New Political Dictionary). "Progressive" (one of the objectives of the Constitution is "To promote the progress of science and useful arts") is another. "Moderate" (a.k.a. "centrist") is a classical virtue like wisdom. I submit that the list of American political virtues is coextensive with the list of euphemisms journalists have applied to socialists.
The great problem of countering propaganda in America is the fact that journalism has been homogenized by the AP. And that the public has been propagandized, for generations, to take for granted that journalism is objective. It is surprisingly difficult to think past that propaganda:
The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing . . .We should turn the question around and ask, "Why would journalists want to be objective?" Not why they would want to be perceived as being objective, which is obvious, but why they would want to undergo the rigors of actually trying - against human nature - to discount their own perspective and risk validating uncongenial viewpoints?It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity,
and they very seldom teach it enough. - Adam SmithThe answer to that question is, for most people, the challenge of competition. "Conservatives" - the label is actually uncongenial to the advocates of liberty who get smeared with it in America - are consistently challenged whenever they make a significant claim. In that environment, there is a real reason to "get your ducks in a row" before making a public statement. Unfortunately for the Republic, the homogenizing influence of wire service journalism means that whatever is convenient/congenial to the journalist as such will never be challenged by anyone else in journalism.
If journalism is simply following the path of its own internal least resistance, why does that result in agreement with socialists and dogged, persistent criticism of any opponent of socialists? Socialism is simply the denigration of anyone who takes responsibility to work to a bottom line. It is the taking for granted of the fruit of all the labors of those who actually work and make decisions in the face of risk. It promotes the critic above "the man in the arena," and criticism is precisely the role of the journalist. There is an inherent synergism between journalists and political socialists.
So, where were the conservative movers and shakers of media, academia, government, etc when all this was taking shape? Don't bother replying with a simplistic answer because I suspect it's as complex as the answer to, "What is God all about?". Maybe not... ;^)
A free society is not in the grips of a one sided propaganda machine.
A free society is not split into two factions - faction 1 are the producer class who are called “the rich”, and under penalty of incarceration must become accountants and document every dollar they possess; the other faction is the parasitic class that has learned how to vote themselves an ever increasing portion of the assets of the producer class.
It was quite obvious to anyone who cared to investigate Obama, that he was an unqualified, indoctrinated Marxist. His past was riddled with unanswered questions.
Yes, we can still print whatever we like, but what matters is what goes out in the mass media, because that is what must voters are tuned in to.
How much longer can this go on?
...the enemies of freedom...criminals.
If you can catch the propagandist in a lie...
...understand that the lie is the weapon used most often by the criminal.
Thanks for the ping/post, c_I_c. Good article and thread. Thanks to all posters. BTTT!
Thanks Winged Hussar.
Protect ourselves? It’s right there in the Second Amendment.
The best part? There’s no “ask questions later” amendment.
Levinson references what I posted here on 7/25: Minority Rules: Scientists Discover Tipping Point for the Spread of Ideas
I feel so honored. ;-)
BTTT
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