Agreed.
There is a "snowball effect" where a tolerance for diversity of opinion has degenerated into "anything goes". This is not just one recent topic, but a handful that go back weeks. Also, it is dangerous when mainstream media sources are denigrated in favor of "alternative media". That is the conservative version of being "politically correct". And to say that conservatives cannot practice "political correctness" is the same as some academics who say that it is impossible for minorities to be racists because they are on the short end of the power structure.
Not all information sources are created equal. And while it is a law of nature that the profession of journalism tends to attract those who have a tendency towards political liberalism (just as the military and law enforcement professions tend to attract the more conservative-minded), it is ridiculous to throw the baby out with the bathwater and then begin to gravitate towards fringe media (internet/newspaper/radio/etc).
If my plumber wants to yammer about how he hates the current occupant of the WhiteHouse, I'd prefer he didn't in my house, but what I care about is that he can fix my broken shower drain, not whether he has his head on straight politically. If I need a lawyer to draw up a contract or a will, I don't care if she is a tree hugger, so long as she does her job well. When I want a job done right, I want a professional. Why should it be different with information?
I don't care that 90% of media professionals are liberal in their private lives. I just want to know that when they are telling me something blew up last night in Iraq and X number of people are dead, that the information is timely and accurate. I can ignore the spin just as I can the plumber or lawyer. "Just the facts ma'am."
It is tempting to hope that an alternative media source is going to uncover the nugget of information that the "lamestream" media ignores (Iran-Contra broke in a small, anti-American Lebanese rag and Lewinsky was revealed by the Inquirer), but the cost is too high. For every nugget of gold you get tons of sewage, and if you use unreliable sources to buttress your arguments, you discredit yourself. Homeruns are a lot more sexy than singles or walks, but getting on base is what is important. Swinging for the rafters all the time will get your batting average in the basement.
"Connecting the dots" does not have a magic shortcut. It is tedious and excruciating and going to sources who promise a hidden scoop is to follow a Pied Piper. I am not trashing all the stations, sites, and papers who are "cutting edge". All I am saying is that tolerance does not require an abandonment of rationality.
When a group of people (a thread, a party, or a nation) adopt a relativistic view of truth, it always ends in disaster. Not all stories/facts/opinions/ideas are created equal. When linking to a site or referencing a source, it is a worthwhile to go back over not just weeks, but months and years to seeing what their "batting average" is. They might have been the first to break a story, but over the years, they may also be peddling lies. Worse than pretending all sources are created equal is to suggest that because most who choose journalism as a profession share opinions contrary to ours, the "professionals" with their reporters around the globe gathering information, editors sifting fact form trash, and columnists who since the founding of our country have enlightened the national debate, should be discarded entirely.
Tinfoil is ok once in a while. 9/11 on 9/10 would have sounded "tinfoily". But it is like declaring a nationwide "orange alert", if you do it every time you see a threat, you defeat the purpose by discrediting yourself. Conventional "lamestream" sources are not sexy, and it is harder to have to take the dots and connect them one by one over time than to buy into fantastical/fanatical theories that purport to pull all the dots together to form a grand picture. But the hare did not beat the tortoise. The tortoise beat the hare.
This has become the "Tinfoil Matrix", not the "Threat Matrix".
Two questions one should ask before posting:
1) Is the source I am using more accurate in reporting facts on their best day than the New York Times is on its worst day? (Over time, do the assertions of an information site/source bear themselves out as truth at a higher rate than the least respected source of conventional news) For a large portion (maybe even a majority) of the sources referenced lately on this thread, the answer is "no". (Reporting what jihadis are mouthing in their media is different in that it comes with the disclaimer that much of it is disinformation, most is unreliable, it has an agenda (more than any liberal here in America), and the sources not only are politically imbalanced (extremely), but exhibit signs of mental imbalance as well.)
2) If I stood up and read my post to a group of my friends and family, would they attempt an "intervention" and seek to have me involuntarily committed to a windowless institution with padded walls and nice doctors with white lab coats?
It, like everything in life, is a balance. Too little of the "cutting edge" and things become dull, narrow-minded, and tunnel-visioned. Too much "cutting edge" and everything falls to pieces.
It's remarkable how little tension (relatively speaking) is present on this thread, but perhaps the reason is that there is such an absence of self-criticism. The "tolerant" environment on this thread (that "anything goes") like appeasement, encourages aggression (against the truth and even sanity).
Like I said, this is not about the last few days, but something that has been developing over weeks if not months. A good thread that was a "market" for trading diverse information has become so cluttered with the bizarre and the extreme that it risks no longer being part of "the market of ideas" and instead becoming the "bizarre bazaar".
Again, I am not directing this at any particular person or topic, but others have remarked in recent days that the thread is going into the ditch. Just making some general observations and (hopefully)constructive criticisms. If I didn't respect the people on here or cared where the thread goes from here, I wouldn't have wasted my time typing this.
My two cents and a good day to all.
I agree that not all sources are created equal.
You make many good points.
My
PERSONAL BIAS, PREFERENCE
IS
to have a MAXIMUM AMOUNT OF INFO and make my own sorting, sifting, analyzing decisions.
My scroll and page down buttons work VERY WELL.
AND,
I have my boss's observations that it was the
VERY FLAKEY, VERY FRINGE organizations, publications, leaflets, posters, pamphlets in prewar Germany which
MOST AND VERY ACCURATELY PREDICTED WHAT HITLER WOULD DO AND WHAT HE WAS AND STOOD FOR.
OF COURSE it's hard to sift through tons of fertilizer and find the swallowed diamond. But it may be crucial to do.
AND THIS IS THE BEST GROUP, perhaps only ongoingly available group OF ALERT PEOPLE, IN MY OBSERVATION, TO DO IT. Those not wanting to do that--ARE MORE THAN WELCOME TO SCROLL ON BY.
I can't tell for sure, but it would appear that no one else on here has had any job related experience sorting through and preparing for library patrons tons and tons of fringe materials. I assure you, this is the best group I've ever come across for giving worthy insights in such a sifting process.
Who knows how crucial even part of this groups' analysis of 'tinfoil' docs will turn out to be.
We did not know until afterward, as this morning's testimony is abundantly showing, how inadequately prepared our defenses of DC and the chain of comman communications were in terms of getting planes in the air with authorization to shoot down hijacked aircraft bent on destroying our White House, Pentegon or Capital. ANY discussion before hand about such, as you note, would have been considered tinfoil by most of the tinfoil 'addicts.'
I don't think a static rule or line would work as to what was kosher or not.
I don't really care how flakey some doc is. I can tell quickly enough in the first few lines whether it's worth my time or not. I prefer the option of making that decision myself.
Even when we are posting in great detail very seriously researched and documented bona fide Al Qaeda or some such docs, MOST OF IT on reflection hours to days later has been RELATIVELY--
CHAFF.
No biggy. Of course that will be true.
On occasion, we come up with nuggets. Occasionally there are insights, counsel, advice data points which are worthy extended pondering and/or some action of use to one's life, family, community, nation. But rarely so to any great degree.
So what. It's still WORTH IT.
It's the nature of life and reality. ANY TOPIC will have tons of chaff.
The 911 hearings have had tons of chaff though supposedly every witness and every question were vitally important at such levels of government.
I realize that tinfoil chaff is more annoying and distasteful to some hereon than other kinds of chaff. But logically, chaff is chaff and nuggets are nuggets regardless of where or what process they come from.
I'm exceedingly comfortable with each poster deciding on their own what's worth posting. All readers have to decide what's worth reading all of whether it's obviously Al Qaeda connected or not.
By it's nature, this thread and group MUST CAST A WIDE NET or else the whole effort is a sham. We MUST cast a wide enough net that we avoid missing clues to the next 911 . . . or to avoid missing clues to what the Jihadi's would do THE HOURS AND WEEKS FOLLOWING
THE NEXT 911
OR THE NEXT NATURAL DISASTER.
They clearly are intent on racheting things up to where they are inflicting disaster after disaster on us week after week.
That's a pretty broad set of boundaries, set of contingencies.
Sometimes these things need to be said and you said it very well. Worth more than two cents in my opinion.
ROFL! Just one post?? What if we read all ten threads to our friends and family? LOL.
Straight jackets for us all. Great post, as usual.
Hey! I resemble that remark!
Seriously I do not want to turn into tinfoil on TM for my sources will not take me serioius, the media won't take me serious. So maybe we should keep tinfoil to private mail TM'rs? Let's discuss this, k?
I guess I should clarify something. I personaly appreciate those who post and say...There was a big flash and bang near my house last night. I don't even mind a occasional and quick mention of the Aussie Bloke thing..(Like once a week). But I agree that we are not here to debate every facit of such a "Bloke". Then we look really tin foily. Same thing goes for putting up everyones Prophecy predictions. Where does that end and what could possibly be made of it.