Posted on 06/12/2006 9:25:54 PM PDT by Reagan Man
Er...this from a "Rabbi"?
Some people believe one achieves greatness by preventing others from achieving greater things than what one can accomplish oneself. That is a viciously false but nonetheless popular belief. The truth is that one achieves greatness by helping others to achieve even greater things than what one could accomplish oneself.
I think the Rabbi makes some very important points, but falls short of the mark. The problem is not the media, per se, but the generation that RUNS the media,and the country.
It's the first generation in American history to ultimately fail of it's promise,in my opinion: the Vietnam generation.
All of it's idealism was blown away with half of JFK's head, and after the death of their media-created hero (if they knew the real JFK, they would have gagged), was let down by the corruption and incompetence in government (as embodied by Johnson and Nixon) and heck, we were all going to be blown to Kingdom Come by all them nukes anyway. When you lose your television-supplied fantasy world, when you lose your ideals, when you can no longer have faith, and you're living under the threat of fallout, why should anything matter anymore?
So nothing was sacred anymore. Military service? A joke (but how many of them feel deep guilt about friends that were lost, and secretly admire their courage for doing something they wouldn't?). Supporting the American government? What for? It's only run by people like our parents and not some God-like figure (a Kennedy) who will mollycoddle us in the manner to which we had become accustomed. Social values? Hey, we're all gonna die in a nuclear holocaust, why shouldn't I get high, get laid and act like a total jerk before it happens?
They lost a winnable war. All that protesting saved not one American, Vietnamese, Cambodian or Laotian life. All that "No Nukes" stuff ensured that nuclear weapons would proliferate (how many nations have them now? Good job, protest generation!). Religion fell by the wayside (unless it was a hip, Godspell-like sorta religion, which stressed the love (i.e. sex) and chucked the morality) and was replaced by a New Ageism (environmentalism), which has no basis in fact or tradition, but which reflects the fears they all had; we'll all freeze to death in a New Ice Age (now we'll all fry to death thanks to Global Warming). Overpopulation will ensure we all starve to death and run out of resources. Even their fears-become-religion let them down when exposed to the realities of rational thought and science. The Age of Aquarius never arrived, depsite their best efforts (how hard can you really be trying when you're hopped up on something, anyway?). You can buy all the Cokes you want, but the world ain't singing in perfect harmony.
If good intentions counted for anything, they should have been gods. However, good intentions took a back seat to self-gratification.
The only accomplishments you can point to? AIDS, rampant drug use, promiscuity, latchkey kids, multiple no-fault divorces, disco, the pet rock, and Jimmy Carter. And the pet rock is questionable.
So much promise, so much talent. All wasted by disillusioned people who had a pretty unrealistic view to begin with.
Our leaders reek with the stench of defeat and selfishness (see John Kerry, John Murtha, Bill and Hilary Clinton, Wesley Clark, Howard Dean, and, sadly, John McCain, just to begin with) that are the prime residue of the 1960's and 70's and the Vietnam War.
Our institutions are likewise permeated by such people; the universities are full of them (and they have tenure!), the corporations are fairly stuffed tot he rafter with them (and they're collecting stock options, just Like Ken Lay), the Congress of the United States which is lousy with them, and finally, the newsrooms where they now hold all the positions of responsibility, and are able to present and craft a view of everything bathed in the light of their own disappointments, their own failures and their own bitterness.
And now, they try to recreate that lost youth in their old age. They refight the Vietnam War in newsrooms and the Halls of Congress, trying to avoid the pain and guilt of self-inflicted defeat by ensuring we NEVER EVER go to war, and if we do, to poison the polical well to such an extent as to get it over with quickly, win,lose or draw. How many commercials a day do you see devoted to Cialis, Viagra, and the problems of vaginal dryness and genital herpes? To this generation, eternal youth is defined as eternal sexual potency, just as it was during the Summer of Love and the Saturday Night Fever era. To these people, freedom doesn't mean anything if it doesn't involve freedom of the genitals. They now expect to be kept alive forever, and to have other people pay for it, with Medicare providing them a steady stream of medications to cure everything from dry eyes to a leaky bladder (even if does come with 73 other side effects, which always include diarrhea, which is fitting, since these folks are mostly full of you-know-what anyway. How perfectly "Brave New World"!). Wars take money to fight, money that could keep Dad supplied with intravenous Viagra and get Mom government-paid-for breast implants for her 65th birthday, dammit!
There's your problem: you have an entire generation trying to sell the "wisdom" they gained (only it was gained in failure, disillusionment, irresponsibility and promiscuity) as what should be the true vision of America; an America where we never defend ourselves, or if we do, we deserve to lose because they did. It relieves them of the guilt they all feel and carry because of their own failures in Vietnam.
An America where they get a do-over.
Of course, some of you will take exception with all of this, and that's fine. I did paint a picture with a rather broad brush, and for those of you who were (and still are) repsonsible folks, I apologize. But you can't say that there aren't an awful lot of people like this out there.
bttt
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It is very transparent to see the Lib media hatred for the troops. Once in a while they push their fake caring for their troops angle stories when it is used as an opportunity to attack the President, but try as hard as they could, their dislike for military and the men and women serving the nation in uniform is plainly evident.
OUTSTANDING stuff, Wombat101! You just started my day off right! I'm, uh, one of those aging boomers. Your piece absolutely hit the hippie on the head; don't worry about the broad brush.
Wanna know how I'm gonna revisit my youth (Vietnam 1971-72)? Courtesy of the Army Reserve, I'm headed for Iraq! And no matter what else I do there, I'm going to shake the hand of every young soldier I see, and thank him/her for keeping us free!
I personally think the ACLU should be destroyed. This socialist group is doing more to ruin this country.
Oh... to have had a BB gun at that point. Just think how fun that would have been.
>>>>Why Do Liberal Media Despise Our Troops?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1320747/posts
George Soros, Media Connections - Bump List
"Why Do Liberal Media Despise Our Troops?"
Because they are a slimy,degenerate,lieing, no good, scum sucking, filthy, stinking, rotten bunch of maggot filth.
Marine Bump!
"I personally think the ACLU should be destroyed. This socialist group is doing more to ruin this country."
Can't disagree with you, but destroy them? Heck,no.
The ACLU, NARAL, NOW, democratic (small 'd' intentional) party, any Kennedy or Clinton, might be a subversive force for evil (or at the very least mischief), but they should remain in place. Why? Because one day, if we work at it, we'll have a country where people will be able to THINK and they'll need constant reminders on how NOT to think, and these people and groups serve that purpose well.
The problem with the people and institutions noted above is not that they are a danger to American society, in the strictest sense, it's the emotional attachment to the reckless militantcy of their youth that is the danger. There is very little of the intellectual to most of their arguments, except in a very superficial way. The good little liberal (and that's a misnomer, if you want to be specific about it, it's Republicans who are the true liberals, in the classical sense of the word) is never expected to act according to reason and logic, he or she (it's usually a she or a male who wishes he was a woman) is just expected to have the right visceral emotional response, when it's required.
That's why most 'liberal' ideas revolve around one of four, easy-to-manipulate emotions: greed, envy, hatred and fear.
Look at every 'liberal' cause there is, and you'll see the same four emotions in the foundation of every 'issue'.
I don't worry about the anti-war crowd because ultimately, Pacifism is street to nowhere. For the Pacifist to get his way, he has to do that which he rails against; use coercive force, either in violent revolution or in the power of the state to enforce his will. Therefore, pacifism is not a viable political system. It is, at best, a smug affectation of those who enjoy freedom, but who cannot be counted upon to actually secure it for themselves.
I don't worry about the 'Flower Power' crowd because they've ultimately failed at everything else they've ever done, so why should this time be any different? I know that evena blind hog occassionally finds an acorn, but the current group of blind hogs (i.e. liberals) is a walking advertizement for birth control, so I hardly pay them any mind.
Very well put!
Private Zachary Kother,Pat Dollard, Lance Corporal Eric Cybulski
A lot of Americans in suits and ties who have never been to Iraq, or who, if they have been here, have stayed in hotels and large camps in the rear, will appear on TV to tell America EXACTLY what is going on in Iraq. (The only interaction I've ever had with an Iraqi hotel was when we blew one up.)
The American Media, by and large, are trying to sway the next two elections to their team. The best way to do this is to damage the administration and the Republican Congress. The best way to do this is to convince the American people that Iraq is a failure. The best way to do that is to declare defeat and force a retreat. Normally, any winning political strategy is fair enough. But to employ a winning domestic political strategy without regard for the consequences to the American people, whose children will be slaughtered at the hands of ascendant Jihadists (among a series of other consequences) is not only wrong, but just plain evil.
The media have, by and large, allied with the Jihadists in the hope that the Jihadists' victory in Iraq will win their party the White House and Congress. The media simply cannot resist the temptation to test their power in the service of a domestic political agenda.
The journalists I've met here have, to a man, all been Democrats, and all have railed against the Bush administration and have, with much hope in their eyes, predicted failure for America in Iraq. They all come here intending to shill for their party, and then they all shill for their party. They give Al Qaeda and the Sunni insurgents hope, they stoke the financial and recruitment fires of the international Jihad Machine.
It's all very simple. They are now, in huge measure, directly responsible for the ongoing death toll of Americans in Iraq. Everyone here in Iraq, the Islamic world at large, and most especially the Jihadist Movement's leadership, follow the American media closely, in order to monitor the American people's headspace, primarily with regard to whether or not we will continue the fight on to the establishment of a successful democratic, capitalistic, and modernized society here, or whether we will run in self-imposed defeat. The morale of the International Jihad Movement is almost entirely dependent on the posture of the American media. Their strategies, indeed, are primarily determined by it as well.
Recent Iraqi law enforcement graduates – men not dissuaded by Al Qaeda's attempts to stop Ramadians from joining their police force.
PATRICK DOLLARD IN IRAQ http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1644762/posts
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