“In war, truth is the first casualty.” — Aeschylus, Greek tragic dramatist (525 BC – 456 BC)

“In a time of universal deceit – telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” — George Orwell

I am a seeker of truth. I certainly have fallen short in this search at times, but I sincerely try to get to the bottom of things, and sometimes that search gets me in trouble, especially with people in positions of power.

I have come to the conclusion, after much reflection, critical thinking and research, that I have been lied to all my life. Some lies are reasonably benevolent. Some are malevolent.

I have become alarmed in recent years that the truth is becoming more elusive, and the greatest promoter of lies and damn lies indeed is the media, of which I am a member. The media has become more like marketing and advertising, which rarely tell the truth because they want to take your wallet and sell you something you probably don’t want or need.

In my tender and naïve youth, I do not recall being bomarded so often daily by lies and damn lies. I agree such things happened, but the process has developed into an art form because of the skillful techniques of marketing, public relations and advertising. These guys are good — they are able to con us into buying bottled water when we can use the safest supply of drinking water almost for free. They are able to get our young people to wear T-shirts advertising products and instead of them paying us for our ad services, we pay them — outrageous prices to boot.

Regardless of my worries about mind control and its consequences, I’ve found a more virulent strain on the Internet, on Facebook, where ordinary good citizens spew hatred based on damn lies fueled by shadowy figures who have much to gain with your anger. Fox News has done of good job with this kind of propaganda, as has Rush Limbaugh, the emperor of hate radio and serial liar. But now normally nice everday people are spreading a hate virus based on damn lies that will tear this country apart from within. Too many post catchy slogans and visual ditties that too many readers accept without doing the research to find out if it’s really true or garbage. It is too often the latter.

Most of the phony venom I see daily on line is about President Barack Obama. For example, one post showed what looked like Michelle Obama on her smart phone while everybody else was in rapt attention for the national anthem. I learned it wasn’t Michelle Obama in the photo (they all look alike, don’t they?).

Another was a video that showed a young black man beating up a poor, homeless veteran and the caption read: “The real Michael Brown.” Snopes showed a lot of evidence that it wasn’t Michael Brown, whose death sparked the much-despised “Black Lives Matter” movement.

I have included in this post a few examples of damn lies, propagated by somebody who has a political or economic agenda and unfortunately has an audience too lazy to find out or even want to find out if it’s true.

• The Confederate Flag — It is not “banned.” It was taken down from public property, but you can fly it any time on your own property without legal consequences.
• The U.S. flag is not banned from any American classroom, despite the occasional anectdotal evidence.
• Police officers in the U.S. indeed are under attack, as they always have been because they deal with criminals and low lifes. But the numbers of these attacks actually have decreased over the last two decades.
• The Logic of Science.com entry is the only sane visual art work of the four. Please take it seriously.