“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 h
as 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” movem
ent.
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.
I’m no police officer, but even I understand that the President would rather support the thugs than the police. In most every instance, he takes sides before he even knows the facts, but that is standard operating procedure for a “community organizer” and Marxist Democrat – he certainly is not President material, much to our detriment. I’m glad none of my family members or friends have a career anymore in law enforcement – they won’t get any support from the President. As for the last photo in the line, yes, it is true – thugs get the support.
For the editor’s rant about FOX and Rush Limbaugh – I thought you and others of your ilk don’t view FOX or listen to Limbaugh? How do you know what is said if you don’t watch or listen…. oh, you like misquotes and hearsay, comments from your buddies as fact. That is not fact, that is consensus, the same as “climate change”. Scientific fact be damned. It is because the President said it.
How we even know he is a college graduate of where he said he attended college? – he’s never released his college transcripts. Is he also a scientist? I guess so, the talking heads at ABC, CBS and NBC all talk of the same headlines in almost the same language at the same time – turn the channel, they all say the same thing, the same way, right on cue.
The country will be torn apart because of internal strife and damage done by the Democrat Party and their liberal ideas and nonsense initiatives. How did electing an African-American work out for racial harmony? Not too well – more racial strife than ever.