----- Original Message -----
From: "Keith Hudson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Ray Harrell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2001 6:39 AM
Subject: Re: The balderdash thread
> Hi Ray,
>
> At 03:27 11/07/01 -0400, you wrote:
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Keith Hudson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >
> >KH said:
> >The fact that citizens are
> >> voting less than ever before (about 50% in our recent General
election*)
> >> means that he regards his "democratic rights" (in the narrow sense) as
> >less important than his other roles.
REH replied:
> >Actually Keith I think the case can be made that the corporations have
made
> >a sustained advertizing blitz for years about the ineffectiveness of
> >Democratic Government whose only value lies in it not being Communist
like
> >Castro or something.
>
KH asked:
> Where's your evidence for this? (snip) This has been carefully
investigated by
several teams in the UK. It's much more to do with scepticism of the
politicial process.
The evidence is everywhere. If you study modern art you can see it. The
perceptions must always be developed by the art of every era unique unto
itself. Old art makes you see through old eyes.
I don't really need to share confidences that I had at the beginning of this
Neo-liberal Chicago Economics School sunami that we are now struggling to
swim free of. But you might start with the Book by Reagan ex budget man
David Stockman where he outlines what they were going to do to push their
agenda by creating havoc in the banking system for social purposes. Then
you could look at the people who are connected today and check out the
Cultural Cold War by Francis Stoner Saunderson and see how many names are
held in common in the current situation and whether they are doing the same
thing to Americans that they did to the old USSR. Then after than you
might check out the Susan George site on the Internet. Finally look at
the works of the conservative (Neo-Liberal) law society that is filling up
our judgships and supporting corporations against the individual and the
federal government here in the US. It is called the Federalist society and
it was their members that instituted the coup that put GWBush in power here.
As for "studies" by "independent groups" I have to know their culture and
agenda before I can figure out their reading of the data, like the "rule of
law" (Federalist) bunch that is now making a mess of the court system in the
US. They have a lousy history which includes slavery, nazi collaboration,
and a 200 year harrassment and genocide of my own people. So, I'm a little
touchy if you get my drift.
It is not difficult to find the cynical attitude towards everything that
even seems mildly middle of the road (they call it left wing liberal)
dominating the media in the US. And it is all corporate run. It doesn't
matter whether it is Time-Warner's CNN or Micro-soft's MSNBC, or Fox with
Rupert Murdoch. They think they are centrists!
Balderdash is a very mild term indeed when considering that the Bush
administration has just recommended a man (Eliot Abrams) to be director of
the National Security Council's office for democracy, human rights and
international operations who ran the media blitz that kept the US feeding
the genocide in Guatamala and El Salvador that murdered nearly 200,000 most
of whom were Mayan Indian farmers.
Cynicism towards government is directly fed by actions meant to stifle the
opposition's desire to vote while stimulating your own base. It is not
that they are against government (their version of it) but that they must
convince the opposition that voting doesn't matter. If you want to know
what is going on then the best way is to see what they accuse the opposition
of doing to them. Like a bad divorce, too much complaining usually means
that the complainer is involved in doing what they are complaining about. A
bald faced example of this was the coup by the conservative (Neo-Liberal)
Supreme Court's decision on last year's presidential election. Or the way
they turned Davy Crockett into a supporter of manifest destiny and an Indian
hater once he was dead and could no longer speak for himself. (Crockett
lost his seat in Congress for supporting Indian causes against Andrew
Jackson.) It is an old and very sleazy story grounded in Western
duplicitous cultural practices.
If the issue was truly that Democracy didn't work or that the population is
not supporting it then they wouldn't need to spend all of that money and
effort that they have spent to build their institutes and create their
version of reality over the last thirty years of Neo-Liberal ascendancy.
I think your dismissal of laziness is ill-thought. Most Democrats here
like their lives and don't want to be bothered with the kind of volunteer
work necessary to sustain their political base. The almost 100% takeover
of talk radio by the radical right is indicative of how easy it has been to
defeat such lazy self-centered folks. Only now is the middle left
beginning to be stirred as a result of the collosal arrogance and ignorance
being flouted by the Right wing. I don't think that it bothers the left or
center that the right wing is ignorant or even that George Bush is. What
bothers them is that their way of life is threatened and that is motivating
a resurgence of political activity on the left in the US.
The Crazy Left is a problem in that they are a turnoff for the average
person who would be attracted to the more social minded message. I don't
think that Seattle or Montreal served much use other than a kind of college
enthused substitute for Spring fertility rites in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
I'm not into that kind of stuff. And the most damning example of that was
how ignorant and left doctrinaire the people who went to Seattle, that I
have talked to, are. Neither left or right wing seems to know much of what
we talk about here on Futurework. In fact we are a genius thinktank
compared to their conversations. But then I never did like college much
myself and have never been into institutions.
Also, your comments about Democracy and its demise are not special
particularly since this is usually the way the Democracies disappear.
Some hero or Messianic organization appears that promises the mass that they
won't have to work so hard or think about politics if they give their power
to the local "answer." Then the "answer" turns out to be a Jim Jones or
a Nazi party and we are back to the same old routine of genocide, murder,
theft, rape and pillage. If you want it to be different then don't give
your power away. And if it is taken then prove your honor and courage by
fighting it to the bitter end. The Indian people have a funny name for
the people who won't fight and continually try to give away their power.
They call him Farting Boy.
REH
