Carrol Cox wrote: > It reminds > me of an astounding statement a local Move-On member made a couple years > ago. She claimed u.s. war making was caused by public opinion. I guess that > was common sense in action.
this "common sense" statement is false, but like most "common-sense" opinions it has a nugget of truth. The US government can't go to war without first manipulating public opinion to endorse it. The state doesn't use coercion alone: it relies on ideological hegemony. I doubt that the MoveOn member studied Aristotle, but public opinion could be seen as part of the "material" cause of US war-making, with the goals of the power elite (and the more general goals of empire-maintenance) being the efficient (immediate) and final (teleological) causes. -- Jim Devine / If you're going to support the lesser of two evils, you should at least know the nature of that evil. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
