Quick note…
Found a lovely piece of propaganda on the “progressive” ThinkProgress website. In it, they extol the virtues of quickly passing a “cap-and-trade” derivatives market scam in order to cripple the “dictatorship” of Iran and other “unfriendly” nations like Venezuela all for the benefit of our “national security”. Of course, as is evident from the cap-and-trade scam in Europe, the only ones it will cripple will be us. More cost passed on to the consumers at a time when the president and his regime are in the process of getting ready to announce a Value Added Tax as well. That and it will cripple what little industry we have left in America while handing carbon credits to the biggest polluters for free.
Iran isn’t a dictatorship. Iran isn’t attempting to develop nuclear weapons.
You know, I read this article over there and I wasn’t surprised at all. I knew they were nothing more than neoliberal Clintonistas years ago. But the fact that they have become so blatant with their ridiculously right-wing propaganda is a little disturbing.
A strong cap on carbon would significantly cut the flow of petrodollars to Iran’s hostile regime, a ThinkProgress analysis shows. The economic and political strength of Iran’s dictatorship is a threat to the national security of the United States and the world, and its nuclear ambitions threaten to destabilize the Middle East.
…Other unfriendly regimes propped up by carbon-fuel money, such as Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela, will also feel the pinch, improving our national security… ThinkProgress
This purely Carl Rovian piece of sophomoric, ham-handed propaganda is on the front page of ThinkProgress. I am so glad I left that shitass website when I did. I can’t believe there is anyone dumb enough to not see though them at this point.
Filed under: Uncategorized |
Will,
You ended up by saying,
“…This purely Carl Rovian piece of sophomoric, ham-handed propaganda is on the front page of ThinkProgress. I am so glad I left that shitass website when I did. I can’t believe there is anyone dumb enough to not see though them at this point.”
Are you reacting emotionally here?
Suppose the people who read the ThinkProgress go around with those thoughts and arguments provided by ThinkProgress. Would you want to be able to rebut their points? Would it not make sense to see where they got the misleading notions they were spreading?
I guess I think there is some value in reading stuff even if it has misleading, inaccurate, or lying shit in it.
There is no real or true Progressive, I guess, just like there is no authentic or true Conservative. They all lay claim to the title because they think there is some value in doing so.
Maybe “they” think that there’s a large number of people who believe anything labelled “Progressive” or “conservative.” But, if you think there’s no good justification for some of what they say as “Progressives,” or that what they say is just propaganda from the corporations, or whatever, then shouldn’t you expose them on their websites?
Without any of this propaganda being challenged, do you think that the people who can’t see it for themselves as well as you are just “dumb?” I would think that the “cap and trade” nonsense works as propaganda because it is consistent with other ideas that are out there and so it gets a free ride, so to speak. People who are going along with it accept it without requiring a good argument because the notion is compelling in some other ways. Maybe people think that “cap and trade” is a good idea, like they thought the President’s health plan was a good idea, because, as crumbs off the table of the wealthy, it’s as good as they are going to get, so why beg for anything better…
I think, yes, there are some people who are like that. They accept the President’s plan about the wars, the health insurance, the financial reforms, or what to do about toxic waste, and think it’s the best their going to get, so applaud and get on the badwagon.
Should the response be to just leave them to their own delusions?
Noah did that, when he found that the people around hem couldn’t figure out that a catastrophe was in the making, he decided to let them be deluded and sailed away in the Ark, saving himself and his own and leaving the “deluded” to their grim fate. Most people are supposed to believe that this was all right and good and part of God’s plan. I think, on the contrary, that Noah acted selfishly and inhumanely in not doing more to help his neighbors see the problem that he saw. The story also showed that if this story revealed anything, it was about the corruption at the heart of this understanding of God.
THis story about Noah makes survival all about submission to the will of God and nothing to do with being reasonable. Apparently, there was nothing that Noah could have said to his neighbors that would have persuaded them to do what they needed to do to save themselves and their families except to submit as Noah had done to the dictates of his God.
So, I have to ask you whether your work here building your own arc is all about them not agreeing with you, or is it about them not being reasonable?
steven;
Its a challenging response you left me. That’s why I like you.
First of all, the point I am making here is that this kind of sophomoric propaganda USED to be easily countered by so many progressives themselves, back when it was Carl Rove writing it for the Bush supporting “Right”.
They don’t NEED me to counter it. They already KNOW it’s bullshit.
(and if you have any questions about that, just go to the site and read some of the comments. They know damn well what it is)
You see, the problem isn’t that “progressives” can’t see through this, the problem is… sites like THINK PROGRESS THINK THEY CANT… and THAT is the problem.
It sure doesn’t makes sense that they fight against doctrines of the Bush adm, but when the same dogma is set up by the Obama adm, they applaud it. Are they thinking that Obama is going to have some magic ‘ending’ to his programs? Do they think, he will lead them to the very edge of diaster and then say… ‘Hey, I was just testing you… we’ll take it all back and set everything straight.’
Will,
I have to go to work soon. I would like to argue this some because you are correct to point out how silly their claims are, though, I disagree with your response. I think the thing to do is point out their silliness to them, and not just fly away from the site.
They said this,
“If the world moves away from oil dependence, Iran’s regime will no longer be able to rely on petrodollars to stay afloat.”
Are they thinking that “cap and trade” legislation would reduce the world’s use of oil? I am skeptical about this. I thought the “cap and trade” proposal was a means of making it only seem like the oil companies were being forced to make less money on oil, when really they were not going to lose anything from their bottom line.
Cap and Trade, I thought, means not that you are forced to consume less oil, but that there’s a means of having the restrictyions imposed be “tradablke” so that Zimbabwe can be saddled with the oil rtestriction that the U.S. oil companies would otherwise be saddled with.
I cannot believe anything the oil companies would support at this point would turn out to be anything good for the rest of us.
I did go to the site as suggested and there wasn’t that much activity. Maybe no one was much interested in this silliness.
However, I still think the people who don’t get it are “dumb.” The powers-that-be have been putting a lot of effort into confusing the rabble.
Jan,
You said,
“It sure doesn’t makes sense that they fight against doctrines of the Bush adm, but when the same dogma is set up by the Obama adm, they applaud it. ”
I’m not sure it’s the same people.
It does make sense, though. When they argue against some doctrine of the Bush people they can do it for several reasons. Some people might actually oppose the doctrine no matter who might propose it. Others might oppose it just because the Bush people were behind it.
So, when Obama takes power, the first people still oppose those doctrines they found objectionable when Bush did them, objectionable when Obama does them.
I find Greenwald opposes civil liberties doctrines pushed by either Bush or Obama that he has reasons to oppose. It doesn’t matter whether it’s from D’s or R’s.
Then, there are others who support the same doctrines when they are proposed by Obama that they opposed when coming from Bush because …for them… it’s not about the dipctrines but, instead, about their personal advancement. They are tied to different stars, it seems.
It’s the same thing when Bush proposes the same doctrines the Nazi’s proposed to justify their “aggressive wars” in Europe. It has been O.K for Bush or Obama to invade foreign countries for profit, whereas it wasn’t O.K. for Hitler and Mussolini to argue the same so they could profit. This is because, as I’m arguing, it’s all about who’s getting the profits.
There’s also reason to wonder whether the Bush/Obama people and the Hitler people have been one and the same.
good points, Steve…. except HItler’s people are mostly dead… and these peole who applaud Obama are supposingly Dems who loudly protested Bush.
I was talking about the masses . not the Puppet-masters…… if the people unite, then the masters have to run for cover… 🙂
Jan,
I think the masses are divided. They do not all have the same aversion to aggressive war that is often expressed on lefty blogs.
Some large number of people believe that the Taliban, or the Iraqis had something to do with 9-11. They don’t make many distinctions between Arabs and Persians and so forth. This is why the simplistic and mostly false story that it was radical Muslims who attacked us works so well.
Any more real explanation will have to challenge the prejudices of a large number of the masses.
I am skeptical that the masses can be united and if they were, it is not a foregone conclusion that they would rebel against the “puppet-masters.” After all, it is the puppet-masters who give the masses their jobs, and otherwise provide for all their needs and desires.
The strength of the puppet-masters is not just that they can hire hoodlums to beat up the dissenters. The puppet-masters are the owners and financiers who put together the w
“wherewithall” to make jobs possible…supposedly. This is the argument that government can’t create long-term jobs,…the economy has to be grown by private industry.
The right wingers take this argument and make their position out of it. It’s only the puppet-master entrpreneurs who make an economy where people get jobs, not the parasitical….government.
steven, see… I learned it all different….
like.. well let’s start with butter and yarn (rough thread)…
long time ago, people who had a goat or a cow, also churned butter or cheese…… it was work… at home.. other neighbors made yard from their cotten, others made jelly from fruits, or candles or flour, …beer, whiskey, candy, …. everybody made something…. and bartered with each other to share products.. .. then came larger communities…(a small town)… when some had the idea of having a store… they bought stuff from the workers and placed the products in a store… or a bar… and then a small clothing store… they charged a sum for their efforts at ‘gathering’ produucts made by a large community of workers… towns grew and hotels and banks and larger stores developed,,, because someone dedicided to gather workers in one place and make numerous products (factories)…… so you see .. the worker or skilled person came first…. they are needed first… you can’t have a corporation unless you have workers… of all degrees of skill….
we have been brainwshed into thinking we need the corporations… no… they need us .. not only to work but to spend what we make on their choice of products..
the corporations are run by workers (of special skills) … used to be skills that required full knowledge of how to actually make a product… in other words, if you had a small factory that made furniture, nine times out of 10, you also could make furniture with the best of them… you were a master carpenter….
now corporations are run by greedy money makers who know little about the product.. all they know is the flow of money.. that has become a legal skill that allows the abuse of the workers and the buyers… through the government trying to appease the corporation owner.
so the economy is made by workers.. do not let that escape you… that’s why our economy is running downhill so fast….. jobs are being sent over seas,,, we buy less.. some companies have to lay off workers due to less buying… and then it fires off more lay offs… less money … the only people who make money are those who have workers here and overseas.,,,, they are now forcing us to buy products made by those who now have our jobs….. and it will keep getting worse.. ..
Jan,
It appears you have the Marxist disease and cannot appreciate how our freedoms and way of life depend upon being able to own the means of production.
steve;
You just contradicted yourself.
You said…
“I think the masses are divided. They do not all have the same aversion to aggressive war that is often expressed on lefty blogs.
Some large number of people believe that the Taliban, or the Iraqis had something to do with 9-11.”
This is a contradiction. When Bush was “elected”, he was ran on a non-confrontational, “no nation building” platform. It was very popular on both sides of the isle.
Just because someone is a republican, doesn’t mean they automatically support “aggressive war”, in fact, if the “election” or at least the primary leading up to the last pre-911 presidential election is any indication, they don’t support the idea of war for war’s sake at all.
All they support, and I mean ALL, is anything that is connected with 911.
Yes, you have a very few who actually profit from conflict, but that is the exception. In fact what most republicans have to do with the war is their children being sent off to fight them.
And I promise you this, you prove 911 was a hoax to all of them, and you will see 100% of them screaming to get their kids and their brothers and sisters back right now.
so steven, you support huge corporations getting bailouts and giving away jobs and lowering wages and taking over farming lands and controling single homeownerships and putting Americans in the streets.. ……… and the owners? many corporate owners that now control America are foreign owners….
and you label me a Marxist because I support American production and small enterprises and support workers (of all skills) and corporate control limited?
maybe you are trying to send a mixed message … not going to work here… take your double talk somewhere else.
Jan,
The Marxist accusation was not serious.
Anyone who talks up the workers in this country has been made out to be un-American and probably Marxist because, as we’re told, Capitalism and ownership rights are the exclusive American way.
s.
Thanks for explaining what you meant…. I didn’t realize you were joking. 🙂
The (London) Times posted this article from Bronwen Maddox yesterday. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/bronwen_maddox/article7103209.ece
I posted the following comment 3 hours ago but it didn’t get past their moderator:
“Bronwen Maddox is obviously paid to support the hawk’s party lines as every article she writes is bolstering the US propaganda. This report is so blatantly out of line with any independent reporting of Venezuala and Hugo Chavez.
I don’t believe for a minute that Hugo is an angel but painting him to be a belligerent Castro-ish dictator cannot be supported with independent research.
The same propaganda machine is in full flow preparing the world for the invasion of Iran and to any intelligent reader, it’s exactly the same script used in the buildup to the Iraq invasion.
How can you consider lambasting Chavez for accepting loans from Russia and China when the US dollar is only afloat because of trillions of dollars of Chinese loans?
Far from threatening the US, Chavez is doing his best to counter the US buildup of forces in Colombia and the aggressive stance that the US is taking in the region. You might note the aggressive stance that the US is taking all over the world and then should show some respect to any leader who is willing to stand up to this onslaught. Lucky for Chavez that they’re not a predominantly Muslim population or you’d be reporting an Al-Queda cell which the US would start bombing with drones. Instead they’re labelled as a source of illegal drugs giving the US a reason to threaten their sovereignty.
If you’re really interested in reporting the news, take a good look at the Venezualian national health system established with help from Cuban medical personnel while training Venezualian’s take over the system. They’ve just had their 7th anniversary and I suspect are showing up the rest of the world by their success.”