Just a little in advance of the news
What will in the news in a few days or weeks or months or years - the news media while fast in the short term but it lacks reflection - and the reality of events comes more slowly - The wiredbrain puts you ahead of the masses and tell what the news media will say in the future.
Sunday, May 09, 2004
Why War?why-war.com
We liberated Iraq. Now the people here don’t want us here, and guess what? We don’t want to be here either, so why are we still here? Why don’t they bring us home?Pfc. Jason Ring, San Francisco Chronicle, July 18, 2003 How to Get Out of Iraq Peter W. Galbraith New York Review of Books April 15, 2004 As of today the United States military appears committed to an open-ended stay in a country where, with the exception of the Kurdish north, patience with the foreign occupation is running out, and violent opposition is spreading. Civil war and the breakup of Iraq are more likely outcomes than a successful transition to a pluralistic Western-style democracy. http://www.why-war.com/news/2004/04/15/howtoget.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11227-2004May8_2.htmlDissension Grows In Senior Ranks On War Strategy U.S. May Be Winning Battles in Iraq, Losing the War, Some Officers Say Some officers say the place to begin restructuring U.S. policy is by ousting Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, whom they see as responsible for a series of strategic and tactical blunders over the past year. Several of those interviewed said a profound anger is building within the Army at Rumsfeld and those around him.
# posted by Peter : 5/9/2004 03:01:36 AM
Dr. Peter E. Pflaum, GlobalVillages http://www.wiredbrain.net/
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# posted by Peter : 5/9/2004 01:46:52 AM
Saturday, May 08, 2004
http://www.counterpunch.org/taguba05052004.htmlUS Army Report on Abuse of Iraqi PrisonersBy Maj. Gen. ANTONIO M. TAGUBA
# posted by Peter : 5/8/2004 07:24:18 PM
The Left Just Got Louder Our Daily ReadingsAtriosDailykosLiberal OasisTalking Points MemoImportant Sites for Us Air America RadioDemocracy for America
# posted by Peter : 5/8/2004 11:57:16 AM
Will Powell replace Rumsfeld? And Conie to State? A reversal of the go it alone and aggressive to our friends and making more enemies to being good to our friends and making fewer enemies -
# posted by Peter : 5/8/2004 09:51:02 AM
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Tuesday, January 29, 2008
The power of the mundane:
The power of the mundane:http://www.wiredbrain.net/mundane
Reflections on the “State of the Union” and the Bush problem with the “vision thing”.
If you imagine a normal distribution, 2/3 rd are between one standard deviation, plus and minus. As De Tocqueville observed in “Democracy in America” the population exhibits a trend toward the middle, neither great intellectual aristocracy of outstanding individuals or masses of poor uneducated peasants. Therefore the distribution in a democracy is bunched in the middle in a common mass culture, so 90 % or more are in what can be called ordinary.
The 10% outside the broad average are rich and powerful, creative and inventive, politically active and well connected or just ordinary intellectual snobs like the author. Talk radio is a field of dreams of the commonplace – people define themselves in a mass in contrast to another mass, like sports teams – The conservatives seem to have a passion for theodicy A vindication of God's goodness and justice in the face of the existence of evil.– and fight over what is the true faith – based on Ronald Reagan’s political theory which was clear and wonderfully routine – and an electoral majority founded on internal contradictions – economic elite, the military industrial complex, and social reactionaries and angry white males that resented racial integration and feminism and the seamier side of secular society. The success was based on marketing techniques of manufacturing consent by appeals to irrational passions and sub-conscience images and frames. See Freudian psychoanalysis and Edward Bernays’ PR techniques below -
There is no common vision between gun control, gay marriage, abortion, excessive militarism, tax reductions for the rich who pay most of the income taxes, undermine health and safety regulation, immigration, and other “hot button” issues. The only theme of the “contract for America” was the issues all ranked 70% or better on public opinion polls.
The great right wing enterprise is declining and falling not from external enemies but as the Roman and Russian Empire from the weight of the internal contradiction.
Economic reality may foretell the end of the American Imperial enterprise as a whole.
The Democratic Party elite as Obama pointed out lacked new ideas since the new deal, new frontier, and fair deal of providing and promising benefits for their supporters in a collection of interests – labor, civil rights, ethnic, Israel, and the remains of the urban political machines. The new idea was the “Third Way” of Blair and Clinton where economic progress and welfare reform exchange benefits for education, training and employment. The vision is of an ever widening circle of us – rather then them, from family and clan, from tribes and war loads, from empires and countries to regional institutions such as the E.U. to the family of man. Bush has narrowed the community of mankind into friends and enemies with a unilateral narrow minded province of West Texas, as opposed to the Family tradition of internationals going back to Brown and Harriman.
It is sadly a fairy tale to believe a visionary leader can get beyond the nasty infighting on trivial issues and demonizing the other side as the enemy rather than the loyal opposition. It is worth a try and better than the alternative. Only the mythology of JFK and FDR makes them into a visionary leaders – rather than a risk adverse centrists who took only the most popular initiatives as every President in the twiddle de twiddle Dom American non-ideological centrist politics.
Surplus Product:
The fault in free market capitalism is the historic issue of over production. The motivation of capitalism is to gain a higher return on investment (ROI) than the going rate of return. A functional capital market will increase investment in sectors that are “hot” until it is over done. Since there is a delay between decisions and the ROI people invest today on the expectation of returns tomorrow. Using historical data is always misleading and can not be true a discount of current value vs. future ROI. There will be more houses, cars, structured investment instruments, etc. than the market can absorb as supply out run effective demand.
The modern discount system escalate the boom and bust effects. A million dollars in mortgages is turned into certificates that generate additional money to fund more home loans that then are used as assets to borrow more money until one dollar becomes ten. When the million dollars in bonds have to be repaid or lose their market value it takes ten million dollars out of the pool so the virtuous cycle becomes a malevolence cycle. It is similar danger as buying on margin.
The monetary policy is to drop interest rates to make ROI easier. The government pump primes by borrowing money and spending it. The scale has to be right – too little too late will not work. As in taking antibiotics you need to get a big dose and finish the course of treatment or the disease will return in a more virulent form. The political system has to be able to act and decisively or it won’t work. Peter Druker’s theory was that war was the only way democracies could dispose of the surplus property by shooting it at foreign enemies. Workers are paid to produce the good of war but nothing enters the civil supply chain. Democracies have a hard time collecting taxes and run surpluses when the economy over heats because human desires are endless and politicians get elected by buying voters with public programs.
A real reserve fund is the solution – save during the seven good years so you have resources in the rainy day.
The central issue from the 17th century forward, is the shift from the rule of established authorities by a established land owning ruling class of king and church to a capitalist and republican form of government. The empirical issue is the nature of mass publics. In “Reflections on the revolution in France” by Edmund Burke and in Alexis de Tocqueville “Democracy in America” explored the question if a mass society could be stable without a responsible ruling class or aristocracy. A very interesting analysis of mass psychology in the Century of the Self and the power of propaganda is a remarkably eloquent series from BBC 4 and director Adam Curtis which explores the influence of Freudian psychoanalysis and Edward Bernays’ PR techniques in shaping western mass media, politics and consumer culture. Political sales use the same methods as other products - the frame or image that connects to emotional attachments (the hook) - cars make you powerful and sexy - tooth paste makes you happy - fast food make for good families - you need to find the real message which is mostly in the pictures - Below the threshold of conscious perception by the use of stimuli adequate to produce subconscious awareness and able to evoke a emotional response: subliminal propaganda.
The issue over the last few centuries and today and in the campaign for democracy today is the problem of the unlikely trust placed in ordinary people – are they a mass of unconscious desires and hidden motivation aroused by the market managers, elitists and the media or are they sovereign individuals endowed by their creator with reason and citizen with rights. Is it Rush or Jefferson? Clearly both are true and important depending on education, the civic culture, the balance between mythology, superstition, and pure reason given the economic conditions.
This years selection of President have this in the background – can people, the great unwashed, the masses take charge of their own affairs – can there be a government of the people, for the people and by the people or is this a fairy tale – and grand illusion?
According to General Semantics, cognitive sciences, it’s the frame STUPID! The frame is the network of associations that spring from the sub-conscientious with the brand.
Obama has a brand of hope and change – a people lost in the wilderness about to cross to the holy land. The collection of tribes of all the people lost in the dessert looking across to the promised land of milk and honey. The leader is a guide and prophet, a coach getting the team into the supper bowl.
Clinton is the good mother or sheep herder taking care of her children or sheep. The sheepherder will provide – health care, financial stability, jobs, welfare, prosperity, world peace, the whole laundry list of democratic promises. The focus is on HER, me, I, the government, the process, and in material benefits of voting.
The Republican image of the strict father offer security and freedom from reason. The people is to follow and believe and not question authority. Ditto Heads…
Democracy in America:
There are some popular myths about the nature of the American civilization. The nation was a child of enlighten not a Christian revival. The Deists and Freemasons who organized the “committees of public safety” and created the propaganda that let to the “rebellion of the American Colonies” and was all about CHANGE. The established order of CHURCH, KING, and State was gothic v. the modern world which was rational, logical as opposed to faith based doctrine based on tradition and authority. The idea that people could manage their own affairs depended on people being sensible, not driven by superstitions, and passions. The people must have a higher sense of the common good and see beyond just personal, regional, racial, ethic, class or religious prejudices. The “people” were property owners and educated. The masses were not to be trusted. Without the balance of power, public education, and a stable middle class Imperial tyranny would be replaced by the rule of the mob.
If Mr. Edwards wants to change “the system” he will have to convince the states to call a constitutional convention to redesign the balance of power. The system we have has been successful designed to prevent Democracy because popular rule would endanger civil liberties and state sovereignty – Democracy only requires majority rule within a parliamentary system. The American design was to prevent the state from doing much, for better or worse. The balance of power design was there because the founding fathers did not trust the people or majorities that would abolish slavery, over tax or regulate, tax trade to the disadvantage of one region or industry or another. Our limited democracy is another result of our original sin of slavery.
netaudr@abc.com, nightline@abcnews.com, 2020@abc.com, evening@cbsnews.com, earlyshow@cbs.com, 60II@cbsnews.com, 48hours@cbsnews.com, ftn@cbsnews.com, Special@foxnews.com, Foxreport@foxnews.com, Oreilly@foxnews.com, Hannity@foxnews.com, Colmes@foxnews.com, Ontherecord@foxnews.com, nightly@nbc.com, today@nbc.com, dateline@nbc.com, msnbcreports@msnbc.com, newshour@pbs.org, atc@npr.org, morning@npr.org, totn@npr.org, rs@latimes.com, editor@usatoday.com, letters@washpost.com, letters@newsweek.com, letters@time.com, letters@usnews.com, tips@upi.com, info@delandbeacon.com, dbethea@orlandosentinel.com, lelis@orlandosentinel.com, observernews@bellsouth.net, mlafferty@orlandosentinel.com, sfajardo@orlandosentinel.com, mblom@orlandosentinel.com, kristina.klasne@news-jrnl.com
Reflections on the “State of the Union” and the Bush problem with the “vision thing”.
If you imagine a normal distribution, 2/3 rd are between one standard deviation, plus and minus. As De Tocqueville observed in “Democracy in America” the population exhibits a trend toward the middle, neither great intellectual aristocracy of outstanding individuals or masses of poor uneducated peasants. Therefore the distribution in a democracy is bunched in the middle in a common mass culture, so 90 % or more are in what can be called ordinary.
The 10% outside the broad average are rich and powerful, creative and inventive, politically active and well connected or just ordinary intellectual snobs like the author. Talk radio is a field of dreams of the commonplace – people define themselves in a mass in contrast to another mass, like sports teams – The conservatives seem to have a passion for theodicy A vindication of God's goodness and justice in the face of the existence of evil.– and fight over what is the true faith – based on Ronald Reagan’s political theory which was clear and wonderfully routine – and an electoral majority founded on internal contradictions – economic elite, the military industrial complex, and social reactionaries and angry white males that resented racial integration and feminism and the seamier side of secular society. The success was based on marketing techniques of manufacturing consent by appeals to irrational passions and sub-conscience images and frames. See Freudian psychoanalysis and Edward Bernays’ PR techniques below -
There is no common vision between gun control, gay marriage, abortion, excessive militarism, tax reductions for the rich who pay most of the income taxes, undermine health and safety regulation, immigration, and other “hot button” issues. The only theme of the “contract for America” was the issues all ranked 70% or better on public opinion polls.
The great right wing enterprise is declining and falling not from external enemies but as the Roman and Russian Empire from the weight of the internal contradiction.
Economic reality may foretell the end of the American Imperial enterprise as a whole.
The Democratic Party elite as Obama pointed out lacked new ideas since the new deal, new frontier, and fair deal of providing and promising benefits for their supporters in a collection of interests – labor, civil rights, ethnic, Israel, and the remains of the urban political machines. The new idea was the “Third Way” of Blair and Clinton where economic progress and welfare reform exchange benefits for education, training and employment. The vision is of an ever widening circle of us – rather then them, from family and clan, from tribes and war loads, from empires and countries to regional institutions such as the E.U. to the family of man. Bush has narrowed the community of mankind into friends and enemies with a unilateral narrow minded province of West Texas, as opposed to the Family tradition of internationals going back to Brown and Harriman.
It is sadly a fairy tale to believe a visionary leader can get beyond the nasty infighting on trivial issues and demonizing the other side as the enemy rather than the loyal opposition. It is worth a try and better than the alternative. Only the mythology of JFK and FDR makes them into a visionary leaders – rather than a risk adverse centrists who took only the most popular initiatives as every President in the twiddle de twiddle Dom American non-ideological centrist politics.
Surplus Product:
The fault in free market capitalism is the historic issue of over production. The motivation of capitalism is to gain a higher return on investment (ROI) than the going rate of return. A functional capital market will increase investment in sectors that are “hot” until it is over done. Since there is a delay between decisions and the ROI people invest today on the expectation of returns tomorrow. Using historical data is always misleading and can not be true a discount of current value vs. future ROI. There will be more houses, cars, structured investment instruments, etc. than the market can absorb as supply out run effective demand.
The modern discount system escalate the boom and bust effects. A million dollars in mortgages is turned into certificates that generate additional money to fund more home loans that then are used as assets to borrow more money until one dollar becomes ten. When the million dollars in bonds have to be repaid or lose their market value it takes ten million dollars out of the pool so the virtuous cycle becomes a malevolence cycle. It is similar danger as buying on margin.
The monetary policy is to drop interest rates to make ROI easier. The government pump primes by borrowing money and spending it. The scale has to be right – too little too late will not work. As in taking antibiotics you need to get a big dose and finish the course of treatment or the disease will return in a more virulent form. The political system has to be able to act and decisively or it won’t work. Peter Druker’s theory was that war was the only way democracies could dispose of the surplus property by shooting it at foreign enemies. Workers are paid to produce the good of war but nothing enters the civil supply chain. Democracies have a hard time collecting taxes and run surpluses when the economy over heats because human desires are endless and politicians get elected by buying voters with public programs.
A real reserve fund is the solution – save during the seven good years so you have resources in the rainy day.
The central issue from the 17th century forward, is the shift from the rule of established authorities by a established land owning ruling class of king and church to a capitalist and republican form of government. The empirical issue is the nature of mass publics. In “Reflections on the revolution in France” by Edmund Burke and in Alexis de Tocqueville “Democracy in America” explored the question if a mass society could be stable without a responsible ruling class or aristocracy. A very interesting analysis of mass psychology in the Century of the Self and the power of propaganda is a remarkably eloquent series from BBC 4 and director Adam Curtis which explores the influence of Freudian psychoanalysis and Edward Bernays’ PR techniques in shaping western mass media, politics and consumer culture. Political sales use the same methods as other products - the frame or image that connects to emotional attachments (the hook) - cars make you powerful and sexy - tooth paste makes you happy - fast food make for good families - you need to find the real message which is mostly in the pictures - Below the threshold of conscious perception by the use of stimuli adequate to produce subconscious awareness and able to evoke a emotional response: subliminal propaganda.
The issue over the last few centuries and today and in the campaign for democracy today is the problem of the unlikely trust placed in ordinary people – are they a mass of unconscious desires and hidden motivation aroused by the market managers, elitists and the media or are they sovereign individuals endowed by their creator with reason and citizen with rights. Is it Rush or Jefferson? Clearly both are true and important depending on education, the civic culture, the balance between mythology, superstition, and pure reason given the economic conditions.
This years selection of President have this in the background – can people, the great unwashed, the masses take charge of their own affairs – can there be a government of the people, for the people and by the people or is this a fairy tale – and grand illusion?
According to General Semantics, cognitive sciences, it’s the frame STUPID! The frame is the network of associations that spring from the sub-conscientious with the brand.
Obama has a brand of hope and change – a people lost in the wilderness about to cross to the holy land. The collection of tribes of all the people lost in the dessert looking across to the promised land of milk and honey. The leader is a guide and prophet, a coach getting the team into the supper bowl.
Clinton is the good mother or sheep herder taking care of her children or sheep. The sheepherder will provide – health care, financial stability, jobs, welfare, prosperity, world peace, the whole laundry list of democratic promises. The focus is on HER, me, I, the government, the process, and in material benefits of voting.
The Republican image of the strict father offer security and freedom from reason. The people is to follow and believe and not question authority. Ditto Heads…
Democracy in America:
There are some popular myths about the nature of the American civilization. The nation was a child of enlighten not a Christian revival. The Deists and Freemasons who organized the “committees of public safety” and created the propaganda that let to the “rebellion of the American Colonies” and was all about CHANGE. The established order of CHURCH, KING, and State was gothic v. the modern world which was rational, logical as opposed to faith based doctrine based on tradition and authority. The idea that people could manage their own affairs depended on people being sensible, not driven by superstitions, and passions. The people must have a higher sense of the common good and see beyond just personal, regional, racial, ethic, class or religious prejudices. The “people” were property owners and educated. The masses were not to be trusted. Without the balance of power, public education, and a stable middle class Imperial tyranny would be replaced by the rule of the mob.
If Mr. Edwards wants to change “the system” he will have to convince the states to call a constitutional convention to redesign the balance of power. The system we have has been successful designed to prevent Democracy because popular rule would endanger civil liberties and state sovereignty – Democracy only requires majority rule within a parliamentary system. The American design was to prevent the state from doing much, for better or worse. The balance of power design was there because the founding fathers did not trust the people or majorities that would abolish slavery, over tax or regulate, tax trade to the disadvantage of one region or industry or another. Our limited democracy is another result of our original sin of slavery.
netaudr@abc.com, nightline@abcnews.com, 2020@abc.com, evening@cbsnews.com, earlyshow@cbs.com, 60II@cbsnews.com, 48hours@cbsnews.com, ftn@cbsnews.com, Special@foxnews.com, Foxreport@foxnews.com, Oreilly@foxnews.com, Hannity@foxnews.com, Colmes@foxnews.com, Ontherecord@foxnews.com, nightly@nbc.com, today@nbc.com, dateline@nbc.com, msnbcreports@msnbc.com, newshour@pbs.org, atc@npr.org, morning@npr.org, totn@npr.org, rs@latimes.com, editor@usatoday.com, letters@washpost.com, letters@newsweek.com, letters@time.com, letters@usnews.com, tips@upi.com, info@delandbeacon.com, dbethea@orlandosentinel.com, lelis@orlandosentinel.com, observernews@bellsouth.net, mlafferty@orlandosentinel.com, sfajardo@orlandosentinel.com, mblom@orlandosentinel.com, kristina.klasne@news-jrnl.com
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