American election.

[Gary Childress]

D'Souza again?

Oh, now, Gary...are we going to go ad hominem now? Are we going to suggest that the statements he makes stand or fall on something other than the historical evidence? We shouldn't, of course.

D'Souza does his homework. But it's not on the man that we should judge the evidence, but on the evidence itself.

Well, he's certainly making a claim. Whether his claim is true or not, I don't know.

[Immanuel Can]

D'Souza does his homework. But it's not on the man that we should judge the evidence, but on the evidence itself.

Well, he's certainly making a claim. Whether his claim is true or not, I don't know.

It stands or falls on the facts.

The "Southern Strategy" thing is a hypothesis contrary to available evidence. It's winsome only because it's simple, and because it allows us to slap the "black hat" -- or more precisely, the white hood -- on the Republicans...the headgear always historically worn by the Democrats, who actually invented it and perpetuated its use during Segregation.

But will the historical facts bear it out? That's the question.

[Gary Childress]

But will the historical facts bear it out? That's the question.

It's a good question. One that I don't know the answer to. It seems to depend on who we ask. We seem to get one story from conservatives and another from liberals. Who has it right? Right now most mainstream journalists and news media outlets seem to favor the liberal version of history. Are all those people wrong?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Immanuel Can]

Who has it right?

The side with the statistics you can also find in non-partisan information sources who do not have the incentive to cull their information for partisan purposes.

Right now most mainstream journalists and news media outlets seem to favor the liberal version of history. Are all those people wrong?

Something very interesting is happening to journalism right now.

As you will no doubt be aware, newspapers are folding like...well, newspaper. And then TV stations, particularly the big traditional ones, like ABC, NBC and CBS are all under serious threat, because younger people don't watch them for news anymore. So they're desperate to survive, and they need money in order to do that.

In some countries, in fact, the government has already begun to subsidize conventional news sources heavily. This is a terrible idea, as it makes the journalists entirely dependent for their survival on pleasing the political party that has issued them their money. To criticize such a government is, for them, now suicide. So they no longer have any reason to do investigative journalism or "speak truth to power." If they do, they go down.

On the other side, where people actually ARE paying attention and the government is not subsidizing, the internet, a very few very powerful companies have monopolistic control. If you've been watching the Twitter, Facebook and Google investigations at all, you know what they do to control the news.
So very powerful media companies are now in control of the vast majority of information people are allowed to see. This is a real threat to democracy and voter rights, because democracy depends on the ability of the people to hold all elected officials accountable. But what if their misdeeds are kept invisible? What if their stories and distortions are rigorously promulgated by these monopolies, so that people do not have two-sided information upon which to base their judgments? What then?

And what when an American president picks a fight with the journalists? What when he calls them out for what they are: "fake news"? How are they going to respond to that? It's an existential threat to them, and one that they know makes them horribly vulnerable. Already, just because of the market, they are losing public attention and credibility. People are choosing the internet instead of them. If the President of the United States certifies them as fraudulent in the public eye, what happens to their jobs? Their power? Their future?

So only one party serves the journalists' interests. And it's not the one in power right now.

We've never had such a situation before. But I have watched recent events in the States with total disbelief. I can't believe, for example, that a government official could be caught red-handed, with hard evidence proving his influence-peddling, corruption and collusion with foreign powers, and that information not be reported in the mainstream media. And I can't believe that with all the evidence of election fraud, so many people continue to say to me, "There's absolutely no proof."

Sure there is. The media is not letting you have it. But I got it. And the media also has it. They just don't want the majority of Americans to have it. So astoundingly, they are succeeding quite magnificently in presenting the facade that it doesn't even exist at all.

A few years ago, I don't think they could have gotten away with it. The journalists still thought of themselves as "The Fourth Estate," the watchdogs of government, and the people's providers of the facts. A scandal of this size would have been front page of every newspaper, because it would have sold newspapers, and newspapers needed to be sold. Moreover, news agencies competed for stories, instead of colluding with the party line. They contradicted and challenged one another, testing each other''s evidence in the public eye. Their controversies sold papers. Now, journalists do not do that at all. They work instead on promulgating the party line, so that they can line up later for the benefits.

And the public? Well, they can all go to Hell in a handcart, as far as most of the media are presently concerned: "They'll believe what we tell them to believe," is the attitude. "We just don't report the news; we make ourselves indispensable by helping the party that is on our side keep the people where they want them to be, in terms of their knowledge and belief. We deliver the vote."

Well, they believe they do, anyway. Only, they aren't as good at it yet as they need to be. They didn't quite manage to deliver the vote as promised; hence the need for widespread, embarrassing voter fraud. But they're clearly getting more able at the game, and shortly the day will come when the story of the mainstream media will be the only story the American people are allowed to get. If they succeed at that, they survive; if they don't succeed, then the market will kill them, because nobody actually wants their product anymore. So their survival will depend utterly on their ability to show they can control public opinion and deliver an obedient citizenry to the overlords.

And believe me, they know that's how it is.

[Nick_A]

The atoms of the Great Beast are being taught to believe, obey, and pay the bills. psychological slavery is a fitting result for all who believe in the illusion and imagined security of psychological slavery.

[Belinda]

Who has it right?

The side with the statistics you can also find in non-partisan information sources who do not have the incentive to cull their information for partisan purposes.

Right now most mainstream journalists and news media outlets seem to favor the liberal version of history. Are all those people wrong?

Something very interesting is happening to journalism right now.

As you will no doubt be aware, newspapers are folding like...well, newspaper. And then TV stations, particularly the big traditional ones, like ABC, NBC and CBS are all under serious threat, because younger people don't watch them for news anymore. So they're desperate to survive, and they need money in order to do that.

In some countries, in fact, the government has already begun to subsidize conventional news sources heavily. This is a terrible idea, as it makes the journalists entirely dependent for their survival on pleasing the political party that has issued them their money. To criticize such a government is, for them, now suicide. So they no longer have any reason to do investigative journalism or "speak truth to power." If they do, they go down.

On the other side, where people actually ARE paying attention and the government is not subsidizing, the internet, a very few very powerful companies have monopolistic control. If you've been watching the Twitter, Facebook and Google investigations at all, you know what they do to control the news.
So very powerful media companies are now in control of the vast majority of information people are allowed to see. This is a real threat to democracy and voter rights, because democracy depends on the ability of the people to hold all elected officials accountable. But what if their misdeeds are kept invisible? What if their stories and distortions are rigorously promulgated by these monopolies, so that people do not have two-sided information upon which to base their judgments? What then?

And what when an American president picks a fight with the journalists? What when he calls them out for what they are: "fake news"? How are they going to respond to that? It's an existential threat to them, and one that they know makes them horribly vulnerable. Already, just because of the market, they are losing public attention and credibility. People are choosing the internet instead of them. If the President of the United States certifies them as fraudulent in the public eye, what happens to their jobs? Their power? Their future?

So only one party serves the journalists' interests. And it's not the one in power right now.

We've never had such a situation before. But I have watched recent events in the States with total disbelief. I can't believe, for example, that a government official could be caught red-handed, with hard evidence proving his influence-peddling, corruption and collusion with foreign powers, and that information not be reported in the mainstream media. And I can't believe that with all the evidence of election fraud, so many people continue to say to me, "There's absolutely no proof."

Sure there is. The media is not letting you have it. But I got it. And the media also has it. They just don't want the majority of Americans to have it. So astoundingly, they are succeeding quite magnificently in presenting the facade that it doesn't even exist at all.

A few years ago, I don't think they could have gotten away with it. The journalists still thought of themselves as "The Fourth Estate," the watchdogs of government, and the people's providers of the facts. A scandal of this size would have been front page of every newspaper, because it would have sold newspapers, and newspapers needed to be sold. Moreover, news agencies competed for stories, instead of colluding with the party line. They contradicted and challenged one another, testing each other''s evidence in the public eye. Their controversies sold papers. Now, journalists do not do that at all. They work instead on promulgating the party line, so that they can line up later for the benefits.

And the public? Well, they can all go to Hell in a handcart, as far as most of the media are presently concerned: "They'll believe what we tell them to believe," is the attitude. "We just don't report the news; we make ourselves indispensable by helping the party that is on our side keep the people where they want them to be, in terms of their knowledge and belief. We deliver the vote."

Well, they believe they do, anyway. Only, they aren't as good at it yet as they need to be. They didn't quite manage to deliver the vote as promised; hence the need for widespread, embarrassing voter fraud. But they're clearly getting more able at the game, and shortly the day will come when the story of the mainstream media will be the only story the American people are allowed to get. If they succeed at that, they survive; if they don't succeed, then the market will kill them, because nobody actually wants their product anymore. So their survival will depend utterly on their ability to show they can control public opinion and deliver an obedient citizenry to the overlords.

And believe me, they know that's how it is.

Then people who seek true reportage should seek whose personal interests are invested in the narratives. Remember, Manny, some journalists lose their lives by going into danger areas to seek primary evidence. Donald Trump studiously avoids personal risks.

[Lacewing]

Do you think that awareness is superior/significant to a LACK of that awareness?

It depensds on ones aim.

The question was put to YOU, Nick, about what YOU think. Not anyone else, nor anyone else's supposed "aim".

The mjority need slvery

To some people, YOU seem to be dependent on a certain slavery of the mind. You can claim that you have awareness about one thing or another, while claiming that most others do not have that awareness, and while insisting that the awareness you have is better and necessary -- that is the loop you are stuck in, and you go round and round, over and over, for years.

The goal of liberty is only possible When the value of objective conscience is respected. That is why the left must suppress it with indoctrinated slavery to its agenda which keeps its citizens like birds in their cage dependent on its master to define its rights,

"Left"... "Right"... are false ideas and limited labels. People are people... leaning in COUNTLESS directions. Your need and your agenda to make claims against a false idea and limited label reveals your own lack of awareness and mental slavery/need. Get beyond that, Nick.

There are no false claims.

That is another false claim. I guess you can't tell the difference. When you assert a claim about what someone else is seeing, believing, feeling... and that is not true (which is often the case with your claims about other people), then those are false claims. Your arguments are therefore BASED ON false claims, which reveal tactics you are enslaved to and dependent on: falseness, distortion, and ignorance.

[Nick_A]

Lacewing

"Left"... "Right"... are false ideas and limited labels. People are people... leaning in COUNTLESS directions. Your need and your agenda to make claims against a false idea and limited label reveals your own lack of awareness and mental slavery/need. Get beyond that, Nick.

Actually I’m not pointing out false ideas as much as finding out the path to truth beyond the domain of opinions. That is why I admire Simone Weil since she felt this need with more dedication than I do.

Excerpted from a letter Simone Weil wrote on May 15, 1942 in Marseilles, France to her close friend Father Perrin:

At fourteen I fell into one of those fits of bottomless despair that come with adolescence, and I seriously thought of dying because of the mediocrity of my natural faculties. The exceptional gifts of my brother, who had a childhood and youth comparable to those of Pascal, brought my own inferiority home to me. I did not mind having no visible successes, but what did grieve me was the idea of being excluded from that transcendent kingdom to which only the truly great have access and wherein truth abides. I preferred to die rather than live without that truth.

You seem to be content with accepting all opinions as equal. You are not attracted to the quality of understanding only possible in “the transcendent kingdom to which only the truly great have access and wherein truth abides.

Only certain people are inwardly free enough to have the need, intelligence, will, and conscious attention to pursue this direction of truth over pleasure.

Thomas Merton records being asked to review a biography of Weil (Simone Weil: A Fellowship in Love, Jacques Chabaud, 1964) and was challenged and inspired by her writing. “Her non-conformism and mysticism are essential elements in our time and without her contribution we remain not human.”

I admire her need to be human. Once she had outgrown her slavery to the ideals of Marxism, her inner freedom revealed the inner path to what she needed at the depth of her being in order to become human. She did what I am not capable of now. So rather than arguing about how people are lost in the world of opinions and what is wrong, I like to keep the option over for those who have chosen the path to truth over opinions and how they have gone about rising above fixation on opinions. It isn't a matter of being right or wrong but in becoming human.

Of course it is hated just like liberty is hated. It is poison to indoctrination. It is intolerable, divisive, and corrupts the youth of Athens. But regardless, I still support it as really the purpose of philosophy. or striving to remember what has been forgotten.

[Immanuel Can]

Then people who seek true reportage should seek whose personal interests are invested in the narratives. Remember, Manny, some journalists lose their lives by going into danger areas to seek primary evidence.

They used to. Not a lot do now. For one thing, the guy you despise, D. Trump, has put an end to American foreign wars. He's settled things down in the Middle East, too. A lot of places that used to be dangerous for journalists are not anymore.

But today's journalists are not Woodward and Bernstein. They're milquetoasts, journalistic lightweights, who risk nothing and rely for their foreign reports on foreign sources and the internet. They're not in the field ducking bullets anymore.

And what "risk 'would a journalist face if he reported on the Democrat electoral fraud? Yet they don't do it. Why not? It certainly exists.

[commonsense]

Certainly?

[Immanuel Can]

Certainly?

Hey, I've seen the testimony -- under oath, by affidavit, and with perjury penalties attached -- and the data charts showing masses of Biden votes suddenly appearing at 4 a.m., long after the polls were supposed to be closed, and the videos of boxes of mysterious stuff being brought in late at night, and the utterly improbably swings in the lead, and the evidence of the problems with the Dominion machines, and the surprising absence of the Dominion officials... and so on.

If I can find all that, why can't you?

It's because he who owns the search engine owns your knowledge. That's how it works now.

[commonsense]

Do you really believe what you think you saw at face value?

[Lacewing]

Nick, it seems that whenever you cannot answer the points that are put to you, you start babbling about Simone and how you worship her. It seems to be a security blanket for you.

"Left"... "Right"... are false ideas and limited labels. People are people... leaning in COUNTLESS directions. Your need and your agenda to make claims against a false idea and limited label reveals your own lack of awareness and mental slavery/need. Get beyond that, Nick.

Actually I’m not pointing out false ideas as much as finding out the path to truth beyond the domain of opinions.

No, you're actually basing your arguments on false and limited ideas/labels -- as in this case: "the left" -- that's how shallow your focus is. "The left" is nothing specific -- there could be countless forms and perspectives of such an idea, as with anything! Yet, you argue it is a solid thing/entity that you can blame/accuse/condemn as you see fit.

You claim to be seeking the "path to truth beyond the domain of opinions" as you're speaking your opinion about other opinions. It's absurd how you falsely frame what you say/do, as if glorifying your own mental/ego slavery to something it's clearly not at all.

...those who have chosen the path to truth over opinions...

Of course it is hated just like liberty is hated. It is poison to indoctrination. It is intolerable, divisive, and corrupts

Your ideas and comments demonstrate YOUR fixation, opinions, intolerance, and corrupt divisiveness. You project all of this onto other people because you are NOT truthful about who/what you really are/do.

[Immanuel Can]

Do you really believe what you think you saw at face value?

I should ask you the same thing.

[Nick_A]

Lacewing

No, you're actually basing your arguments on false and limited ideas/labels -- as in this case: "the left" -- that's how shallow your focus is. "The left" is nothing specific -- there could be countless forms and perspectives of such an idea, as with anything! Yet, you argue it is a solid thing/entity that you can blame/accuse/condemn as you see fit.

You claim to be seeking the "path to truth beyond the domain of opinions" as you're speaking your opinion about other opinions. It's absurd how you falsely frame what you say/do, as if glorifying your own mental/ego slavery to something it's clearly not at all.

The question of left vs right was brought up as they concern objective conscience. Morality is determined by the state and its laws for those who favor big government. Objective conscience just interferes with the dictates of a strong centralized government. Objective conscience, awakened by religious principles and contemplation only concern those needing freedom from secular government.

Both the opinions of governments and secularized religion become corrupt. However there is a minority who know that corruption is natural for the human condition so strive to transcend secularized secular opinions and experience the truth for conscious human potential.

Your ideas and comments demonstrate YOUR fixation, opinions, intolerance, and corrupt divisiveness. You project all of this onto other people because you are NOT truthful about who/what you are

I’m in good company. These same ideas expressing the effect of imagination which keeps secular life as it is were explained by both Jesus and Socrates. Both were killed. Certain ideas concerning the human condition are too divisive, insulting, and intolerable so their spokesman must be killed by those in power. This isn’t projection. It is just seeing the world as it is.

Liberty gives a person the opportunity to find themselves and their essential value. It is opposed by indoctrination keeping a person as an indoctrinated slave of the state. I choose freedom with the opportunity to become human.