The Stalin School of Fatification
One of the most creative contributions made by Stalinism to the global culture -- apart from the show trials and the gulag itself-- was the complicated and delicate art of airbushing and falsifying photos in order to match an evolving party line. Now you see 'em -- now you don't. Trotsky who? You know the drill.
Well, Uncle Joe maybe dead and gone, for sure, but his spirit lives on in at least one cheesy corner or two of the blogosphere!
Check this out from a self-described "unrepetant Marxist." I was rather horrified to see how what was supposedly my own image had been falsfied. This non-photo of me makes me appear as someone much more interesting and --in a strange way-- alluring than I am in real life! I can only imagine the gads of strange and needy women longing to frenetically rub this guy's bulging gut as if it were a ripe watermelon. I also like the plastic machine gun this huggable dude, whoever he is, has on the wall ( The only thing that bummed me out about this post was to learn -- sort of unexpectedly-- that my journalistic credibility is currently "in tatters." Oh my, this must mean my work would never be accepted for publication in People's World Weekly.
But wait... there's more. Turns out that another self-proclaimed Marxist blogger, on this very same day, also features a photo of me. Geez, is this what it feels like to be Jennifer Anniston?  While this one is actually me, it is, alas, accompanied by some unflattering text. We learn that I am not only a running-dog zionist tool of the ruling imperialist clique but yours truly is now also to be listed among a crew of "pomaded lardies" (to be honest, this real photo of me is a couple of years old and and my pomade is a bit thinned out by now -- if not the rest of me. Also glad to see my pal Christopher Hitchens made the same line-up).
But isn't it lovely that in the very same moment we've got two, count'em TWO revolutionaries -- you know, those impassioned battlers against all forms of discrimination and oppression and who will lead us to a more compassionate and equal New Society -- resorting to fat fotos as their line of argument? It's no accident, comrades, as Stalin would say. Intellectual and political bankruptcy can be viral.Â
I'm not offended in the least. After a lifetime of pudginess I've embraced my corpulence and made the best of it by eating with great gusto and frequency without having to worry or fret. If I were ticked, I'd hardly be inclined to link to these comrades and give them the free traffic and, um..exposure...they'd otherwise not have. But, frankly, I just couldn't resist. I think their posts say much, much more about them than I ever could and I wanted them to speak loudly and widely (no pun intended).
Now, time for a snack.
May 4th, 2006 at 3:21 am
Hey, can I get in on this action? Every time our resident Bobsy twins on the know-nothing right and dogmatic left (you know who you are W and E) quote from my Web bio and say that living in France disqualifies me from commenting on the issues of the day, they neglect to reproduce my photo:
http://www.michaelbalter.com/author.php
Full disclosure: I usually wear glasses.
May 4th, 2006 at 3:40 am
I am diisgusted by this attack on my hero Joseph Stalin. He was a leader in bringing the wonders of digital photography to the world. Heard of Photoshop ? It is a capitalist version of Fotochop which Comrade Stalin personally invented using the advanced science of Dialectical and Historical Materialism. Fotochop was originally developed as a tool to help the working class envision the world as it should be, untainted by the distortions of the capitalist marketplace. It is no accident that most people are completely unaware of this.
May 4th, 2006 at 5:34 am
Marc, you just gotta ignore Proyect. I read him when he posted on lbo, and learned to ignore him then.
The one unpleasant trait the left has in abundance is their intolerant way of disagreeing with each other. Yuck.
May 4th, 2006 at 6:26 am
Wow, a two-fer. Within this post and comments, one lefty criticizes Marc Cooper (pragmatic leftist) and another one criticizes a person whom I presume must be me (a centrist) [along with Eleanore?]. I’ve never said that living in France disqualifies someone from commenting on issues. I may have hinted that some individuals who live in France may not be qualified or rational enough to make reasonable conclusions on issues. Please be careful with facts, as am I.
The only statement that I made on looks in the past was that a certain science writer needed to comb his hair. Here’s a documented and updated picture of him, located on the second row and second column.
Marc, I knew that picture wasn’t you. A surf fisherman has a tan extending beyond his lower arms.
For the first time, I’m honored to reveal how I look. Please refer to this top left picture.
Given the three link limit, I must continue onto a new comment….
May 4th, 2006 at 6:26 am
Continuing….
After some research, I’ve narrowed down the pictures of reg and present three possibilities on which you can vote (vote twice if you’re a Democrat!) An accurate presentation of reg is possibly (A) this, (B) maybe this one, or is it (C) this one?
May 4th, 2006 at 6:28 am
Well, the reference to Stalinism would be more persuasive if I wasn’t a raging Trot – a State Cap., no less.
We learn that I am not only a running-dog zionist tool of the ruling imperialist clique but yours truly is now also to be listed among a crew of “pomaded lardies”
I don’t believe I referred to you as a running-dog zionist tool of the ruling imperialist clique. That’s the sort of caricature of left-wing language, of revolutionary left language in particular, that reactionaries retail. Now, why you would resort to this sort of nonsense is beyond me. But if you’re going round slandering people as antisemites based on utterly spurious extrapolations from their texts, then I’m sure you can handle the fat jokes.
Really, you’ve got a lot of nerve whining about it.
May 4th, 2006 at 6:40 am
zzzzzzzzzzzzz
Why anyone gives a second thought to Louis Proyect is beyond me..
May 4th, 2006 at 7:04 am
The most Stalinist behaviour I’ve seen through the last few years, starting with Michael Walzer’s “decent left” essay, comes from the purge! purge! pur
May 4th, 2006 at 7:05 am
(hit send) purge! “decent left” including sometimes the owner of this blog.
May 4th, 2006 at 7:06 am
And the most creative contribution of Stalinism was definitely the Popular Front. Say what you will about Robeson’s sympathies, he could sing.
May 4th, 2006 at 7:36 am
Randy, please feel no urge to read or respond to my comments. You add nothing of substance to the discussion with such responses here and elsewhere on the internet where I have seen that others have similar problems with your trite attacks and extremely phony intellectual sophistication. It’s not me–it’s you. I think that the technical medical term is wacked. A mental health care professional discusses this condition here and here . Don’t start it with me again until after you’ve sought counseling.
May 4th, 2006 at 7:49 am
[BIG YAWN]
May 4th, 2006 at 7:53 am
There’s proof. (Psycho)
May 4th, 2006 at 8:10 am
Woody,
This is going to be one of those rare occasions when I will actually respond to you as I’ve been trying to make a practice of ignoring your flatulent attacks on me and the other contributors here who do not share your views. Why feed a troll?
I linked sarcastically to your ad hominem, irrelevant and ultimately puerile attack on reg by posting to pictures of freaks. Perhaps in Woody world that kind of nonsense adds to the discussion. Not in the world of adults.
I have been attacked on an ad hominem basis because you presume that I should think the way you think. You don’t know squat about my life, Woody, so you have absolutely no basis to presume how I think.
You have accused me of anti-Americanism for not following your bovine party-line way of thinking. You have accused me of pseudo-intellectualism in what can only be described as an orgy of subconscious envy. God forgive me for speaking more than one language, loving to travel and having the ability to look outside my own narrow interests.
Your obsession with calling me a pyscho speaks ill only of you.
I have flushed stools, picked things out of my ears and navel with a cotton swab and broken wind all of which are far more capable of erudition than anything you have ever posted here or anywhere else.
From this point forward as far as I’m concerned you don’t exist.
May 4th, 2006 at 8:45 am
What’s wrong with pomade?
May 4th, 2006 at 9:01 am
“Lenin:” Checked out your site. Your and most of your commenters give me the chills. It reminds why totalitarianism tends to rise from the left at least as often as from the right. Getting that reaction is part of the thrill for people like you, I’ve come to realize.
May 4th, 2006 at 9:37 am
Paul – Surely you’re not taken in by this ‘totalitarianism’ myth? I suggest you have a read of Ian Kershaw on the matter. Or, let me essay on it for a bit. It is very effective as a regulator of ideology (’extremism’ = ‘totalitarianism’, so moderation is A Good Thing), but it’s a very poor method of comparative analysis. In particular, the similarities between Stalinism and Nazism are actually rather superficial, focusing as they do on certainly overlapping methods of rule. About the origins and structure of each regime, ‘totalitarianism’ theory is astonishingly glib. For instance, the tendency to focus on a state-run economy as an indicator of totalitarianism misses a more fundamental dimension, which is the reasons for state intervention in each case, the scale and the outcome. Hitler’s government was given to privatising where it could, and its plans were often drawn up by large segments of capital, who made up along with the army, the SS-police bloc and the Nazi party a part of the power elite. In Stalin’s case, this could not have been the case since the Bolsheviks had already eliminated independent capitalist class power. This granted the emergent bureacracy a freedom of manouevre in terms of state-led economic growth that was denied Hitler. And while Hitler’s interventionist state was largely aimed at reconsolidating the power of the German capitalist class, both politically and economically, Stalin’s was geared toward development in military and economic competition with the West. That’s just one example, and these are significant differences. One could find ample overlap between fascism and colonialism, or the US South’s racial hierarchy – as indeed the Nazis themselves did, and Arendt did in earlier versions of her text. For these and other reasons, historians of fascism like Kershaw and Hans Mommsen have rejected the ‘totalitarianism’ thesis as superficial and unscientific. I think it’s main function, as I say, is to police ideology.
Authoritarianism can certainly emerge from the left, but I think it’s important to remember Primo Levi’s remark about this: socialism is a project that went tragically wrong, whereas fascism is a project that went tragically right (I’m paraphrasing).
Anyway, if this is the standard of commentary here, I’m going to leave in a huff. If that’s too soon, I’ll leave in a minute and a huff.
May 4th, 2006 at 9:43 am
Thanks for that lesson in Marxist-Leninist thought, lenin [sic], but you never pronounce on the question of whether Stalin was authoritarian under your definition. Do tell us where you stand on that question.
May 4th, 2006 at 10:23 am
I’m taken in by the severe blinkeredness of the comments. Half-blind moral certainty sets my head on fire.
May 4th, 2006 at 10:35 am
If Stalin wasn’t authoritarian who the hell would be?
May 4th, 2006 at 10:48 am
lenin, you and your pals remind me of Gollum.
May 4th, 2006 at 12:04 pm
btw lenin is right that there are lots of differences between Nazism and Stalinism, including some of the ones he mentions. But that doesn’t stop both from being totalitarian in the usual sense of the word, which refers to a method of ruling over a population, and involves tightly controlling the economy, culture including art and literature, social life, and all political activities, forcing everyone to conform to a dogmatic conformism and squelching all individual liberties. So yes, both were totalitarian, which is what they had in common despite the differences.
May 4th, 2006 at 12:05 pm
I meant to say conform to a dogmatic political line.
May 4th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
Off Topic…but required:
Randy Paul, I merely carried on and responded to the thought started by your buddy, Michael Balter, who was injecting a somewhat humorous (to a liberal) dig at me, and I also was responding to the next comment by reg, who was making a sarcastic reference about his “love for Stalin.” I appreciated their light remarks.
Rather than let those three comments pass, you took a dig at me–and, that was completely unnecessary and was a complete distraction from Marc’s post, which does include and benefits from humor at times, even though you are clearly unaware that such an emotion exists. (I suspect that reg appreciated the picture of the guy kissing Stalin’s bust.)
You must not be very smart, as you believe, because you should have known that I would respond to your attack–and, you better believe that I will respond intensely if you do it again. Try to have more self-discipline and don’t even be tempted to read or respond to my comments in the future–as you previously committed to yourself before failing again.
Oh, and you completely mischaracterized my views on you. I know, like, and respect friends and family who are multilingual and extensively traveled, as you claim to be–but, they never turned into pompous asses. That’s the difference. It’s not what you do–it’s what you are. Oh, and please, please don’t flatter yourself by thinking that I have some subconscius envy of your intellect. I have witnessed very little of that coming from your direction.
I responded to you here because you chose to publicly attack me at this place rather than contact me privately. But, now, if you have an ounce respect for Marc’s site and have any reasoning left untainted by the need to keep this up due to your feelings of inferiority or inadequacy–then, let this drop and stay out of my business going forward.
Go see a shrink. Until you get some help, I’ve had it with you. You are a waste of time for me and a lot of people.
May 4th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
A real world example of why the debate over the notion of “totalitarianism” involves false premises: Famous story of Russian dissidents travelling in the States in the 80s and realizing that between Samizdats and word of mouth, there was more critical analysis of their “totalitarian” reality than in “Democratic” America.
The notion was also disproved, relating to the above, by the failure of Kirkpatrick’s thesis that “authoritarian” societies with relatively free media were preferable to “totalitarian” societies. It was in the latter that the systems could more easily crumble. As Chomsky among others put it, thought control is far more intricate and succesful in “free” societies than in so-callled totalitarian societies.
For more on this see an old piece of mine
http://www.counterpunch.org/cummings01052004.html
May 4th, 2006 at 12:28 pm
I love Louis Proyect’s film reviews. He sees some great, obscure films and gives them some great insightful reviews. He’s no National Review Online, mind you, but I like it.
May 4th, 2006 at 1:27 pm
I think Proyect’s writings are a helluva lot more interesting than Cooper’s close friends Horowtiz or Hitchens. The latter’s bizarre anti-Juan Cole tactics have been especially bizarre.
May 4th, 2006 at 1:29 pm
[STUPENDOUS YAWN]
May 4th, 2006 at 2:08 pm
So J – the really bad societies without free media are actually preferable because the system can crumble…and, of course, be replaced with societies with relatively free media where the mind control is worse ?
I guess that kind of thinking is a major reason why I don’t bother with “the world’s greatest intellectual”.
(For the record, I’ve argued here and other places that notions like “evil empire” and “totalitarianism” were not useful descriptions of the USSR in its later evolutions – if only because in the Reaganite world view, circa 1980, a Mikhail Gorbachev – who was essentially a social democrat in “Bolshevik” clothes – would have been an impossible figure to rise to power. That said, I think the notion that thought control is worse or “more successful” in the United States than in, say, North Korea or other totalitarian societies is about as stupid a notion as I’ve ever heard in my life. I guess I’m not enough of a world-class intellectual to get the complexity of that one.)
May 4th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
reg -
Yeah. As a mand said, there are some ideas that are so stupid you have to have gone to college to believe them. I did go to college – and there were times I flirted with believing them!
May 4th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
reg -
Yeah. As a man said, some ideas are so stupid you have to have gone to college to believe them. I did go to college – and I flirted with believing them!
May 4th, 2006 at 2:22 pm
Double post alert!
May 4th, 2006 at 3:14 pm
Thanks Lenin for weighing in (no pun ) and proving what a peddler of rubbish you are. The only relevant difference between Stalinism and Nazism is sorting out how many tens of millions perished as a result of each system. Other than that, Im flatly unimpressed by lesser nuances. Here’s my favorite line from him: “In Stalin’s case, this could not have been the case since the Bolsheviks had already eliminated independent capitalist class power.” There’s a slight historic error in this formulation as Mr. Lenin (who claims to be a Trotskyist) should know: It was Stalin himself who achieved the most in eliminating the Bolsheviks. By 1937 or so, just what Bolsheviks are we talking about? Most had already been tried and shot. What’s astounding about Lenin’s back-door defense of Soviet totalitarianism (oops I mean authoritarianism) is that if u are one of the many millions who wakes up dead one day, or imprisoned in the gulag it really doesnt matter a fat fuck if you are there because the national engineers of your particular society have failed or succeeded. You’re just as dead eithe way. Unless, of course, you can manage — as Mr. Lenin has– to actually become part of the Living Dead.
A few words to young Aaron… I want to make sure Ive got this all down correctly. You come onto this blog under your own power and feel compelled to make your very first comment an insulting one that impugns my integrity and ignores my rather public history. OK, that’s ur right to be both rude and ignorant. Then over the next handful of days or a week or so you read and engage the blog enough to make…oh… about 50 more comments! Maybe more, I havent bothered to tote them up. And now you write that, in spite of your feverish participation on this blog, you nevertheless much prefer reading the (inane) ramblings of Unrepentant Marxist and full-time sectarian Louis Proyect over what I put on on this blog– which is also certainly your God-given right. The only part I havent quite figured out is why in hell, then, Im paying for bandwith to host your continuing comments? What are you, my ward?
One thing you might try is engaging in comments with Proyect’s readers a little more and hanging around here a little less… Though I understand that it’s difficult to engage readers who pretty much dont exist.
May 4th, 2006 at 3:32 pm
Marc…. Yeah, but looking on the bright side, you can now legally claim Aaron as a dependent on your income taxes.
May 4th, 2006 at 3:45 pm
Reg- I don’t know how you infer that from what I’m saying. I’m just saying the conceptual optic of totalitarianism, in a globalized world, simply doesn’t exist. Even North Koreans are able, I presume to “Read Pravda correctly” as Russians learned to do at the heart of the Brezhnev era.
I don’t think “democracy” or “totalitarianism” or some such are the sum total of how one measures a society. Many totalitarian societies have been more free than some alleged democracies.
May 4th, 2006 at 4:09 pm
“make your very first comment an insulting one that impugns my integrity and ignores my rather public history. OK, that’s ur right to be both rude and ignorant”
THis is a typical Marc Cooper tactic, pretend those on the left who disagree with him are ‘young’. Ok, I’m slightly younger than you, but “young”? Uhm, no you’re guessing wrong their cappy.
It’s ironic after your attack on Yoshie’s ideas as ‘anti-semitic’ that you now are sensitive about people being critical about you. And as I recall correctly, Lenin called you out on your false accusations you made about Galloway a while back. I guess the only time false accusations aren’t ok in your book are when Amy Goodman makes them. Gosh you are full of double standards.
And it’s not fair, I have given you credit Marc. You make good strong arguments for justifying the US’ reneging on its commitment to pay reparations to Vietnam after its two decade attack on the country’s people and infrastructure with the most powerful weaponry in the world.
May 4th, 2006 at 4:10 pm
Says JCumming: “Many totalitarian societies have been more free than some alleged democracies.”
Didn’t Orwell say it better? Slavery is freedom.
Cummings, you take the cake with that one. That’s why I said some time ago, thank God YOU dont have your hands anywhere near the levers of power. I shudder at the mere thought of the frightful expediences you would decree if you ad the power!
Im not going to ask you to explain your statement… Ive been reading apologia for dictatorship for all of my adult life and I know it all by rote.
I will point out that your, indeed, Orwellian formulation derives directly from your privilege of living in a very free and democratic Canada. It’s easy, isn’t it, to sit on ur arse and enjoy those benefits while telling… who? Cubans? that they should appreciate how fundamentally free they really are.. you know with a ration card worth 700 calories a day and a daily edition of Granma to use as toilet paper. Anyway, with no malice, I can say that you sentence above is the single dumbest one line I have seen on this blog. Shame on you.
May 4th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
Aaron… ur delusional. Ive never written a word either way on reparations. But I suppose you’re infering that because I have called the Vietnamese govt totalitarian? No doubt.
Ur right, I dont know ur age. But you do a great job of sounding young, brash, impudent and ignorant.
Give me a reason not to fulfill ur fantasy and click u off.
May 4th, 2006 at 4:18 pm
[...] No, make that the line of the year… from one of our more rigidly ideological commenters: [...]
May 4th, 2006 at 4:40 pm
Nominees for the best quip are reg, rosedog, Michael and Marc.
May I have the envelope please: And the winner is ROSEDOG for “…you can now legally claim Aaron as a dependent on your income taxes.”
May 4th, 2006 at 4:44 pm
“But I suppose you’re infering that because I have called the Vietnamese govt totalitarian? No doubt.”
Oh, so you think we should have paid reparations to a government that you regarded as terribly repressive and totalitarian, etc, or what was the point of raising such an issue to attack someone for stating that the Vietnam invasion of Cambodia had positive purposes in the first place? Who says that supporting the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia perse requires one to turn a blind eye to repressive features of the Vietnamese government? Aren’t you the one whose sounding brash, impudent, and ignorant when you attack people with no evidence that they are turning a blind eye to something?
I see Jordi as a heckuva lot more reasonable than Horowitz or Hitchens in argumentation, what gives with your allergic reaction to Jordi?
By your standards, Reg must be a little 2 year old, what with all his swearing and name calling against Woody, GM, myself and anyone else whose arguments he finds himself disagreeing with.
May 4th, 2006 at 4:45 pm
I could use Marc as a deduction…a failed investment!
May 4th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
“Many totalitarian societies have been more free than some alleged democracies.”
For the record, I don’t believe that he and I are related…
May 4th, 2006 at 5:12 pm
hitler the socialist, stalin the communist and mao the marxist….whew, what a great collection of uncles. and then there’s always benito the friendly fascist. throw in today’s minor league players like castro, lil’ kim, chavez and maoist this and maoist that, and we have quite the cast of characters proving the merits of the hard left. and lets not forget its new evil spawn–radical islam, with hitler and stalin as idols. talk about a failed business model!
with hundreds of millions dead under their belts who would figure that most of their paraphernalia would be such big sellers. you got to love capitalism!
May 4th, 2006 at 5:15 pm
OK…I understand how the statement can be percieved incorrectly, and it was intentionally provocative. What I mean is that in terms of actual choice of leadership, legislation and others, for example, Tito’s “totalitarian” Yugoslavia was far more free than the fake democracies of Central America in the 80s, Nicarague nonwithstanding.
I appreciate the stern lecture, but I’m sure you felt different when working with a government that got quite a bit of help (though not enough) from the GDR.
May 4th, 2006 at 5:16 pm
Well, let’s try it this way…..
You’re poor, and you have cancer.
In the U.S., you are entitled to die.
In Cuba, you get heath care.
Now, where are you more free?
May 4th, 2006 at 5:19 pm
A completely unscientific comparison there Wall, it should be Cuba vs. Haiti, in which case of course Cuba is the better place to be. Ya don’t, at least in circles of people who take scientific comparison seriously, compare the wealthiest country in the world with a poor one.
HOWEVER, actually it depends on what part of the country you’re from If you’re from Mississipi, you’re better off in Cuba if you’re poor at least. Ditto Washington DC…where infant mortality rates are far higher than in Cuba for starters
May 4th, 2006 at 5:36 pm
I’d rather be in New York than Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia or Cuba.
May 4th, 2006 at 5:53 pm
wall,
you can’t be serious………
May 4th, 2006 at 6:33 pm
It wasn’t my intention to be scientific. If the poster who rather clumsily suggested that when we throw around words like “democracy” and “totaliarianism” things get relative fast. I’d be forced to agree.
I wouldn’t want the U.S. to pay reparations to Vietnam, as long as their goverment is as bad as it is. I would like to see the U.S. issue a full apology for the millions it slaughtered there; and I’d like to see Marc Cooper applaud Jane Fonda for the heroic actions She took in opposisition to the war; instead of smirking about her with his neocon buddies like Hitchens.
Thanks to the likes of Hitchens, the Iraqis are now helping themselves to the finest Democracy that American Business and Military interests will allow. What does that have to do with freedom? We shall see.
I remember news reports of the early elections after the fall of the Soviet Union. “The Bush (1) administration is worried about the effect these elections might have on Democracy.” Now THAT’s Orwellian.
At any rate, should it shock us that some Nations, whatever flag or mantle they rap themselves in; might do better in some areas of freedom, worse in others?
May 4th, 2006 at 7:35 pm
Yeah JCummings has to be the most deluded in the left gutter. Here’s your sign.
May 4th, 2006 at 7:50 pm
” I wouldn’t want the U.S. to pay reparations to Vietnam, as long as their goverment is as bad as it is.”
You have nothing to worry about, the US government will never give Vietnam reparations for bombing the piss out of it and killing god knows how many millions of Vietnamese to save its popular revolution.
May 4th, 2006 at 8:19 pm
My worry is, given our current leadership, we will end up going for money to THEM.
For what it’s worth: It has always seemed to me forgotten that in the society portrayed in 1984 there is a functioning and seemingly free press. Newspapers abound, but they’re all filled with nothing but gossip, tabloid tripe, and astrology.
May 4th, 2006 at 8:24 pm
Only seems fair, ya bomb the piss out of a nation,kill and maim millions…should pay reparations.
May 4th, 2006 at 10:39 pm
hahahahah!!! ah this is awesome. It’s 4 person army of Marxist gnomes.
Snack time indeed.
May 5th, 2006 at 12:00 am
I guess the real question is what is worse, killing millions of your own people, or, killing millions of people in other countries – but failing to record it in major corporate media? Or, perhaps, it is more noble to impoverish people in other countries so that you and yours can live opulently – rather than impoverishment of your own people on a grand scale? Ah choices….
As far as form of government I guess, with the present and past predominant forms, it must depend on how a certain elite portray themselves. Either with obvious centralism which does not benefit the people, or with a form of representation which does not benefit the people. One that has an obvious conformity with poverty and disenfranchiment, or one that has a form of diveristy with poverty and disenfranchment. Choices, choices….I chose neither of them, do you mind? Either way those few always seem to laugh all the way to the bank.
May 5th, 2006 at 2:30 am
So J – the really bad societies without free media are actually preferable because the system can crumble…and, of course, be replaced with societies with relatively free media where the mind control is worse
The logical conclusion appears to be that voting for a system which cracks down on freedom of expression is therefore a good thing, since it breeds incisive underground communication, rather than bland corporate media.
So, er, vote Bush!
P.
PS: Marc, glad to see you’ve made an enemy of Lenny, the Commissar from Ballymena.
May 5th, 2006 at 2:49 pm
Paul,
I was curious if you ever heard the name of Edward Bernays – he is known as the “father of public relations.” In response to President Wilsons Creel commission on the subject of “how we might better win” (subjects) in the sense of the interest of elites in gov.
This, of course, resulted in agreement with most of the wars that followed, etc. You can still get his book, it is an interesting read, on how to subvert thought processes to your favor. If you think this is not being employed it just proves the job has been done well!
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