couldn't have said it better meself

[Guest guest]

but don't worry, its all ok..

there's bound to be good sales at Wal Mart this weekend.....

 

June 28, 2006

 

Watch Us, Wiretap Us, Search Us, Jail Us ...

The High Price of American Gullibility

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

 

What explains the gullibility of Americans, a gullibility that has

mired the US in disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and which

promises war with Iran, North Korea and a variety of other targets if

neoconservatives continue to have their way?

 

Part of the explanation is that millions of conservatives are thrilled

at the opportunity to display their patriotism and to show their

support for their country. Bush's rhetoric is perfectly designed to

appeal to this desire. " You are with us or against us " elicits a blind

and unquestioning response from people determined to wear their

patriotism on their sleeves. " You are with us or against us " vaccinates

Americans against factual reality and guarantees public acceptance of

administration propaganda.

 

Another part of the explanation is that emotional appeals have grown

the stronger as the ability of educated people to differentiate fact

from rhetoric declines. The Bush administration blamed 9/11 on foreign

intelligence failures; yet, the administration has convinced about half

of the public that mass surveillance of American citizens is the

solution!

 

Many Americans have turned a blind eye to the administration's illegal

and unconstitutional spying on the grounds that, as they themselves are

doing nothing wrong, they have nothing to fear. If this is the case,

why did our Founding Fathers bother to write the Constitution? If the

executive branch can be trusted not to abuse power, why did Congress

pass legislation establishing a panel of federal judges (ignored by the

Bush administration) to oversee surveillance? If President Bush can

decide that he can ignore statutory law, how does he differ from a

dictator? If Bush can determine law, what is the role of Congress and

the courts? If " national security " is a justification for elevating the

power of the executive, where is his incentive to find peaceful

solutions?

 

Emotional appeals to fear and to patriotism have led close to half of

the population to accept unaccountable government in the name of " the

war on terrorism. " What a contradiction it is that so many Americans

have been convinced that safety lies in their sacrifice of their civil

liberties and accountable government.

 

If so many Americans cannot discern that they have acquiesced to

conditions from which tyranny can arise, how can they understand that

it is statistically impossible for the NSA's mass surveillance of

Americans to detect terrorists?

 

Floyd Rudmin, a professor at a Norwegian university, writing in

CounterPunch (May 24, 2006) applies the mathematics of conditional

probability, known as Bayes' Theorem, to demonstrate that the NSA's

surveillance cannot successfully detect terrorists unless both the

percentage of terrorists in the population and the accuracy rate of

their identification are far higher than they are. He correctly

concludes that " NSA's surveillance system is useless for finding

terrorists. "

 

The surveillance is, however, useful for monitoring political

opposition and stymieing the activities of those who do not believe the

government's propaganda.

 

Another reason for the gullibility of Americans is their lack of

alternative information to government propaganda. The independence of

print and TV media disappeared in the media consolidations of the

1990s. Today a handful of large corporations own the traditional media.

The wealth of these corporations consists of broadcast licenses, which

the companies hold at the government's discretion.

 

Newspapers are run by corporate executives, whose eyes are on

advertising revenue and who shun contentious reporting. The result is

that the traditional media are essentially echo chambers for government

propaganda.

 

The Internet and the foreign news media accessible through the Internet

are the sources of alternative information. Many Americans have not

learned to use and to rely on the Internet for information.

 

Many Americans find the government's message much more reassuring than

the actual facts. The government's message is: " America is virtuous.

Virtuous America was attacked by evil terrorists. America is protecting

itself by going to war and overthrowing regimes that sponsor or give

shelter to terrorists, erecting in their place democracies loyal to

America. "

 

Sugar-coated propaganda doesn't present Americans with the emotional

and mental stress associated with the hard facts.

 

In National Socialist Germany, by the time propaganda lost its grip,

Germans were in the hands of a police state. It was too late to take

corrective measures. Not even the military could correct the disastrous

policies of the executive. In the end, Germany was destroyed. Does a

similar fate await Americans?

 

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the

Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street

Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He

is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be reached at:

paulcraigroberts

 

 

" NOTICE: Due to Presidential Executive Orders, the National Security Agency may

have read this email without warning, warrant, or notice. They may do this

without any judicial or legislative oversight. You have no recourse nor

protection save to call for the impeachment of the current President. "