The Slippery Slope - Surveillance

The subject matter of this post is intensely provocative, so I have packed it with as many links as possible from recent mainstream sources to help illustrate that the statements made are based on fact, and are happening now. Click on the orange highlighted parts to learn more.

Ever since 9/11/2001, we have been sliding down the slippery slope on the issue of domestic surveillance, towards an ever more pervasive, and invasive, surveillance state. The current scandal over the General Petraeus affair would never have gained the attention it has if the FBI hadn't made use of the vastly expanded powers it has been quietly acquiring over the last eleven years. Before 9-11, we would not have seen a complaint from a well-connected socialite about supposedly harassing e-mails trigger a full-scale cyber-investigation allowing the FBI to hack into private e-mail accounts, read thousands of e-mails and expose personal activity that was neither criminal nor a security risk. But now in today's post-9/11 total surveillance environment, it is problematic to even suggest that the FBI (or the NSA, or the CIA, or your local police department for that matter) ought not to be exercising such power over American citizens.

Under the all-purpose justification of "fighting terrorism," surveillance technologies have been developed and rolled out, like a steamroller, at a rapid pace. Typically, the technology is first introduced for military applications on the battlefield, i.e. not anywhere around here. For example, drones. First, we are shown how successful they are in a war zone at giving the good guys greater ability to detect the bad guys. In the case of drones, they can not only detect but also kill the bad guys, efficiently and safely (for the good guys). The mainstream news media helpfully airs lots of programming/promotion to help us get used to the new technology.



Then, with little fanfare, drones are introduced domestically, for use by government agencies. Of course the purpose of the new technology is at first entirely anti-terrorism, but soon that is expanded to drug dealers, illegal immigrants, search and rescue, and of course, catching cattle rustlers.

From there it trickles down to local law enforcement, and next thing you know, big cities are getting a supply of drones, developed and marketed by military contractors, and often acquired with financial aid from the Department of Homeland Security. Everyone can appreciate how great the drones are at enhancing surveillance of criminals while allowing the officers to remain safe. We are assured that the drones used by local police will not be weaponized, except that it quickly becomes obvious that they will be. They won't be used for spying on citizens, except that they will be.

Again, mainstream news is there, basically passing along press releases from the companies that make the drones, reassuring us that this is all cool stuff that we will love, and don't worry, your privacy concerns are being addressed.



The slippery slope has already become an avalanche. The issue of encroachment on the civil liberties of ordinary citizens is further compounded by the increasingly overt militarization of many police forces, again encouraged and supported by Dept. of Homeland Security, leading directly an increasing frequency of highly aggressive actions by police in response to non-terrorist, even non-criminal situations. Add to that the NSA's vast expansion of its domestic surveillance capacity and the government's insistence that it has the right to operate such programs in secret. This has led to a situation right out of Kafka, in which the Justice Department denies any challenge to the legality of being subjected to surveillance unless the subject can prove the government was spying on him, but that can't be proven because the government classifies that information as secret.

And we haven't even gotten into RFID tracking and fingerprinting of children, cell phone tracking, vehicle tracking, the amassing of biometric databases, and of course the security cameras which seem to be in use everywhere in spite of their dubious value; and the list goes on.

Where are we going with all this? We are now seeing official, taxpayer-funded surveillance and data mining of ordinary citizens expanding to stunning, unprecedented levels. There is not even a pretense anymore of using the terrorism threat to justify such radical departures from what our society used to be.

Who benefits? Who decides? We can only say for certain it is not you or me.

Here comes the typical comment: Why should I care? It doesn't affect me. I have nothing to hide anyway.

Answer: #1: Ask General Petraeus.

Answer #2: Think about someone besides yourself, who feels their privacy is important, and with good reason, say a victim of domestic violence, or a political activist.

Answer #3: Information is power, and power corrupts. We're only part way down this slippery slope. The U.S. is descending into a vast surveillance state in which privacy and civil liberties are disappearing. Do you really want to see us go all the way?

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Further reading:
Bob Koehler "The Buzzing Wasps"

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Together On The Journey

In this blog, I hope to not only to search for the deeper truth behind the appearances of current events, but also to pursue the idea that personal transformation and spiritual development, person by person,  are essential for there to be any hope of turning around the deterioration of our society as a whole.

The story of Arthur Boorman, a man with a lot of serious health issues who changed his life in a few months with the help of an unconventional yoga instructor, is a wonderful example of this. His story is incredibly inspirational in all the best ways. Arthur shows us:

• that it is possible for ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things;
• you can overcome the most difficult obstacles, and you can exceed what you think of as your limitations;
• hard work and determination are essential;

But there is more to this. There are lessons that go much deeper, and things for all of us to seriously take to heart.

Did you have a moment when you watched Arthur's story where you thought about saying to a loved one or friend, "Look, see, Arthur did it, what's your problem?"
Sounds un-compassionate and judgmental, and it is. Yet people respond this way all the time: "I choose to eat healthy. What's your problem?" "Why don't you just exercise your free will like I did, and choose to quit smoking/drinking/eating junk food/watching the crap on TV?"

This kind of response misses the critical point that changing behaviors of a lifetime is often incredibly difficult, especially when resisted by the pressures of lifelong habits and addictions, poor self-esteem and other emotional issues, poor education, financial difficulties, as well as the influence of family, community, culture, media and commercial psychological warfare.



Arthur's story teaches us another whole set of lessons. Look at what happened:

• Arthur realized he needed to change.
• He realized he couldn't do it alone, he needed help,
• He reached out, searched and found help. 
• He accepted the help that awakened him to his own sense of personal power, and inspired him to do the work he needed to do to revitalize his health. 

The steps he took afterwards are also very important. When he appeared in this and other videos, he sent some vital messages:

• he expressed his gratitude for the help he got;
• he turned it around to help others by inspiring them with his story.

We all need to hear this, because each of us may some day find ourselves on either side of this situation: we may be the one who needs help, or we may be the one who can offer it.

Arthur is very strong and courageous; he struggled and worked incredibly hard. But part of his strength was in opening himself up to being helped, overcoming fear, isolation and feeling hopelessly stuck in his troubles. It also takes strength to change your priorities in life, which Arthur had to do. On his testimonial page at the DDP Yoga website, he talks about realizing he had to change his eating habits, and says, "I was communicating to my wife and kids –the people I love the most in the world – that I wanted that pizza more than I wanted the years that I would not be able to spend with them."

One of the hardest things about making big changes is distancing yourself from the foods, places, activities and especially people who are not aligned with your new priorities. But Arthur's experience shows that if you are open to it and you ask for it, you will find there are people out there who are ready and willing to help empower you to be the most happy, healthy and awakened person you can be. He also shows that if you think about it, you could be that person for somebody else.

One of those people is Crystal, who has had her own experience with overcoming many serious health issues. Her journey of restoring herself to vibrant good health has led her to create an incredible website/blog, The Queen's Table:
http://thequeenstable.blogspot.com/
In it, she provides a huge resource library of references to books, videos, websites and people that were helpful to her in her own efforts. She is also full of compassion and understanding that everyone is at a different stage of their own journey, and we all need inspiration and support.

Self-empowerment is a central concept here, but I think there should be no distinction between that and spiritual growth. Arthur did not become disdainful, condescending or otherwise egotistical as a result of his success, nor did Crystal. In fact, one frequently witnesses a huge expansion of peace, love, wisdom, humility, compassion, gratitude and forgiveness accompanying such personal transformations. It is all part of the same trip, and we are all taking the ride.




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Robert Koehler: Peace Journalist

I feel very fortunate to have discovered Bob Koehler, a veteran journalist who for many years has turned his talents toward commentary with a mission. His writing has been very inspirational to me, and I would say Bob has figured prominently in motivating me to go forward with this blog.

Bob speaks his mind, with his heart fully engaged, on matters of conscience. He observes and comments on current events, then drills down into them to find the deeper relevance to our humanity. He unfailingly takes a stand firmly on the side that so few seem to consider: the one of compassion, of forgiveness, and most insistently, of non-violent conflict resolution. He insists that we take a hard look at the callousness, the inhumanity, of much of our modern society, but he is also fully confident in our ability to transcend it.

As a career journalist in Chicago, he has the credentials to back up his analysis of current events. He has been an award-winning reporter, editor, and for many years a columnist. Regarding his column, I'll let him describe it for you:

"Since 1999, I’ve written a column that has been nationally syndicated by Tribune Media Services, which is part of the Chicago Tribune. That column was initially called by the name this website still bears, Common Wonders. It started out more personal than political, then, post-9/11, as the Bush administration unleashed its war on terror, I became increasingly focused on current events. I referred to the column as “part political brawl, part secular prayer...”
...I’ve trespassed, as a journo aiming at a mainstream audience, upon the sacred consensus that America is a dumbed down, spectator nation, yet somehow special, God’s Chosen Superpower, the greatest nation on Earth. Let’s get beyond our limited allegiances, I say, and celebrate our wholeness as a species and a planet.
I’ve been called blatantly relevant.
And I have proclaimed myself, ever since coming across the term at Transcend Media Service, a peace journalist.
“Peace journalism is when editors and reporters make choices — about what to report, and how to report it — that create opportunities for society at large to consider and to value nonviolent responses to conflict.” — Jake Lynch

Visit his website, commonwonders.com to keep up with his weekly columns.

While you're there, check out his book, Courage Grows Strong At The Wound.

Bob says:

"The book is a collection of my essays fused into several narratives. They run the gamut from the highly personal (dealing with grief, the death of my wife, single parenting) to the acutely political. The book is about the quest for both inner and outer peace, the urgency of both, and the fragile future we are giving birth to." 

Amazon.com says:

"This spellbinding book is a plea for sanity and disarmament, a celebration of the wonder of life and a cry of faith in an empowering love that can save us."

And a great review of the book can be found here.

I count on Bob's weekly columns to remind me that there is always another aspect to be considered when reporting or commenting on the brutality and injustice of our world: the possibility of non-violent conflict resolution, forgiveness, redemption, and peaceful co-existence. Bob is there to remind us that these are not just the topics of Sunday school sermons, but are in fact essential for our survival and evolution as a species. And he frequently shows us that there are brilliant, courageous people out there in the world right now, doing the hard work of seeking peace.

Solutions?

OK, at last, I am going to come down from my pedestal in the clouds and bestow my inspired ideas on how to solve our problems and get us out of the unholy mess we're in...

...mmm, not so much.

In an earlier post, I said:

"So the point of this blog is ultimately to be an exploration of how to respond to all this. I can't avoid observing and commenting on the political aspect of all this, but my intention is to probe deeper. I think that activism on a personal,family, community or government level is great, each to his own talents and passion. But beyond that, I think the ugly mess we're in now requires a renewed embrace of basic ethical, philosophical even dare I say spiritual principles, starting on a deeply personal level. If this seems like a cop-out to you, I hope to develop and express my ideas well enough to change your mind, but the floor is always open for conversation." 

What this means is I'm not going to try and spew forth on things I am not knowledgeable enough to speak of.  I'm not an economist, I can't advise on how to change our economic system. I'm not a political scientist, so I can't advise about a better form of government (although I will say I'm not an anarchist, not a collectivist, and I'm not in favor of benevolent dictatorships, fascism, satanism or the sale of Star Wars to Disney.). So what good am I?

Well, don't forget, that this blog is my personal thoughts and opinions, nothing more, and I'm entitled to them. You are entitled to agree or disagree and if you want you can tell me so. Nicely. But I do have some thoughts and perspectives I am passionate about, and in my experience, it is always a good idea to follow your passion. So here I am.

Here are some ideas I'm going to be exploring:

I believe in starting with your level of consciousness, and admitting that it can be improved. Beyond that, a conscious mind doesn't exist in isolation, so relationships with others is the next logical step in learning. To me, personal relationships are a microcosm for everything else in life.

I think we must have an underlying foundation of core values, if we expect to have any success in our activities in the outer world. I believe that spiritual traditions teach these values for practical reasons, not just because they make you feel good about yourself.

I have an enduring trust in the indomitable spiritual power of human beings, not in institutions.

So while I will continue to point out what I think are warning signs of serious deterioration and danger in our society, my ultimate point is that these problems can only be truly solved by the evolution of our consciousness, our relationships, and spiritual awareness. I think we can all help each other along the way with that, simply by living by the values we all know are universally beneficial, and making that the basis for our actions in the world.

You can have the most intellectually sturdy argument or position on an issue, but without a clear commitment to your core values, I believe you are missing something critically important. I have my ideas on how to express those values; I hope that will be a part of the conversation. I hope to flesh out and develop these ideas, and I expect to see them evolve as I go along. There are so many aspects to consider; I think the brief essay format of the blog is a good vehicle for taking the time to explore them, a little bit at a time. Hope you'll stay with me...




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What Kids Teach Us

On the one hand:
The way we treat our kids tells us at least as much about ourselves as it does about them.

So what does this story tell us:

New York Times, Oct. 9, 2012:
Attention Disorder or Not, Pills to Help in School
 Drugs that are normally used to increase focus are in some cases being prescribed simply to improve struggling, low-income students’ academic performance at school.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/09/health/attention-disorder-or-not-children-prescribed-pills-to-help-in-school.html?smid=pl-share

Relevant quotes:

Although A.D.H.D is the diagnosis Dr. Anderson makes, he calls the disorder “made up” and “an excuse” to prescribe the pills to treat what he considers the children’s true ill — poor academic performance in inadequate schools. 

“I don’t have a whole lot of choice,” said Dr. Anderson, a pediatrician for many poor families in Cherokee County, north of Atlanta. “We’ve decided as a society that it’s too expensive to modify the kid’s environment. So we have to modify the kid.” 
It is not yet clear whether Dr. Anderson is representative of a widening trend. But some experts note that as wealthy students abuse stimulants to raise already-good grades in colleges and high schools, the medications are being used on low-income elementary school children with faltering grades and parents eager to see them succeed.  
“We as a society have been unwilling to invest in very effective nonpharmaceutical interventions for these children and their families,” said Dr. Ramesh Raghavan, a child mental-health services researcher at Washington University in St. Louis and an expert in prescription drug use among low-income children. “We are effectively forcing local community psychiatrists to use the only tool at their disposal, which is psychotropic medications.” 
On the Rocafort family’s kitchen shelf in Ball Ground, Ga., next to the peanut butter and chicken broth, sits a wire basket brimming with bottles of the children’s medications, prescribed by Dr. Anderson: Adderall for Alexis, 12; and Ethan, 9; Risperdal (an antipsychotic for mood stabilization) for Quintn and Perry, both 11; and Clonidine (a sleep aid to counteract the other medications) for all four, taken nightly.  
 
This barely touches on the disturbing info presented in this article. As usual it is left to us to wonder and research for ourselves the roots of what is evidently a trend. How is it that prescribing stimulants, anit-psychotics and sleep aids, some if which are known to be addictive and have serious side effects, has become an acceptable thing for doctors to do to children? The government fosters the idea by providing complete prescription coverage through Medicaid. A school system may end up approving the use of such drugs because even though they may be ripped by funding cuts, they are still expected to get their students to perform better and get better grades.

Frankly this makes me ill.

But on the other hand:

The honesty, sincerity and simplicity of a child has a huge amount to teach us about what kind of people we could be:  

September 7, 2012
8-Year-Old Starts Lemonade Stand for Freedom; Raises $50K in Two Months

http://goinspirego.blogspot.com/2012/09/vivienne-harr-8-year-old-girl-makes.html

Quotes:

Vivie was inspired to take a stand against slavery after seeing an installation on slavery by Lisa Kristine, a photographer who captured these authentic, haunting, gut-wrenching snapshots of modern-day slaves around the world....
Vivie was inspired to take action. Watch how she quickly garnered tens of thousands of supporters from the local and worldwide community and raised more than $50,000 dollars in just under two months.



Certainly the parents probably helped with logistical matters, but it was the child who had the idea, and the simple belief, based on the simple principle of compassion, that she should do what she could, and that it would be worth doing. It was her motivation and persistence that inspired others to help her and spread the word, turning her dream into a plan into reality. What we can learn from this child is much more powerful and positive for our lives than the disturbing news presented above.

Media Coverage - We Lose Again

OK it's over. As you could guess, I would have been just as unsatisfied if the Republican had won instead of the Democrat. Both are merely emblematic of a system that is rotten, corrupted beyond repair. What I want to point out today is the enormous role of the major media in and the role they play in degrading the average person's understanding of current events, and thus contributing to the abhorrent state of affairs we find ourselves in.

I did not watch any of the campaign/election coverage on any of the major networks or news channels. I do not read the daily papers or national magazines on any regular basis. I do not follow any popular bloggers or Twitterers. Nevertheless I can tell you what the vast majority of the coverage was like:

1. The candidates were presented as personalities, celebrities, two-dimensional figures. The focus was not on their genuine character, but on how well they did at concocting an image/"brand" for themselves and selling it to the public.
2. Their activities were covered like a reality TV show or a sporting event. Emphasis on drama, winning/losing, crisis, scandal.
3. Genuine context and background exposition was absent from most analysis. Even if they wanted to, how could they when most of the time, coverage of any particular item only lasts one to two minutes?
4. The various media outlets and their star "journalists" knocked themselves out claiming that each was the most honest, independent, fair, balanced and tough in their reporting, while what you actually saw were egotistical media celebrities whose main talents are looking good, and a willingness to say and do just about anything to boost their ratings.

The net result is that the picture of reality presented by the mainstream media is, overall, an incredibly superficial one, in which the complex problems of the world are reduced to sketchy dramatic episodes, absent any sense of larger context, background or history. The thoughts of our leaders are reduced to sound bites. Media coverage, especially TV, degrades reality down to the TV paradigm - everything is reduced to short, commercialized bursts of entertainment that are expected to be quickly forgotten.

One might think that political figures would be unhappy with this state of affairs. But in fact for those at the top of the political milieu, this is just what they're looking for. It is useful for them to have the public accustomed to learning about the world in the most shallow, superficial, fragmented way, because by keeping the public awareness at that level, our political leaders can then come forward with bogus solutions to those problems, that in reality only support the agendas of themselves and their wealthy patrons.

People like to say the media is biased in either a "liberal" or "conservative" direction. While this may be superficially true, both are smokescreens for the larger bias - towards those with money and power. Especially as regards news and political coverage, those with the money and political clout get covered, period. This guarantees a very narrow range of views is ever presented, thus effectively marginalizing alternate perspectives, which in the real world are quite abundant.

The media are complicit in making us think it's only Coke or Pepsi. Red or blue. Us vs them. Freedom vs evil. This false reduction of reality down to a fake paradigm of only two choices is the big lie.

What do you think the consolidation of so much of the multimedia landscape down to just a handful of mega-corporations has to do with this? Hmm, another blog post...

This is not to say that there is no good information out there, or no good journalism going on. There most certainly is. But in today's world, we must go after it, seek it out, and find it for ourselves. It usually is just laying on the ground, un-noticed, waiting to be picked up, or it has fallen down the memory hole, and must be dug out. And even then, we must frequently do our own work to learn the actual context, history and background of the story for ourselves. It is always there, but almost no one in the mainstream media bothers to connect the dots. We have to do it for ourselves, and you know what? We're actually better off if we do.

There are some people whose work has been incredibly helpful to me, and has inspired me to work much harder at learning for myself, researching and thinking critically about what I see and hear. I will be highlighting their work in future blog posts, in hopes they might give someone else the kick start they gave me.

For this post I have leaned heavily on two brilliant books which I highly recommend:


 News: The Politics of Illusion (9th Edition, by W. Lance Bennett

and:


Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman

What About The Rest of Us?

The election is one day away. Who will I vote for? I already know who's going to win. I was beaten to the punch in this article by Mike Adams at NaturalNews.com, but he is just expressing what a lot of us already knew full well.

Many people choose their candidate because of his position on one or two issues. They may not like him on everything, but as long as he's on their side on the issue they care about, that's enough. Many people are party-loyal; end of discussion, decision made. But even some of them are not satisfied with their candidate, yet will vote for him anyway because their party's propaganda machine has defined the other candidate as a demon from the pits of hell, and thus they simply have to vote with their party.

What about the rest of us? What about those of us who see that both major candidates have virtually the same positions on the issues we care about, and those positions are unacceptable? Is this the case? Sure it is. All you have to do is look for the issues that are never mentioned in campaign ads, speeches or debates during this election season (thanks again to Mike Adams for creating a quite in-depth list; I am adapting it to my own purposes). I already discussed the sham that our two party political system makes of the election process in my previous post. But here's just a few more issues on which both parties agree and approve, but  I find intolerable:

• Continuation of the expansion of our military presence around the world.
• Expansion of the CIA into full blown paramilitary activity, an aspect of their business once considered too unethical and illegal to be acknowledged.
• Expansion of a government-supported domestic surveillance system, in which the average person's right to privacy is gutted, while the government increasingly operates such systems in secret, with no public accountability or legal recourse. This is becoming a critical erosion of fundamental civil liberties.
• Expansion of police departments into more and more militarized operations, equipped with military grade equipment, weapons, vehicles, drone aircraft, and an increasingly "gloves-off" approach to daily law enforcement.
• Unwillingness to hold any major figures accountable for the vast criminality and fraud behind the financial crisis of 2008, and failure to produce any meaningful reform, or to enforce reforms that are produced. The result of said failure is a guarantee that another financial catastrophe is imminent.
• Support for an industrial food production system that puts control over our food supply in the hands of a very few corporate entities whose production model prioritizes quantity and profit over health and nutrition.
• Support for the expansion of biotech/GMO food development while ignoring the plentiful information on the risks and dangers, as well as already occurring damage to food, animals, people and the environment.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Mike Adams' article takes it much further, and he comes to some conclusions I find hard to take. But nevertheless the truth is inescapable: we are seeing the fundamental institutions and systems of our country crumbling around us, and if we look hard enough, we see that our political leadership is not just ignoring, not just enabling, but in some ways actively encouraging and participating in the process.

So the point of this blog is ultimately to be an exploration of how to respond to all this. I can't avoid observing and commenting on the political aspect of all this, but my intention is to probe deeper. I think that activism on a personal,  family, community or government level is great, each to his own talents and passion. But beyond that, I think the ugly mess we're in now requires a renewed embrace of basic ethical, philosophical even dare I say spiritual principles, starting on a deeply personal level. If this seems like a cop-out to you, I hope to develop and express my ideas well enough to change your mind, but the floor is always open for conversation.

 I am always heartened by the realistic optimism of people like Howard Zinn, who said:
“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic.  It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives.  If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something.  If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future.  The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”

And he is not alone:

“We have it in our power to begin the world over again.”
 - Thomas Paine
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
- Margaret Mead
"Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step."
– Martin Luther King, Jr.
"Eighty percent of success is showing up."
– Woody Allen

So how will I vote? Hmm. I used to think that simply voting against incumbents was the thing to do, but that is still, in essence, supporting the status quo of the system. I'll just say that any vote besides Democrat or Republican may be futile in a practical sense, but if enough people stand up up to express their disapproval and non-acceptance of the system as it is, in any way they see fit, that would be a start.

Who Decided?

                        

Who decided that to compete in the world of presidential politics, you must be willing and able to raise and spend upwards of a billion dollars?

Who decided that a presidential "debate" may only include two candidates, who don't actually debate at all, but merely recite talking points, and only in a format that they have jointly pre-approved in advance? Oh that's right, the Republicans and Democrats made that decision all by themselves. In fact it has been that way since 1988, when the two parties got together and created a bi-partisan commission to control the debate process.

Debates used to be run by the League of Women Voters, remember? But after the commission was formed and a long list of demands was issued from the Bush and Dukakis campaigns, the LWV refused to comply and announced that they would no longer participate in organizing the debates. They issued a press release, saying, among other things:
"The League of Women Voters is withdrawing sponsorship of the presidential debates ... because the demands of the two campaign organizations would perpetrate a fraud on the American voter. It has become clear to us that the candidates' organizations aim to add debates to their list of campaign-trail charades devoid of substance, spontaneity and answers to tough questions. The League has no intention of becoming an accessory to the hoodwinking of the American public."
The LWV walked away in disgust, and the commission has controlled the debate process ever since.
You should read this article that details the whole affair, as well as the full press release from the LWV.

So why should we care about these debates? 

Why should we care about anything the candidates say? It has been long understood that presidential campaigns are nothing more than marketing campaigns. They are not meant to enlighten, or provide useful information on which candidate would actually do the best job of serving the country. Campaigns are merely meant to sell the candidates to the public, as Aldous Huxley said, like deoderant.

                             

Remember Obama's 2008 campaign? Its success led him to be named "Marketer Of The Year" and his campaign was given gushing praise by leaders in the advertising business. This is nothing new. As Huxley wrote in Brave New World Revisited in 1958:
                                    
 
"…today, in the world’s most powerful democracy, the politicians and their propagandists prefer to make non­sense of democratic procedures by appealing almost exclusively to the ignorance and irrationality of the electors. “Both parties,” we were told in 1956 by the editor of a leading business journal, “will merchandize their candidates and issues by the same methods that business has developed to sell goods. These include scientific selection of appeals and planned repetition… . Radio spot announcements and ads will repeat phrases with a planned intensity. Billboards will push slogans of proven power… . Candidates need, in addition to rich voices and good diction, to be able to look ‘sincerely’ at the TV camera.”
The political merchandisers appeal only to the weak­nesses of voters, never to their potential strength. They make no attempt to educate the masses into becoming fit for self-government; they are content merely to manipulate and exploit them. For this pur­pose all the resources of psychology and the social sciences are mobilized and set to work…All that is now needed is money and a candidate who can be coached to look “sincere...”
In one way or another, as vigorous he-man or kindly father, the candidate must be glamorous. He must also be an entertainer who never bores his audience. Inured to television and radio, that audience is accustomed to being distracted and does not like to be asked to con­centrate or make a prolonged intellectual effort. All speeches by the entertainer-candidate must therefore be short and snappy. The great issues of the day must be dealt with in five minutes at the most — and prefera­bly (since the audience will be eager to pass on to something a little livelier than inflation or the H-bomb) in sixty seconds flat. The nature of oratory is such that there has always been a tendency among politicians and clergymen to over-simplify complex is­sues. From a pulpit or a platform even the most con­scientious of speakers finds it very difficult to tell the whole truth. The methods now being used to merchan­dise the political candidate as though he were a deo­dorant positively guarantee the electorate against ever hearing the truth about anything."

That was in 1958. Do you think things have gotten any better?

But it's more than the fact that the candidates are manufactured media personalities with no substance. It is that they are given to us by very rich and very powerful people who would like us to think we are exercising our rights as citizens to choose, but in reality are simply picking from two pre-selected characters who have essentially the same underlying agendas, dictated to them by those same rich and powerful people.

What to do? I don't know, but you have to start somewhere. And I think it would be a good start if more and more people would just stand up to express their unwillingness to tolerate this completely corrupted system in its present state, any longer, and start exploring other options. As Mr Spock once said, there are always possibilities...

Disdain

The word "disdain" perfectly sums up the recurring attitudes which underlie so much of what the rich and powerful do. It explains things perfectly. The word disdain represents an attitude of utter disregard, disrespect and even contempt for others, arising from a firm belief in ones' own superiority. This is clearly, obviously, how the rich and powerful of this world feel about the vast mass of ordinary people whose lives they dominate. George Carlin said it best:


Racism has always been the most common form of disdain employed by empire builders. When conquering a country, it is useful to declare the indigenous people to be hopelessly primitive, ignorant, untrustworthy, violent, and otherwise completely incapable of managing their own country. Thus, the conquering country can cast itself as the tough but compassionate benefactor. They can say that by taking over, they are doing the natives a favor, even as they impose a brutal and oppressive occupation on them. Many involved with the expansion of empires have been true believers, i.e. they really believed that people of other races in foreign lands were truly inferior, and thus did not deserve to be treated with any respect or even morality. It is well documented that in the U.S., such racist attitudes were considered to be true and supported by science, well into the 20th century. And today? Well, just ask a returning war veteran:



This certainly comes in handy when it's necessary to drum up support for yet another war. Throughout our history, leaders of the U.S. consistently used racial superiority as the rationale for many violent, ruthless and immoral invasions and attacks on those who stood in our way: Native Americans, Hawaiians, Mexicans, Indonesians, Chinese, etc. not to mention the enslavement of Africans. It is how this country was built.

The genuine purpose of war has always been the expansion of power, commerce and trade, access to markets, and control of resources, all on behalf of one's own country. This is no secret. The part not so apparent is that government's only meaningful function is mainly to support a rich and powerful class of people in their efforts to endlessly expand their personal wealth and power. Still, even that was not really a secret.

But In the early 1900's, something unusual happened in the U.S.: the rich and powerful turned their disdain on the American people en masse. The rationale for this was provided indirectly by Sigmund Freud, who at the time was just becoming renowned as the father of modern psychology. His theories on the unconscious mind were incredibly influential on the development of new ideas about human nature.

But it was his nephew, Edward Bernays, who pulled it all together, put a bow on it and gave it to the rich and powerful. Bernays' profession was producing propaganda, but he became successful by re-branding his job as "public relations." And he was also paying close attention to the work of his uncle Sigmund. He saw, in the theories of Freud and his followers, justification for the use of the most deceptive, unethical tactics imaginable in pursuit of a public relations mission. He had an idea about the big picture that was surely music to the ears of the emerging modern corporate giants: that it was actually necessary and beneficial to the population at large to secretly manipulate them in order to fulfill the interests of the rich and powerful, who knew better what was best for society.

You can't make this stuff up folks. Here's a few quotes:
First, from Wikipedia:
"Bernays' vision was of a utopian society in which the dangerous libidinal energies that lurked just below the surface of every individual could be harnessed and channeled by the corporate elite for economic benefit. Through the use of mass production, big business could fulfill constant craving of the inherently irrational and desire driven masses, simultaneously securing the niche of a mass production economy (even in peacetime), as well as sating the dangerous animal urges that threatened to tear society apart if left unquelled."

At this time in the early 20th century, the big businesses were entering a new era of modern industry that was capable of mass production on a huge scale. But the public at large wasn't quite ready to go along with mass consumption of more and unnecessary things. Bernays gave the corporations a rationale they could use to justify using methods that were secret, manipulative, exploitative, unethical and harmful, to condition the American public to become mass consumers.

This brings us back to that attitude of disdain. Bernays' fundamental rationale was that the average person was incapable of making responsible decisions for himself. The idea, based on Freud, that people were driven by unconscious desires, led to the belief that people in general were actually dangerous if left to their own devices. They must be conditioned into predictable, controllable behavior, for the sake of the whole society.

Did Bernays really believe this? Hard to say, but he was certainly good at promoting himself as an expert on the subject. He published numerous books. Here's a quote from his 1928 book, Propaganda:
"If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, is it not possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing about it? The recent practice of propaganda has proved that it is possible, at least up to a certain point and within certain limits."


Bernays wasn't alone. There was also Ivy Lee, another early master of PR who was shameless about using lies and deceit on behalf of his wealthy corporate clients. And there was Walter Lippman, a journalist and political commentator who also promoted the idea that it was impossible for ordinary people to act effectively on their own, and thus they must be guided by unseen elites.
But Bernays summed it up best in another quote from Propaganda:
"The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. ...We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. ...In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons...who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind."

By providing his services and philosophies to the wealthiest and most powerful people in business and government, Bernays essentially gave them the tools necessary to achieve the most stunning of accomplishments: establishment of a genuine financial oligarchy, right under the people's nose. What I observe over and over today is a direct result of Bernays: we in the U.S. live in a flimsy shell that looks like a democratic system, but it's nothing more than a façade, created and kept in place through application of his principles. It seems evident from all this that in addition to his publicly available works, there must be manuals and guidebooks  for manipulation and conditioning of the public mind, based on Bernays' concepts. They are privately distributed and secretly utilized used by the business elites, in the shadows, on the masses for whom they feel nothing but disdain.

References and further reading:



The Imperial Cruise, by James Bradley. A stunning book with a controversial premise, but solidly grounded in factual history and well-documented. A disturbing reminder of the racism that underlaid American expansionism in the 1800's and early 1900's.
The Century of the Self by Adam Curtis the 2003 BBC documentary by Adam Curtis, is essential to understanding how public relations, spin, marketing techniques and flat out propaganda are used to hide the way corporations have dominated our lives and become the true shadow government. It is thoroughly researched and full of first-hand interviews.


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