"A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people's business.
"This minding of other people's business expresses itself in gossip, snooping and meddling, and also in feverish interest in communal, national and racial affairs. In running away from ourselves we either fall on our neighbor's shoulder or fly at his throat."
I think it is a matter of balance, whether a person is normally serious about the affairs of state or tends to be somewhat nutty with personal preferences, judgments and mitigations. You can tell how far off course the discourse has become by the shrillness of the dialogue.
The True Believer, Copyright 1951 by Eric Hoffer. Printed in the United States of America. Harper & Row, Publishers.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Friday, September 27, 2013
CALL TO ACTION! LET'S DUMP NETWORK NATIONAL NIGHTLY NEWS!
Over the past couple of years the States have become a tame and happy place, so bright and tranquil I don't believe we need those news anchors yapping and yammering at us any more. Okay, if that's too big a leap, we can still keep the anchors and fill the half hour with the same stuff they're doing now, but let's not call them news anchors, and let's not call it news any more. Let's change the name to something like "National Nightly People, Places & Things", or "Nation Nightly Lightly" or Netty Nips & Tucks".
There was a time when with a half hour reporters couldn't shove in nearly enough of the political, economic and social news of the day. But no more, and the proof is in the pudding: Let's take last night's ABC Nightly News with Diane Sawyer as a random sample of the deterioration of the broadcast form (from Thursday, September 26, 2013):
Diane began with a sort-of bio/expose of a British lady known as the "White Widow" who was rumored to have been involved in a recent shopping mall terrorist raid on a shopping mall in Africa. This went on for nearly eight minutes of air time.
The next section was a minute or two detailing President Obama's displeasure with the Republican House of Representatives, calling them 'blackmailers' for attempting to stop Obamacare. And this was followed by a minute or so of commentary presenting ex-President Clinton siding with Obama's point of view. There was no presentation of the actual substance of the disagreement, whatever it might have been.
The next segment gave viewers the same amount of time to consider that some airline pilots are regularly sleeping in the cockpits while the giant passenger jets in their charge go hurtling through the air.
Next, a report on a major fast food chain's switch from Styrofoam to paper cups, a few minutes on the Michael Jackson Wrongful Death Suit trial (now in the hands of the jury), a short section on Deals in Shopping Malls, a 'color seg' on a 'high flying workout', and a final report on Bill Gates asserting that the Control-Alt-Delete command wasn't entirely his fault.
That's the national news for Thursday, 27 September, 2013. News Lite, not even. You see what a false pretense the name National News has become.
Meanwhile, the real jobless rate in our country isn't 7 point something it is over 15 point something because your government has fudged the numbers. The actual rate of inflation is many times over the official rate because your government jacks the numbers. The unreported disaster of Obamacare is about to rob the middleclass to give to the poor. The dirty IRS is covering up the manifest criminal acts they performed over the past five years that most certainly influenced the outcome of the last presidential election: our labor force, our hospitals and our social services are flooded with illegal immigrants: our foreign policy is a shambles: our allies wonder at our lack of direction and our sworn enemies openly poke fun at and make fools of us.
My God, none of this bad crap can possibly be true. Surely, that would have been news and it would have been reported if it were true, but it wasn't reported and so obviously isn't true. No way real Americans can accept this second world, the grim and absurd fictional one I've just made up. Americans are too smart to believe the mad rant of a fool, too educated to be duped like that. That second scenario must be something, like, well, science fiction, a literary device presenting two entirely different worlds superimposed on each other in the same place and time. That problematic second world staggering under the heavy burden of its problems of over-taxation, inflation, government corruption and international bungling, that can't be real, can't be so, can't be the way things really are. I'll close my eyes and plug my ears. Look, I'm doing it right now. Can't be. Can't be. Can't be.
There was a time when with a half hour reporters couldn't shove in nearly enough of the political, economic and social news of the day. But no more, and the proof is in the pudding: Let's take last night's ABC Nightly News with Diane Sawyer as a random sample of the deterioration of the broadcast form (from Thursday, September 26, 2013):
Diane began with a sort-of bio/expose of a British lady known as the "White Widow" who was rumored to have been involved in a recent shopping mall terrorist raid on a shopping mall in Africa. This went on for nearly eight minutes of air time.
The next section was a minute or two detailing President Obama's displeasure with the Republican House of Representatives, calling them 'blackmailers' for attempting to stop Obamacare. And this was followed by a minute or so of commentary presenting ex-President Clinton siding with Obama's point of view. There was no presentation of the actual substance of the disagreement, whatever it might have been.
The next segment gave viewers the same amount of time to consider that some airline pilots are regularly sleeping in the cockpits while the giant passenger jets in their charge go hurtling through the air.
Next, a report on a major fast food chain's switch from Styrofoam to paper cups, a few minutes on the Michael Jackson Wrongful Death Suit trial (now in the hands of the jury), a short section on Deals in Shopping Malls, a 'color seg' on a 'high flying workout', and a final report on Bill Gates asserting that the Control-Alt-Delete command wasn't entirely his fault.
That's the national news for Thursday, 27 September, 2013. News Lite, not even. You see what a false pretense the name National News has become.
Meanwhile, the real jobless rate in our country isn't 7 point something it is over 15 point something because your government has fudged the numbers. The actual rate of inflation is many times over the official rate because your government jacks the numbers. The unreported disaster of Obamacare is about to rob the middleclass to give to the poor. The dirty IRS is covering up the manifest criminal acts they performed over the past five years that most certainly influenced the outcome of the last presidential election: our labor force, our hospitals and our social services are flooded with illegal immigrants: our foreign policy is a shambles: our allies wonder at our lack of direction and our sworn enemies openly poke fun at and make fools of us.
My God, none of this bad crap can possibly be true. Surely, that would have been news and it would have been reported if it were true, but it wasn't reported and so obviously isn't true. No way real Americans can accept this second world, the grim and absurd fictional one I've just made up. Americans are too smart to believe the mad rant of a fool, too educated to be duped like that. That second scenario must be something, like, well, science fiction, a literary device presenting two entirely different worlds superimposed on each other in the same place and time. That problematic second world staggering under the heavy burden of its problems of over-taxation, inflation, government corruption and international bungling, that can't be real, can't be so, can't be the way things really are. I'll close my eyes and plug my ears. Look, I'm doing it right now. Can't be. Can't be. Can't be.
THE TRUE BELIEVER - by Eric Hoffer
"A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it isn't, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people's business.
"This minding of other people's business expresses itself in gossip, snooping and meddling, and also in feverish interest in communal, national and racial affairs. In running away from ourselves, we either fall on our neighbor's shoulder or fly at his throat."
There have been times in history and places on this planet earth where such incidents were not pervasive. These United States of America used to be one such place, and, in shrinking sectors, still is.
"This minding of other people's business expresses itself in gossip, snooping and meddling, and also in feverish interest in communal, national and racial affairs. In running away from ourselves, we either fall on our neighbor's shoulder or fly at his throat."
There have been times in history and places on this planet earth where such incidents were not pervasive. These United States of America used to be one such place, and, in shrinking sectors, still is.
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