Bobblehead Nation

People don’t know shit. And the idea of self-governance for people who don’t know shit, is a recipe for disaster. That’s why people have ALWAYS been ruled. (Usually by an idiot, given 10,000 years of chronic warfare/conquest/slaughter/revenge.) Even the limited experiment in self rule that was America was short lived before the historic leadership re-assumed command of the government and society to guide the ignorant, subhuman mass to its proper role – obedience and loyalty en masse.

Laugh at Ahmadinejad all you want that Islam produces no deviancy to orthodoxy, but how does the world laugh at bobble-headed America, the most violent, self-entitled and dysfunctional people on earth who worship at the altar of liberty within a military-police state where warfare is diplomacy, diplomacy is unilateral fiat and the average human being has the value of nil.

After all the hype, freedom remains a dream. To fight and die for.

“Everyone in this room would agree that people in this country were misled in terms of  the rationale of this war,” said Couric, adding that it is “pretty much accepted” that the war in Iraq was a mistake.

Pretty much. (Yawn and stretch.)

“I’ve never understood why [invading Iraq] was so high on the administration’s agenda when terrorism was going on in Afghanistan and Pakistan and that [Iraq] had no true connection with al Qaeda.”

Yeah, me neither. And, yeah, all that terrorism going on in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Icky. That was the good fight and Iraq is the bad fight. But no matter, another good fight is just over the horizon.

People don’t understand but don’t ask the question. Folks may wonder what went wrong but don’t care to know. Knowledge is responsibility. And what with the job, the kids, the spousal unit, the bills, the debts, the stress, more responsibility is too much to ask. That’s what government is for.

“I’d feel totally comfortable saying any of that at some point, if required, on television.”

Everyone knows impeachable crimes were committed by “misleading” the country to war, but, hey, oops, fool me once…okie-dokie-smokie. (A war of aggression is illegal under international law. Only defensive war or imminent threat makes for justifiable war. If our posturing about ‘defense’ and ‘imminent threat’ – al qaeda/mushroom clouds – were, uh, unfounded, and actually, uh, willfully deceptive, then Bush/Cheney is guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity under international law. Lock ’em up and throw away the key.)

Everyone knows the Iraq ‘war’ is a disaster and everyone wishes it never happened, but to end it will only make things worse. Duh. Any fool can see that. The Sunni and Shia hate each other and we’re keeping them from a bloodbath. If we leave, all hell will break loose.

“The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying ‘we’ when referring to the United States and, even the ‘shock and awe’ of the initial stages, it was just too jubilant and just a little uncomfortable. And I remember feeling, when I was anchoring the ‘Today’ show, this inevitable march towards war and kind of feeling like, ‘Will anybody put the brakes on this?’ And is this really being properly challenged by the right people? And I think, at the time, anyone who questioned the administration was considered unpatriotic and it was a very difficult position to be in.”

I guess millions of dollars a year and a lifestyle of the rich and famous can buy the silence of even the most sensitive and hard working truth seeker like Ms. Couric.

I had just a bad icky feeling, you know, and then remembered my pedicure appointment and had to dash.

The bobble-headed media knows something is rotten in the state of Oceana but can’t make a move beyond the official ‘script’ produced by professional propagandists who get the news from the government. The news is always the same; it’s the ‘angle’ that sells. Get the human interest, get the explosion and, most importantly, get the moral of the story. It’s good versus evil. The white hat versus the black head-dress. God versus the heathen. The hero versus the monster.

“Oftentimes Westerners don’t really understand fully the values of this particular culture,” said Couric. “And I think the jury is still out as to whether democracy can really thrive in Iraq.”

The silly dogs don’t know a god-given inalienable right when one is jammed down their throat by the gift of America’s blood and treasure. The ungrateful brutes.

America may make mistakes, but, by god, like the President’s, don’t question our heart.

Perhaps when commentators use the meme of ‘sheeple’ or refer to a stupid republic of clueless, ignorant couch potatoes, as to why the ‘people” seem lethargic to the disintegration of their vaunted America, we are being too hard.

Perhaps.

And perhaps those who place their hope in the beauty pageant, horserace political process to refine the best Roboprez and lead America to more of the same in the name of change, are prophets of human understanding and I salute them.

But, perhaps it’s really that people understand their powerlessness, so what is the point?

Or maybe it’s folks like me who see the moment has passed, while others are waiting for the moment to arrive.

Presumptuous? Arrogant? Patronizing?

Well, of course.

I’m only human.

In the end it comes down to the half empty or half-filled glass of outlook.

Is the glass at half on its way to topping off or dribbling away to nothing?

It’s not that I don’t have hope. I do. I fully expect humanity to pick itself up, dust itself off and try again to live without fratricide.

It’s hard in freefall to know which way is up and which way is down. And, as a human being, I am the first to admit I don’t know shit.

But a bottom is coming, in my opinion. George Bush’s bottom. And ours too. Unless we stop it, reverse it and head in a completely different direction and turn our war machine into ploughshares and peace.

The two-party system is a lie.

The choice is clear.

Bobblehead into oblivion or awake to rebellion.

Turn off the TV and organize in secret. 

cross-posted from My Left Wing