So much to talk about WITH UPDATE

I don’t know how these things work, but I have something that I really wanted to share here, but when I thought about it, I realized there’s really no better way to do this particular one than to simply “post the post” that I wanted to share.

I went looking for an open thread in which to post it and saw that, well, there wasn’t one.

So hey, I figured WTF, I’d start an open thread.  Why not?  

I’ll start with the thing I wanted to share.   I’ve recently bookmarked a site called “Naked Capitalism” and it has some pretty cool stuff in it.   Tonight I headed over there and found a link to this absolutely amazing post here:

Investor Psychology: Fear Turns People Into Sheep

I don’t even know what to do except tell you to read it.   It’s only a little bit about investing.   Mainly it’s about how the Powerful can exploit Fear.  


Sociologists from four major research institutions investigated why so many Americans believed that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, years after it became obvious that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.

The researchers found, as described in an article in the journal Sociological Inquiry (and re-printed by Newsweek):

Many Americans felt an urgent need to seek justification for a war already in progress

Rather than search rationally for information that either confirms or disconfirms a particular belief, people actually seek out information that confirms what they already believe.

“For the most part people completely ignore contrary information.”

“The study demonstrates voters’ ability to develop elaborate rationalizations based on faulty information”

People get deeply attached to their beliefs, and form emotional attachments that get wrapped up in their personal identity and sense of morality, irrespective of the facts of the matter.

“We refer to this as ‘inferred justification, because for these voters, the sheer fact that we were engaged in war led to a post-hoc search for a justification for that war.

“People were basically making up justifications for the fact that we were at war”

“They wanted to believe in the link [between 9/11 and Iraq] because it helped them make sense of a current reality. So voters’ ability to develop elaborate rationalizations based on faulty information, whether we think that is good or bad for democratic practice, does at least demonstrate an impressive form of creativity.

An article yesterday in Alternet discussing the Sociological Inquiry article helps us to understand that the key to people’s active participation in searching for excuses for actions by the big boys is fear:

Subjects were presented during one-on-one interviews with a newspaper clip of this Bush quote: “This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al-Qaeda.”

The Sept. 11 Commission, too, found no such link, the subjects were told.

“Well, I bet they say that the commission didn’t have any proof of it,” one subject responded, “but I guess we still can have our opinions and feel that way even though they say that.”

Reasoned another: “Saddam, I can’t judge if he did what he’s being accused of, but if Bush thinks he did it, then he did it.”

Others declined to engage the information at all. Most curious to the researchers were the respondents who reasoned that Saddam must have been connected to Sept. 11, because why else would the Bush Administration have gone to war in Iraq?

Fascinating stuff, with lots of links, and it provided me, finally, with a quote that I am now using as my comment signature:


Never let a serious crisis go to waste. What I mean by that is it’s an opportunity to do things you couldn’t do before.

How Bushian!   Do you know who said it?   Rahm Emanuel.

One other thing I just want to chat about is the mass shootings at Fort Hood.    A few things bother me about this (not the obvious ones).   For starters, this reminds me of “hitting the trifecta” yet again, as far as the propaganda value the government, the military, and the CIA will be able to milk from this (suddenly I’m reminded again of the Rahm Emanuel quote).  I mean, just as the public support for the Afghan campaign is cratering, just as Obama seems to be expressing some reservations about giving the bloodthirsty Generals  what they want, just as it’s revealed that not only is the “President” of Afghanistan a CIA asset, he’s a corrupt and lying, cheating, fraudulent President, and his brother, who is ALSO a CIA asset, is one of the biggest drug dealers in the world ……. we have this extremely convenient mass murder by a Muslim, and not just a mass murder by a Muslim, BUT a mass murder by a Muslim who was terrified of going to “war”, and having to kill (presumably) his fellow Muslims.    I mean, here we have a cowardly Muslim who, when he snaps, commits to an act of violent terrorism against Americans (almost like it’s in his blood!).    Yet this man was a complete product of the American Military, he even went to their very own Medical school, and seems to have always been a very non-violent fellow, yet suddenly he turns into a superhuman Rambo and is able to shoot, what, 40 or more trained soldiers in the course of a few minutes with guns that don’t need reloading?    The mind boggles.    And who was the other “suspect” whisked away by men in suits who pulled up in a black Crown Victoria?    I grew up on military bases, and guys in suits who outranked the M.P.’s?   These are guys who outrank the MILITARY on a MILITARY BASE.   WTF?


(CNN) — A senior officer who was playing golf Thursday near Fort Hood, Texas, told CNN he witnessed the arrest of one of the two surviving suspects of the shooting at the Army installation.

Shortly after the shooting, the officer said, military police told him to clear the course and he saw other MPs surround the building that held the golf carts, he said.

The senior officer said he ducked into a nearby house for cover as 30 to 40 cars carrying MPs approached.

He said he saw a soldier in battle-dress uniform, his hands in the air. The MPs ordered him to lie on the ground and open his uniform, presumably to ensure he was not carrying explosives, the senior officer said.

He said an MP told him that authorities considered the man to be a suspect in the shootings after having overheard the man say he was with the shooter.

The man was surrounded for 25 to 30 minutes, until a convoy of vehicles arrived, led by a Ford Crown Victoria and carrying men in suits, and he was taken away, the senior officer said.

The golf course is about 2.5 miles from Fort Hood, the officer told CNN.

Now I’d just like to throw out a few words that might remind you of over times when the government/pentagon utterly lied to us about events:

Pat Tillman.   Jessica Lynch.

But the thing that really bothers me about this has nothing to do with the shootings at all.   It is, instead, that Hasan was being watched and monitored by “law enforcement personnel” on the Internet, months ago.  


At least six months ago, Hasan came to the attention of law enforcement officials because of Internet postings about suicide bombings and other threats, including posts that equated suicide bombers to soldiers who throw themselves on a grenade to save the lives of their comrades.

They had not confirmed Hasan is the author of the posting, and a formal investigation had not been opened before the shooting, said law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the case.

If they are not authorized to discuss this, why are they telling us this at all?   Ah, because “Big Brother” is good, and is watching out for us!   In fact, if “Big Brother” had just a little more power, they might have been able to stop this tragedy.    At least that’s just the propaganda value of this.    But the more pressing question is why was this guy being watched by law enforcement personnel in the first place?  And who, exactly, where these “personnel”?    

And who else are they watching?  

Oh right, they’re watching all of us.   Hi, guys!   How’s it going?    Did you like my essay about how the CIA is boiling people alive in Uzbekistan?   I’ll bet you did.   You’re welcome.

UPDATE:  They are now trying to connect him to the “911 terrorists”.    I am not making this up:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new…


Fort Hood shooting: Texas army killer linked to September 11 terrorists

Major Nidal Malik Hasan worshipped at a mosque led by a radical imam said to be a “spiritual adviser” to three of the hijackers who attacked America on Sept 11, 2001.

Right on schedule.

14 comments

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    • Inky99 on November 7, 2009 at 09:53
      Author

    Let’s talk.

    Who else thinks the Ft. Hood shooting smells fishy?   Why do I keep being reminded of Sirhan Sirhan?

    • TMC on November 7, 2009 at 10:37

    Why do American’s still believe tnat Sadaam was connected to 9/11? They believed it in the first place  because it was the information that was fed them by the corporate controlled MSM, it was easy to buy into and they didn’t have to think about it pr do any fact checking. It goes to the point that many people are not just gullible but ignorant and lazy. They atill “believe” it  because they hate to admit they are wrong

    • Inky99 on November 7, 2009 at 21:26
      Author

    http://www.dangerousminds.net/

    Which brings us many hilarious and insightful things such as:

    SKID ROW CHIC: HOMELESS-INSPIRED BEDDIN

    And did you know that so far Swine Flu is just as dangerous as …. Leprosy!

    http://www.dangerousminds.net/

    I love this place.

    • Inky99 on November 7, 2009 at 21:28
      Author

    From The Nation:

    http://www.thenation.com/doc/2


    Okay, now for the serious version of the above: In November 2008, the National Intelligence Council (NIC), an affiliate of the Central Intelligence Agency, issued the latest in a series of futuristic publications intended to guide the incoming Obama administration. Peering into its analytic crystal ball in a report titled Global Trends 2025, it predicted that America’s global preeminence would gradually disappear over the next fifteen years–in conjunction with the rise of new global powerhouses, especially China and India. The report examined many facets of the future strategic environment, but its most startling, and news-making, finding concerned the projected long-term erosion of American dominance and the emergence of new global competitors. “Although the United States is likely to remain the single most powerful actor [in 2025],” it stated definitively, the country’s “relative strength–even in the military realm–will decline and U.S. leverage will become more constrained.”

    That, of course, was then; this–some eleven months into the future–is now, and how things have changed. Futuristic predictions will just have to catch up to the fast-shifting realities of the present moment. Although published after the onset of the global economic meltdown was underway, the report was written before the crisis reached its full proportions and so emphasized that the decline of American power would be gradual, extending over the assessment’s fifteen-year time horizon. But the economic crisis and attendant events have radically upset that timetable. As a result of the mammoth economic losses suffered by the United States over the past year and China’s stunning economic recovery, the global power shift the report predicted has accelerated. For all practical purposes, 2025 is here already.

    Of course, throwing whatever prosperity we have left into the money-burning bonfire that is Afghanistan and Iraq will only speed up, indeed guarantee, America’s rapid deterioration.

  1. don’t we want to hear? Americans like violence. Apparently “ordinary” people go on killing sprees every day and everybody clucks and says this should never happen again and it does. This country was built on inflicting violence to others as were many modern western countries.

    We watch slatter porn at the movies and while I can’t with any certainty make a link between the popular conumption of violent entertainment and acting it out we do seem to have this need to indulge ourselves in it.

    Americans like guns and sports where people get hurt. Certainly all Americans do not like it to the same degree, some may shun it but it is firmly embedded in our daily life.

    We just had a pile of layoffs at work and the first instinct was to beef up security. I had to show my ID and my parking tag about a million times and explain that I was actually coming to work this week even though the dude on the gate knew my face. Clearly the big dogs thought some annoyed person might come up and shoot the place up because well it has happened.

    Rolling Stone just had an interesting article about some soldiers with untreated stress and trauma who killed some folks. You can hardly expect to send people to war and then plop them back in the suburbs and expect them to grill out and hug their kids. Even after the “big one” WW II when people supposedly did exactly that there were men who never recovered. My grandfather had a friend he fought with and he would show up once in a while unannounced and my grandmother, mother and uncle knew not to let him in the house.

    It isn’t so much that I “trust” the government to give us the truth about what happened in the Fort Hood shooting. I don’t. I just don’t see this particular loss of life as being any more special or meaningful that other acts of violence we perpetuate against one another. All of it is awful. We are one fucked up and neurotic nation.

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