I wonder how many people are slowly beginning to comprehend what it is to live in a world with unreliable information inputs. Some people, you know the ones wearing tinfoil bonnets, believe that the government knows everything and doesn't share the truth out of spite. A lot of them know people who work in government and many of them think those people are clowns or idiots and yet they believe that their friend or relative is in a position to know the truth. Kind of silly when you think about it.
What you get when you sit at any information nexus in the government whether it be in research and development, military intelligence, national intelligence, diplomatic intelligence, economic intelligence, is a welter of data from a vast number of sources which over time you and your predecessors have been winnowing down to the handful of inputs considered reliable and timely. We sort of weed out the people who have a gullibility factor on par with a national news correspondent. If we wanted garbage input we'd pick up the Washington Post or New York Times and read it alongside the far more reliable sources like the tabloid press you see in the supermarket checkout lane.
I've always been interested in the idea that there is an illuminati that knows all things and also has the power to suppress information.. I'm watching the latter in action now every day as the media overtly scrambles to ignore the story about Biden being accused of some non-crime from 24 years in the past because they think it may do what? Ditto the story about charges being dropped against General Flynn. Maybe now we could talk about how irrational it is to pay any attention whatsoever to some dingbat leaping out of the wordwork with a tale of woe to tell about something that evidently didn't raise to the level of a crime 24 years ago?
I'm sick and tired of:
One report says
Sources within the White House
Sources within the Justice Department
Our man in Baghdad is reporting
The entire Benghazi story was a nothingburger and so we move on to other news
well, you get the point.
If it is presented in that fashion it isn't really news or information at all now, is it? It's fog.
5 comments:
They used to attempt to teach critical thinking in the schools. I wonder if that is still in the curriculum. Being able to identify false advertising and propaganda (is that still a thing?)were worthy subjects. Don't even get me started on the level of scientific literacy in the general public today.
at this time, I believe I have an advantage over other people in my locale of reliability of information pertaining to a certain public official and the veracity of the espoused image of this person who is running for President. the advantage consists of personal observation and one on one conversation with said individual. 2005, I had fifteen minute conversation with this person at a meeting in Las Vegas. Not much time, I know but bear with me on this. he was fairly sharp in a lawyerly way. In 2015, I again had a short conversation him. a totally different persona; serious changes. Short attention, brusque, unable to focus on the conversation subject at hand, seemingly harried. those around him of his staff were constantly attempting to hurry things along and he seemed discomforted at not moving the conversations he was having into a particular direction he wished to go. his staff/handlers constantly interrupted him stating " what the Senator means is..." I found this to be out of place for a person who wished to be President of the United States of America.
Twenty years ago, Senator Biden would have been a much more effective candidate for higher office as a democrat, but today...one would think his family would do better by the man by pulling him into private life. there comes a time to us all when that becomes the best option and this may be the time for him to withdraw to private life.
Now, as I said, this is my personal observation and conclusions. In politics, I would never prevent my adversary from shooting himself in the foot especially if the foot was in his mouth already.
I am waiting to find out who it is the democrat machine runs as a VP candidate(recalling the efficacy of the 25th Amendment), as that would be their true choice for the highest office. someone weak and controllable no doubt.
I learned critical thinking in higher education and life itself. Maths and engineering do not lie when the information used is true. people do lie, even to themselves.
I won some battles and lost battles but for the most part when dealing with people on an individual level, I find battles end in a stalemate or an accomodation. but I do find that there are some people who, no matter how many proven historical facts are presented to them, no matter how persuasive a speaker can be, no matter how in depth a teaching can be, they will always think they "believe that they have the field in sight" right before they crash and burn into the mountain side.
Isn't it odd that today I find it easier to believe factual what I find on the internet than what the network news has to offer?
I doubt they teach much of anything like critical thinking in schools these days. It's all rote, dogma and the pc line. No questions, no questioning, no musing aloud/allowed and no postulating.
OTOH, back in my school days the questions about scientific notation were along the lines of how many pecks to a bushel, etc. :)
I don't find your last at all in conflict with the way things have turned out. I believe almost nothing I see presented on the news. In every single case where I do know the facts based on personal and lived experience, the news gets it totally wrong.
I remember some epic briefings/visits from 3 and 4 stars and the only one that seemed the slightest bit uncomfortable or harried was the least of them by any measurement.
As I think back over the years I don't really think I've ever tried to change anybody's opinion on anything that wasn't life and death. In those cases I mostly convinced the other party to do it my way. I have never, to my knowledge tried to, or succeeded in changing anybody's mind about politics, law, history, etc.
I think we all become comfortable with the familiar and it takes great effort to change the course once one is settled in the stream.
Personally I's state that it is due to a bad case of Howard Zinn scholarship (giggle) and the attendant gaslighting of the school populace. But then again I'm around your age and at the sharp end....
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