How the Truth becomes the "truth" to serve our Masters
Hey Folks -
Here's my answer to the column in the posting directly below.
I haven't heard a word from anyone at the Dispatch., but what could they say?
- Uke Man
Dear Mr. Hallett,
It’s not “impossible” to do what “we need to” do; and the “Truth” isn’t that a dysfunctional Congress or a lack of resources or an “entitlement mentality” or a reluctance to sacrifice makes doing what we need to do impossible. That is not the Truth.
At the same time, I agree that we are seldom told the Truth, but it isn’t because we can’t face the truth. It is because the elite dare not speak the Truth; They can’t admit the Truth.
The Truth is that we do not live under a democracy – at least if by democracy we mean a government responsive to the majority of the people. As the Supreme Court has ruled, money constitutes free speech; and as political scientists have pointed out candidates with the most money overwhelmingly come out on top. To me, “one dollar-one vote” is a strange form of democracy.
Before you dismiss this contention, consider your own words. Why is it that you believe there to be a lack of resources? It has been demonstrated that simply applying the payroll tax to the top ten percent of earners on every penny they earn – instead of setting them free at $100,000 – would easily solve the Social Security “problem” – without making Grandpa work until he drops – and with no extra payments by “the rest of us.”
Why does no one ever characterize these exempted folks at the top as having embraced an “entitlement mentality”? It seems to me that this pejorative tag fits wealthy folks demanding big tax breaks much better than poor families seeking health care for their children and old people trying to get off their feet at 65 rather than 70.
If it is “next to impossible” to help kids and Grandpa, it is because too many people believe it “next to impossible” to have the wealthy relinquish some of their entitlements. It is misleading to suggest that to do what we need to do, “the rest of us” would have to pay. Over the years the rich have been getting richer, their percentage of tax responsibility has been continually reduced, and THAT is what has been foisted on “the rest of us” – the 90% of Americans who make less that $100,000 per year.- those who, for the benefit of the entitled elite, are already sacrificing via regressive taxation and inadequate social programs.
Sure, to do what we need to do, regular folks (the rest of us) will have to pay our share, but that will be oppressive only if the wealthy continue shirking their responsibility. Moreover, regular people don’t mind sacrificing so much when they know it serves the people rather than just their masters.
The elite have ingrained an acceptance of their unholy dispensation from social responsibility (their entitlement) in the minds of regular folks. It’s “the way God wants it,” or if not God, then the way the “infallible, invisible hand of the Market” wants it. It’s the only way it can be – ask a wealthy economist; he’ll tell you. The way to help “the rest of us” is to make the rich richer so they’ll spring a leak and trickle down on “the rest of us” (I don’t know about you, but that “trickle” idea always paints a picture for me – see: http://www.manneken-pis.com/intro.html )
Folks are led to believe all this stuff, but it is not the Truth; and I suspect it was this conventional “wisdom” that convinced you we lack resources to do what we ought to do. Unfortunately, this conventional wisdom is informed by the assumption that – as Leona Helmsley put it - taxes are for the little people (“the rest of us”).
This bias is accepted everywhere in the media – you know the saying: “The media is only as liberal as the Conservative businesses that own them.” Recently the Dispatch reported and editorialized on the KIPP school plans. As usual, the teachers’ union and some school board members were characterized as unreasonably difficult about cooperating with what the paper thought was wonderful – the paper’s elite bias was showing, however.
The cheerleading reporter gushed breathlessly about the program, editorializing on the March 1 front page that all the amazing magic she described from Washington D.C. is happening all around the country (how many schools did she visit?) and it “will happen in Columbus when the Kipp Journey Academy opens here this summer” (emphasis mine). The only critical aspects of her story were the implied and stated views that public school teachers were less able, enthusiastic, and dedicated than private KIPP teachers; that public school curricula were inferior; and that public school unions and school boards hinder such wonders as demonstrated by KIPP.
All this in the face of admitting that “KIPP schools have no tolerance for fighting.” I guess the fighters can just be sent back to the crummy public schools where when you have to go there, they have to take you in.
Worse, the naïve reporter states: ”KIPP students – poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods – have been brainwashed, in a sense, to believe that they were put on the planet to pave their ways to elite high schools and on to college . . . if they learn more, they’ll go on to a great high school. And if they go to a great high school, they might get into a top-tier college, And so on.”
She’s talking about Washington D.C. !! How many “poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods” is KIPP serving? What about the rest of the kids – the vast number of D.C. kids not headed for “elite high schools” and “a top-tier college”?
If KIPP is so wonderful, why not use it for all the children?
Because it is an elite program. How many elite high schools are there for the KIPP kids to enter? Are there enough top-tier colleges to hold all the “poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods” now in Washington D.C. ? Obviously not. So, why is the newspaper so enthusiastic?
Well, helping all the kids is “next to impossible”; we “lack resources,” and public schools suffer from the “entitlement mentality.” Helping a few kids is all we can do, all that we can afford, all that’s possible.
This is not the Truth; it is the “reality” that the privileged choose to project regarding education and other areas where “we need to” do more. It does seem to be the conventional wisdom now, and it is a daunting challenge to change this self-serving “reality.” But it is not impossible.
The Bush administration has lied so often and so ineptly that - in conjunction with the economy, the war, the hurricane, and other inescapable facts that have filtered into public awareness over the last seven years - the people are getting glimpses of the Truth – Not Big Brother’s truth, but the Truth, the Truth the establishment works to obscure – the Truth of just how unimportant “the rest of us” really are to those who rule And out of that Barack Obama is raising the expectations you mentioned: “Yes we can!!”
Now, I understand and generally agree with your view that political candidates make promises they know they won’t keep in order to get elected and then, once in office, climb back into bed with the same insurance companies and owners of professional sports venues they promised to tame.. But a different outcome is not impossible.
In listening to Obama, I find myself acknowledging “he’s saying all the right things; and he’s saying that he will lead a united people to achieve these things, to demand these things.” Now, it’s possible that he doesn’t really mean it or that, if elected, he will be dissuaded from fighting for it; or –as happened to Howard Dean – his threatening candidacy might be squashed by the establishment of both parties. Nevertheless, if he means it, is elected, and the establishment doesn’t assassinate him, all of your objections can be overcome.
“The rest of us” constitutes the vast American majority, and any President who tells the real Truth to the people (an act the elite call “dangerous demagoguery”) will have no trouble bringing a dysfunctional Congress to heel when the People demand it.
As for resources, the Truth is: resources are never even considered when it comes to things such as unnecessary wars to please elite game-players with imperial wet dreams of power, control, oil, and domination (what are called “American interests”). Resources are only considered scarce when needed for the interests of regular Americans, and that’s another Truth whose name we dare not speak.
As for entitlements, Lincoln claimed this to be a government of, by, and for the People. The Declaration of Independence says, ”Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
Pretending that there is something selfish about demanding the government address the needs of “the rest of us” while defending slavish kowtowing to the desires of the richest few among us is outrageous, upside-down, and more in keeping with Feudalistic values than with our American heritage. Our aristocracy of wealth – foreseen and warned against long ago by Alexis de Tocqueville – don’t have titles but they are “entitled” just the same.
In their minds these are invisible entitlement, perhaps - cloaked by the will of God, the Market, the Heritage Foundation, Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, and newspaper editorial boards. But they are entitlements just the same, paid for by sacrifices enforced upon “the rest of us” by diminishing the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness we foolishly see as our entitlements.
It may surprise you, but I agree entirely with your advice to the candidates:
“What the presidential candidates should be saying is, ‘You need to hear this . . .’ Real leadership is about telling people the truth, no matter how hard to swallow, and then persuading them to make the sacrifices necessary to accomplish public goals.”
Exactly!! But the truth you would have them tell is not the Truth, and the people who embrace that truth have no trouble swallowing it because it demands no sacrifice from them; instead, it calls on “the rest of us” to continue sacrificing for their good, the good of the few most able to sacrifice - but who would rather not. It’s the truth of “blame the victim” and is supported by the ingrained Puritanical notion that because of our “sinful nature” we deserve to be abused.
Now, that’s the Truth, and Obama seems to be saying something like that, and he says he will lead a united people to demand that the Truth be honored. If that should come to pass (admittedly no small “if”), it could be revolutionary. The Dispatch might even be forced to quit complaining about union workers costing the taxpayers a pittance now and then on a one time basis while it soaks the taxpayer year after year via tax abatements for its pet projects.
But whether or not Obama is sincere, whether he can get elected, whether as President he would fight for the people; he is still the only candidate telling the Truth. The others are busy manipulating “reality” to promote themselves - without regard to the Truth.
If “the rest of us” are ever to get a fair shake and a bit of dignity, someday we will have to embrace the Truth Obama has been presenting and stand up to demand that the powerful enjoy only one vote per person, not one vote per dollar. We will have to stand up and assert that government of, by, and for the People has nothing to do with the notion of a selfish “entitlement mentality.” We will have to stand up and demand that government derives its just powers from the consent of all of us – not only the top ten percent, but also “the rest of us” as well.
And that’s the Truth.
Yours - Tom Harker
Here's my answer to the column in the posting directly below.
I haven't heard a word from anyone at the Dispatch., but what could they say?
- Uke Man
Dear Mr. Hallett,
It’s not “impossible” to do what “we need to” do; and the “Truth” isn’t that a dysfunctional Congress or a lack of resources or an “entitlement mentality” or a reluctance to sacrifice makes doing what we need to do impossible. That is not the Truth.
At the same time, I agree that we are seldom told the Truth, but it isn’t because we can’t face the truth. It is because the elite dare not speak the Truth; They can’t admit the Truth.
The Truth is that we do not live under a democracy – at least if by democracy we mean a government responsive to the majority of the people. As the Supreme Court has ruled, money constitutes free speech; and as political scientists have pointed out candidates with the most money overwhelmingly come out on top. To me, “one dollar-one vote” is a strange form of democracy.
Before you dismiss this contention, consider your own words. Why is it that you believe there to be a lack of resources? It has been demonstrated that simply applying the payroll tax to the top ten percent of earners on every penny they earn – instead of setting them free at $100,000 – would easily solve the Social Security “problem” – without making Grandpa work until he drops – and with no extra payments by “the rest of us.”
Why does no one ever characterize these exempted folks at the top as having embraced an “entitlement mentality”? It seems to me that this pejorative tag fits wealthy folks demanding big tax breaks much better than poor families seeking health care for their children and old people trying to get off their feet at 65 rather than 70.
If it is “next to impossible” to help kids and Grandpa, it is because too many people believe it “next to impossible” to have the wealthy relinquish some of their entitlements. It is misleading to suggest that to do what we need to do, “the rest of us” would have to pay. Over the years the rich have been getting richer, their percentage of tax responsibility has been continually reduced, and THAT is what has been foisted on “the rest of us” – the 90% of Americans who make less that $100,000 per year.- those who, for the benefit of the entitled elite, are already sacrificing via regressive taxation and inadequate social programs.
Sure, to do what we need to do, regular folks (the rest of us) will have to pay our share, but that will be oppressive only if the wealthy continue shirking their responsibility. Moreover, regular people don’t mind sacrificing so much when they know it serves the people rather than just their masters.
The elite have ingrained an acceptance of their unholy dispensation from social responsibility (their entitlement) in the minds of regular folks. It’s “the way God wants it,” or if not God, then the way the “infallible, invisible hand of the Market” wants it. It’s the only way it can be – ask a wealthy economist; he’ll tell you. The way to help “the rest of us” is to make the rich richer so they’ll spring a leak and trickle down on “the rest of us” (I don’t know about you, but that “trickle” idea always paints a picture for me – see: http://www.manneken-pis.com/intro.html )
Folks are led to believe all this stuff, but it is not the Truth; and I suspect it was this conventional “wisdom” that convinced you we lack resources to do what we ought to do. Unfortunately, this conventional wisdom is informed by the assumption that – as Leona Helmsley put it - taxes are for the little people (“the rest of us”).
This bias is accepted everywhere in the media – you know the saying: “The media is only as liberal as the Conservative businesses that own them.” Recently the Dispatch reported and editorialized on the KIPP school plans. As usual, the teachers’ union and some school board members were characterized as unreasonably difficult about cooperating with what the paper thought was wonderful – the paper’s elite bias was showing, however.
The cheerleading reporter gushed breathlessly about the program, editorializing on the March 1 front page that all the amazing magic she described from Washington D.C. is happening all around the country (how many schools did she visit?) and it “will happen in Columbus when the Kipp Journey Academy opens here this summer” (emphasis mine). The only critical aspects of her story were the implied and stated views that public school teachers were less able, enthusiastic, and dedicated than private KIPP teachers; that public school curricula were inferior; and that public school unions and school boards hinder such wonders as demonstrated by KIPP.
All this in the face of admitting that “KIPP schools have no tolerance for fighting.” I guess the fighters can just be sent back to the crummy public schools where when you have to go there, they have to take you in.
Worse, the naïve reporter states: ”KIPP students – poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods – have been brainwashed, in a sense, to believe that they were put on the planet to pave their ways to elite high schools and on to college . . . if they learn more, they’ll go on to a great high school. And if they go to a great high school, they might get into a top-tier college, And so on.”
She’s talking about Washington D.C. !! How many “poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods” is KIPP serving? What about the rest of the kids – the vast number of D.C. kids not headed for “elite high schools” and “a top-tier college”?
If KIPP is so wonderful, why not use it for all the children?
Because it is an elite program. How many elite high schools are there for the KIPP kids to enter? Are there enough top-tier colleges to hold all the “poor, mostly black children often from depressed neighborhoods” now in Washington D.C. ? Obviously not. So, why is the newspaper so enthusiastic?
Well, helping all the kids is “next to impossible”; we “lack resources,” and public schools suffer from the “entitlement mentality.” Helping a few kids is all we can do, all that we can afford, all that’s possible.
This is not the Truth; it is the “reality” that the privileged choose to project regarding education and other areas where “we need to” do more. It does seem to be the conventional wisdom now, and it is a daunting challenge to change this self-serving “reality.” But it is not impossible.
The Bush administration has lied so often and so ineptly that - in conjunction with the economy, the war, the hurricane, and other inescapable facts that have filtered into public awareness over the last seven years - the people are getting glimpses of the Truth – Not Big Brother’s truth, but the Truth, the Truth the establishment works to obscure – the Truth of just how unimportant “the rest of us” really are to those who rule And out of that Barack Obama is raising the expectations you mentioned: “Yes we can!!”
Now, I understand and generally agree with your view that political candidates make promises they know they won’t keep in order to get elected and then, once in office, climb back into bed with the same insurance companies and owners of professional sports venues they promised to tame.. But a different outcome is not impossible.
In listening to Obama, I find myself acknowledging “he’s saying all the right things; and he’s saying that he will lead a united people to achieve these things, to demand these things.” Now, it’s possible that he doesn’t really mean it or that, if elected, he will be dissuaded from fighting for it; or –as happened to Howard Dean – his threatening candidacy might be squashed by the establishment of both parties. Nevertheless, if he means it, is elected, and the establishment doesn’t assassinate him, all of your objections can be overcome.
“The rest of us” constitutes the vast American majority, and any President who tells the real Truth to the people (an act the elite call “dangerous demagoguery”) will have no trouble bringing a dysfunctional Congress to heel when the People demand it.
As for resources, the Truth is: resources are never even considered when it comes to things such as unnecessary wars to please elite game-players with imperial wet dreams of power, control, oil, and domination (what are called “American interests”). Resources are only considered scarce when needed for the interests of regular Americans, and that’s another Truth whose name we dare not speak.
As for entitlements, Lincoln claimed this to be a government of, by, and for the People. The Declaration of Independence says, ”Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
Pretending that there is something selfish about demanding the government address the needs of “the rest of us” while defending slavish kowtowing to the desires of the richest few among us is outrageous, upside-down, and more in keeping with Feudalistic values than with our American heritage. Our aristocracy of wealth – foreseen and warned against long ago by Alexis de Tocqueville – don’t have titles but they are “entitled” just the same.
In their minds these are invisible entitlement, perhaps - cloaked by the will of God, the Market, the Heritage Foundation, Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, and newspaper editorial boards. But they are entitlements just the same, paid for by sacrifices enforced upon “the rest of us” by diminishing the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness we foolishly see as our entitlements.
It may surprise you, but I agree entirely with your advice to the candidates:
“What the presidential candidates should be saying is, ‘You need to hear this . . .’ Real leadership is about telling people the truth, no matter how hard to swallow, and then persuading them to make the sacrifices necessary to accomplish public goals.”
Exactly!! But the truth you would have them tell is not the Truth, and the people who embrace that truth have no trouble swallowing it because it demands no sacrifice from them; instead, it calls on “the rest of us” to continue sacrificing for their good, the good of the few most able to sacrifice - but who would rather not. It’s the truth of “blame the victim” and is supported by the ingrained Puritanical notion that because of our “sinful nature” we deserve to be abused.
Now, that’s the Truth, and Obama seems to be saying something like that, and he says he will lead a united people to demand that the Truth be honored. If that should come to pass (admittedly no small “if”), it could be revolutionary. The Dispatch might even be forced to quit complaining about union workers costing the taxpayers a pittance now and then on a one time basis while it soaks the taxpayer year after year via tax abatements for its pet projects.
But whether or not Obama is sincere, whether he can get elected, whether as President he would fight for the people; he is still the only candidate telling the Truth. The others are busy manipulating “reality” to promote themselves - without regard to the Truth.
If “the rest of us” are ever to get a fair shake and a bit of dignity, someday we will have to embrace the Truth Obama has been presenting and stand up to demand that the powerful enjoy only one vote per person, not one vote per dollar. We will have to stand up and assert that government of, by, and for the People has nothing to do with the notion of a selfish “entitlement mentality.” We will have to stand up and demand that government derives its just powers from the consent of all of us – not only the top ten percent, but also “the rest of us” as well.
And that’s the Truth.
Yours - Tom Harker
posted by Ukulele Man at 1:48 PM
1 Comments:
Hi Tom,
Wonderful, wonderful. Where are the thinking people? Sondra
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