crap! As a citizenry, we suck, It took me nearly three months to finish this book because I had to keep putting it down with disgust at all the things that we put up with from our political representatives.
Note: They're not our "leaders" they're not simply "politicians" as if that's their job and no need to hold them accountable they are our political representatives and we've got to stop relying on them to run our communities, our nation and our world.
Attention Deficit Democracy by James BovardThe author contends that the average American knows less less about his government than they do about math and science in which areas America has dismal rankings.
Part of this is due to the fact that Americans no longer real to inform themselves but depend on media and social networking mush.
Theelection between two of the worst presidential candidates inyears with both parties screaming about horrible the other candidate is while downplaying how horrible their own candidate is has demonstrated the point of this book beyond any reasonable doubt.
The major party nominees have consistently declined in quality over my lifetime, I actually can't think of a decent person nominated by either party in the lastyears, yet the government has more and more power over our lives in spite of the idiots we keep electing.
We keep asking the idiots we elect to solve all our problems,
I weep for our country, Does the people's need to believe in the president trump their duty to understand, to think critically, and demand truth Have Americans been conditioned to ignore political frauds and believe the lies perpetuated by campaign ads James Bovard diagnoses a national malady called "Attention Deficit Democracy," characterized by a citizenry that seems to be paying less attention to facts, and is less capable of judging when their rights and liberties are under attack.
Bovard's careful research combined with his characteristically caustic style will give "ADD" a whole new meaning that pundits, politicians, and we the people will find hard to ignore.
Pretty good book overall. Lacks in some things as it's a decade and a half old while talking about the Bush administration in the present tense, but some of it was eerily prescient about fake news and journalists being lazy hacks.
i am not yet finished with this one, am aboutdone, kindle, but i wanted to write a few things and that is what i am doing.
just finished a rather lengthy chapter on the torture issue,
and now i need to hit "save" on this so i can see my kindle highlights here so i can continue to write the things i'd been thinking about.
. .
this is the rough draft/final version, my "notes to myself", . . if another benefits from what is here, hallelujah,
anyway, bovard writes, "This book examines the rising ignorance of the electorate, the fearmongering tactics of theand other presidential campaigns, the profusion of lying and how it fundamentally changes candidates relation to citizens, the ways in which contemporary elections are degenerating into a tawdry trading of votes for handouts and subservience, and the current Messianic Democracy push.
"
so yeah, okay. some of the information here is new to me, the n. e. d. the i. r. i. has to do with influencing elections, the manner in which the u, s. a. has done so. what with the hullabaloo over the alleged "russian influencing elections here" and the abundant lack of any evidence of that, lack of anything to justify the hype.
. . apropos. here's one highlight:
McCain hooted in: “When we provide the democratic opposition in Albania withJeep Cherokees and they win an election, Im incredibly proud.
” and yet he is deeply disturbed at the thought of russian involvement on our shores, okay, johnnie. you bet. some relatively good information here regarding our u, s. a. influencing, meddling, overseas. some of it new to me,
what else i just finished a lengthy chapter on the torture, i'm honesly inclined to not give a damn, it's war. both sides are trying to make the other side bleed, and bleed profusely, to bleed until they quit, and we're talking about torture yeah, okay. sure. it's war. we expect people to be polite they hack off a guy's head on national television and caution us over and over that we can't use the word islam and terrorism in the same sentence.
torture they march twenty men in orange jumpsuits down to the beach, hack off their heads, torture meh.
toward the end of the lengthy, very very protracted chapter on torture, bovard asks the hypothetical question: What would it take to make the public acquiesce to the torture of Americans Would simply applying an “odious” label such as “cultmember” at Waco, or “Muslim” with John Walker Lindh to the victims be sufficient There certainly was little or no outcry about the brutalizing of John Walker Lindh.
and i thought, finally! you see, bovard in this lengthy and protracted chapter chastising bush and company for tortureone gets the sense that bush is there, brandishing the electrodesand i suspect the only reason the bush name is used, repeatedly, is because the administration in the form of lawyers wrote down guidelines for torture.
otherwise otherwise what i dunno. there is no otherwise. but i thought with that "cultmember" word, . . that comes at the bottom of the page, . . that i quickly turn to see if he makes the point i'd been thinking about all along, . . when i read of torture that consisted of, quote "According to the logic of the attorney general nominee, federal authorities could deprive American citizens of sleep, isolate them in cold cells while bombarding them with unpleasant noises and interrogate themhours a day while the prisoners were naked and hooded, all without violating the Constitution.
" end quote.
the point is, that was done! on national television! at waco! and the people inside the building being bombarded with noise and light included children.
and it was general reno who rented a tank to do them in,
so mr bovard, you you certainly know, What would it take to make the public acquiesce to the torture of Americans you know.
you watched it, too, you saw it on national television, you get the american people to acquiesce to the torture of americans by labeling them a cult, you continue that mindset with eight years of abuse of the white house by having all and sundry use words like "white trash".
. . "red neck" . and "bighaired wimmen" all in the name of keeping potus's numbes relevant and up there, americans watched torture of their fellow americans on the nightly news and i remember the day the world war two vet walked outside to report on general reno driving the tank through the building.
. . next door neighbor, gone now, . . but yeah. you think people are not paying attention guess again,
anyway. that is all for the moment, 'boutdone. had to look see when this came out,. so there's quite a bit of government lies and abuse not covered up to the current day, curious to see how the rest of it goes,
, finished
and i'm done,
back to the torture issue, bovard, like i said, devoted a long protracted chapter to the issue of torture, i realize when one gets into a numbers game one risks, in another chapter, bovard writes about the number of iraqi children that died as a result of sanctions, hundreds of thousands. children. disease, this, that, the other, sanctions stared presumably under bushone, continued under clinton, and still in force to the u, s. invasion. while some were wringing their hands over some who were tortured, that same heartfelt emotion was missing when the matter was the death of iraqi children.
perspective.
meh. why bother
throughout, bovard makes the point that the american electorate is less than stellar in their choice at the polls.
not as much time is spent on the idea that we are presented with two choices, a third, if there happens to be a third force contender.
. . say, ross perot, was it in ''that probably had something to do with why b, c. f. r came about. the incumbent protection plan. and a violation of thest amendment though it was upheld by the u, s. s. c. their decision coming down a few days before saddam was found hiding in a hole,
what bovard does not cover
the lament that we continue to elect deceitful men, and then reelect them to a second term, is the argument.
that we are losing our liberty as a result is a point, what bovard doesn't say anything about is the army of bureaucrats who are unelected, accountable, and who have all three powers of government at their disposal.
unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats writing regulations that have the force of law is fascism, when those same bureaucrats have all three powers of government at their disposal it is fascism squared, . . or cubed. never could get my geometry straight, nothing about that in here,
ummmm.
a couple items i noted
at one point, bovard used this expression It was unclear whether this warning rallied the redneck vote for Bush.
the point isn't "this warning", . . the point is the use of the term "redneck" used without apology or regret, imagine bovard using the fabled nword, we wouldn't hear the end of it, but it goes to what i've been saying, . . in the various "speak bitterness" campaigns i'm free to engage in on facebook, . . that afteryears of hearing the same disparaging words from the media elite during the clinton abuse of the white house, . . afteryears of hearing the warnings about using the words "islam" and "terrorism" in the same sentence, . . afteryears of hearing the "racist" label bandied about whenever i've openly expressed disapproval of citizen obama's objectives, . . i'll say that i am not surprised, at all, that the one candidate who resembled a thirdparty candidate, trump, was elected, i doubt i am alone in my thinking,
we know the zombies are taught not to denigrate the different, we hear it almost daily, we're inundated with it, political correctness, but like i said, foryears during clinton, foryears during obama, the zombies have also know that there are some it is perfectly okay to denigrate.
here's another that bovard uses:
Despite historys failure to validate his theory, Kants doctrine has been embraced in recent decades with the fervor of a religious revival meeting.
unlike some here, too many, at goodreads, who should be subject to the same "show me don't tell me" criticism, i prefer to show.
there's no doubt what is meant by "religious revival meeting" and there's no doubt, the zombies would know, that yes, it is okay to denigrate the different, in this case, the christian.
and yes, it is okay to use a tank to run over
"cult" members the ultimate torture because the media and political elite have said so.
. . in so many words. all goes to support my point that after a certain amount of time, the people get fed up, and chose another path,
much of bovard's thesis can be summed up in jefferson's words from the declartion, paraphrased probably that all experience has shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, rather than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they have grown accustomed.
remains to be seen whether the people can take back that liberty which has been taken from them by dishonest, powerhungry politicians.
bovard uses the "fact" of polling to support his claim that the people are somewhat ignorant of government, too trusting, all so very scientific. polling. i remember answering the phone on occasion, some pollster, asking questions, me with a mouthful of spaghetti, or the pot boiling, or me, wanting a cold beer, just having gotten home from work.
meh. polling. science and yet i tend to agree with his claim that the majority majority of people are not engaged enough with the political process.
ummm what else
endless footnotes, touches on the court decision, was it kelo kelso about the land grab, touches on b. c. f. r. has some truly remarkable and dumbfounding quotes from politicians, heh! there's one from nixon, . . a number of others.
that's all for now, i doubt i try to rewrite this, try to make it coherent, for whom
wait now, . . there was another point i wanted to make, what was it
bovard touches, briefly, on the idea of the twoparty we have, i know the last at least six presidential elections, my vote has been for the lesser of two evils, can't say it any clearer than that, forget the offices below that, forget trying to engage representatives, . . think it is interesting that when one on the "right" opposes big government, the label is "antigovernment" when that is not true, smaller government, yes. antigovernment no. how about the left a variety of labels i guess, . . unpatriotic this, that, the other, from a variety of sources, when the "antigov't" label comes from across the board, from all, curious, is all.
i wanted something to read, . . maybe to cleanse the palate, . . after listening to cnn or fox news on the truck radio, . . i rarely watch television. thought bovard would be the ticket, somewhat. dissatisfied that so much was made about the torture of a relative few compared to the small service paid to the death of hundreds of thousands of children.
. . and i had to backtrack to discover what president was responsible for that, . . bushone, clinton, and bushtwo but there was no doubt about the torture issue, bush/cheney. and like i said, americans watched other americans being tortured on the nightly news, a la waco,texas, . . and narry a word. not a word. bovard did touch more on the waco incident later, . . after i wrote the far above, past theread mark,
all in all, good read, .
Seize Attention Deficit Democracy Written By James Bovard Categorized In Paper Copy
James Bovard