The End of an Era

There doesn’t look like a lot of hope now for the foreseeable future -- for those to continue to live in the manner they had grown accustomed to and thought would never end.

That’s usually what these calamitous reevaluations of assets in the financial markets indicate -- that an old way of life is ending, and quietly, sometimes invisibly, a new manner of living is emerging. Obviously, bigger and more expensive homes are not the wave of the future, or dreams of yearly travels and cruises around the world, stopping at the many homes one has around the world.

That kind of life of excess, is a thing of the past, as the social and economic hierarchies get leveled out. While it is often said that the rich only get richer, while the poor get poorer -- there are actually times, when the rich get poorer at alarming rates of loss (distress,) while the poor continue mostly unaffected, because they weren’t planning any cruises anyway, and were happy gleaning from the bottom of the barrel anyway

Those most affected however, are those who have grown accustomed to thinking of their job security and upward mobility as a permanent state (entitlement) -- rather than as business must be, fluctuating and changing. Frequently, even landmark institutions become history.

While there is still the Dow Industrials as a measure of the stock market fortunes, the composition of that average changes over time, to obviously favor the progress of its most successful and prominent enterprises -- and those no longer so, are dropped from the list, and many disappear entirely. So there is that bias to the market always seeming to trend upward, and not to reflect what happens to those still holding certificates for businesses that no longer exist.

What we see happening now happening in full view has been the fall of even the way we obtain this information of what is happening in the world -- speeded in their demise, by deciding to become undisguisedly partisan and bias sources -- frequently against those who still patronize them, as though somehow, it made sense to attack those who could still afford to employ them.

So when they lost their best customers, all they were stuck with, were those who no advertiser was interested in marketing to.

Money, Media and the Madness of Crowds

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While it is undeniably true that the media can be bought by whoever has the most money to spend on their marketing (propaganda) campaigns, I think Senator McCain should be commended for honoring his pledge not to allow the presidency to be bought -- but earned through authentic contacts with the people.

That is the disturbing thing about these media reports about who has the most money to spend -- as though one was a fool to deprive the media of their "take" upfront. But hopefully, the American public can recognize these abuses and will value those who can't be bought.

That's the better choice for president -- and the people who surround him/her.

One of the unfortunate things about being a writer, or a media celebrity, is that one doesn’t get paid for saying and being themselves -- but are at the beck and call of whoever pays the bills. That point is usually lost in their protestations of “objectivity” and fairness that once used to be the objective of at least the reporting professions. Now, one can usually assume the bias and partisanship, whether there is a disclaimer at the beginning and the end. If they had no self-interest, we wouldn’t see them in the first place.

This cult of celebrity feeds on itself -- so that one only is a somebody, if that mediated world makes one so -- and any other accreditation and validation has no meaning -- in that fabricated world. That’s why the “Oprahs” and the other high-priests of media are so self-important -- in determining what and who is known -- which has come to eliminate virtually all those with authentic and legitimate qualifications, in favor of those who play the “media game” best -- and have the money to spend.

Formerly, that was not a trait highly valued -- but in the mass media age, is the only qualification. Thus, the only expertise now sought among many politicians, are the unscrupulous spin doctors who pride themselves that they can get the public to believe anything, and attack and discredit those who won’t go along.

We see this being played out in the pages of the old media meeting the new, where there are countless defenders of the media hierarchy, who believe they are just one character assassination away from their own show -- and will do and say anything to get it.

Distortions of the Mass Media

John McCain and Sarah Palin have nothing to be ashamed of. They have both lived and conducted themselves with grace and honor -- all their lives.

That's what is really disturbing about this election and particularly the media's role in distorting real values with their bogus issues. There is no racism, no smears, "anger," hatred, no belittling, derision, fear or hate-mongering on their part -- as their anonymous, or nearly anonymous operatives have accused them of.

What is sad and shameful is the liberal presses abandoning all pretense of its "objectivity" and becoming full-out partisan -- and more extremist than the American public is. Rabid partisans account for a small percentage in America, and are not a majority -- either of the left or right. That is the distinctive makeup of the American society and culture.

Yet the press (demagogues) have been hellbent on making America sectarian -- like those wonderful despotic countries in the middle east, where one group is slaughtering off the other -- at every opportunity to do so. Their polls are skewed to show extreme partisanship as the dominant driver in American life.

The makeup of America is pretty nearly all-American, and not 50% Democrats, 40% Republicans, and 10% independents. Rather, its constitution is probably closer to 50% independents, 30% Republicans and 20% Democrats -- but that 20% being 90% in the media, schools and unions -- with greater access and control of mass audiences, and thus they have undue influence on what is thought and believed.

Republicans don't have that control of mass influence because that is not their style. They tend to relate to each to each other individually and authentically -- and why they don't spend all their time demagoguing in the usual mass media styles of manipulation, coercion, intimidation, and conformity (political correctness).

That is also the reason that the "old media" (forums) are losing its audience and influence, particularly among the most independent sector of the public -- which is resistant to mass media influences and allowing others to do their thinking for them. That is the valued sector of the public to reach -- because it is the most vital, dynamic, and of course, independent -- which is the new game in town.

It is not a development that needs to be lamented, but the passing of its time -- and the coming of age for a new America of free and independent people -- not defined and burdened by the labels, that make them prone to flattery, praise and self-righteousness, or criticism, judgment and rebuke.

The Measure of the Bush Presidency

When the terrorists attacked America on 9/11/01, whatever other plans President George W. Bush, may have intended, fell by the wayside, and the very lives of living in the USA, became in doubt and jeopardy. Nobody awakening the next day, could even imagined a future in which lives even in America, would ever again be free from the unrelenting fear and memory of an imminent and ruthless act of savagery at any moment, anywhere.

Obviously, that’s not the world we live in now -- of that constant fear of death and destruction, and in fact, those thoughts are so far removed from most people’s consciousness, that many now are in denial that such events ever happened, or could ever happen again -- because that overwhelming fear has already dissolved into denial.

Now, however, the most deceptive and manipulative, including and especially many in the mainstream media, would have us believe, that such atrocities were merely staged or imagined -- and were never real. They were nothing but “lies,” merely as a pretext for unprovoked aggression, they will now insist, although at the time, they were among the most fearful.

And it may be largely on account of that shame, embarrassment and humiliation, many have turned so bravely to attack their protector -- which wouldn’t be unprecedented in the annals of history or literature. Often when one empowers another, those not taught to use that power wisely and responsibly, first turn against those who have given them such powers.

And in this case, that power is the freedom from fear -- that constant and pervasive fear that enveloped the world days after those memorable terrorist attacks of 9/11/01, when the world was literally paralyzed by fear, and the most hopeful thought that only time could diminish such fearful preoccupations.

But all that change suddenly and dramatically with President Bush’s War on Terror -- whereby no international boundaries would now protect one from the retribution of justice. On the top of that list was the refuge of terrorist activity in the country run by the Taliban in Afghanistan. “Those who knew better,” proclaimed that such a venture was doomed because even the Russians had been defeated there.

So imagine the shock and awe, when that war seemed to be over with virtually no resistance and casualties. Khadafy of Libya immediately proclaimed he was out of the international terrorism business, including sheltering those with such designs and suspicions.

Saddam Hussein of Iraq, therefore, became the most outspoken in defiance of the international resolve not to harbor any terrorists, and even, pointed out, he had plenty of secret weapons himself, to maintain his defiance -- and even suggested he might have a plan or two of his own to take advantage of the volatile situation of anxiety hanging as a cloud over security and prosperity in the world.

The response from President Bush is history -- and an immense, unprecedented prosperity so consumed the world in relief that it led to its present excesses, which too in time, will resolve itself, although maybe not as dramatically and definitively as the overthrow of regimes harboring the terrorist elements in the world.

That day is past -- although, again the media demagogues will convince us, there never were good days that got out of control to have been the excesses -- that now have to be addressed and resolved. Those who don’t know history, have very short memories, and think that the present, is all that has ever been -- and is not the result, of the challenges of a previous time.

So while there is fear and anxiety about the financial future many thought just months ago was assured -- the excesses and abuses change that future quickly, and destructively. It is not that we’ve never had prosperity, but when we had that success, many were unprepared for such good fortune, and thought they were now entitled to that forever, and irrevocably.

But those are the challenges for the next president. The measure of the Bush presidency was in keeping everyone here at home in America, alive and well -- with a chance to live and enjoy the future.

The New is Really Something Different

People used to the old conditioning, see the new as the old -- rather than the new for the first time, and then get angrier when the new “fails” to live up to their expectations of the old. In most cases, that will far exceed the old capabilities, but those “conditioned” to the old, will find them “unsatisfactory” because they aren’t the old -- rather than a totally new ball game they now have to “learn.”

And “learning,” they were “taught” in schools, is the most traumatic, time-consuming, humiliating, and wasteful use of their time and energy -- unapologetically by bad teachers. The worst teachers of course, will not suspect that, but will think their pogroms for humiliation and control, are the state of the art in achieving the discipline they desire -- and that is the conditioning they teach, that will invariably fail all those they have contact and relationships with in their lives.

And so they will pronounce and reinforce, what a terrible place the world is -- full of arbitrary, vindictive, capricious people -- and will feel their great calling in life to propagate that message everywhere they can, as the liberal, socialsitic enlightenment. All that they can do is organize themselves in cliques of temporary expediency and mutual exploitation to do battle daily with those of other cliques -- they automatically presume must be their enemies.

In their old world view, it can never be suspected that mutual benefit is the goal and objective of fundamental human relationship and activities -- rather than the certainty that they must compete and vanquish every other (class) -- as the only way they’ve been taught life has ever been, is, and must be -- endless partisan divisions, struggles, conflicts and ultimately war with every other -- only now they will call their crusade and purification movement, “Peace” -- even if they have to resocialize and eliminate all those who do not conform to their new ideal of paradise.

But certainly, that will be the final and ultimate solution -- and nobody will be allowed to question it -- in their perfect world. They will drown out all other ideas, voices and ensure the correctness handed down by Big Brother dutifully -- as every correct-thinking person MUST

Welcome to 2008.