01-09-2009, 09:47 PM
Paul Rigby Wrote:Myra Bronstein Wrote:Not that I'm optimistic about the capacity of Americans for the truth. They tend to recoil, well conditioned to deflect it.
“It was an entire nation of wearied spectators who had long ago given up all interference in their own fate, and knew not what catastrophe they were to hope or fear,”
Guizot (on France before the abdication of Napoleon I)
Apologies if this offends US readers, but this is my strong sense of America today.
Based on my insider status I have to say that too many Americans decide what to believe based on how information makes them feel. That's backassward. Ideally people will decide what's true, then they will react emotionally to the truth. Americans have emotional fact filters.
It's most distressing for me. It's, no doubt, most advantageous for the powers that be.