THE ASSAULT ON REASON discussion thread... Join In!

[IndyOp]

All posts welcome!

Book sections:

Introduction
Chapter 1: The Politics of Fear
Chapter 2: Blinding the Faithful
Chapter 3: The Politics of Wealth
Chapter 4: Convenient Untruths
Chapter 5: The Assault on the Individual
Chapter 6: National Insecurity
Chapter 7: The Carbon Crisis
Chapter 8: Democracy in the Balance
Chapter 9: A Well-Connected Citizenry
Conclusion: The Rebirth of Democracy

I am going to start with Gore's post to Amazon.com readers provides an interesting "in" to the book. It explains why it is dedicated to his father. I'll have another comment about this just below the text box...

I've dedicated my book, The Assault on Reason, to my father, Senator Albert Gore Sr., the bravest politician I've ever known. In the 1970 mid-term elections, President Richard Nixon relied on a campaign of fear to consolidate his power. I was in the military at the time, on my way to Vietnam as an army journalist, and I watched as my father was accused of being unpatriotic because he was steadfast in his opposition to the War--and as he was labeled an atheist because he dared to oppose a constitutional amendment to foster government-sponsored prayer in the public schools. The 1970 campaign is now regarded by political historians as a watershed, marking a sharp decline in the tone of our national discourse--a decline that has only worsened in recent years as fear has become a more powerful political tool than trust, public consumption of entertainment has dramatically surpassed that of serious news, and blind faith has proven more potent than truth.

We are at a pivotal moment in American democracy. The persistent and sustained reliance on falsehoods as the basis of policy, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, has reached levels that were previously unimaginable. It's too easy and too partisan to simply place the blame on the policies of President George W. Bush. We are all responsible for the decisions our country makes.

Reasoned, focused discourse is vital to our democracy to ensure a well-informed citizenry. But this is difficult in an environment in which we are experiencing a new pattern of serial obsessions that periodically take over the airwaves for weeks at a time--from the O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson trials to Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole Smith.

Never has it been more vital for us to face the reality of our long-term challenges, from the climate crisis to the war in Iraq to the deficits and health and social welfare. Today, reason is under assault by forces using sophisticated techniques such as propaganda, psychology, and electronic mass media. Yet, democracy's advocates are beginning to use their own sophisticated techniques: the Internet, online organizing, blogs, and wikis. Although the challenges we face are great, I am more confident than ever before that democracy will prevail and that the American people are rising to the challenge of reinvigorating self-government. It is my great hope that those who read my book will choose to become part of a new movement to rekindle the true spirit of America.

http://www.amazon.com/Assault-Reason-Al-Gore/dp/1594201226

If you haven't seen it before, Spike Jonze' 2000 Campaign Video "Unseen Al Gore" includes Al saying that, as a young man, he was as disillusioned about politics as anyone you could meet. He said that it was as a result of covering politics as a journalist. His comment above reveals that it was also a result of witnessing what happened to his father in the 1970 election. "The Assault on Reason" has clearly been a long time - nearly 40 years - in the making.

[IndyOp]

1. Al's connection to Scott Peck --

One of my first discoveries in The Assault on Reason - TAOR - is a quote on the back of the book from M. Scott Peck. Why?

Not too long ago, I read an interview in which Al quoted Scott Peck. I don't remember the quote or where the interview appeared. When I read that interview, though, I thought that the title and message of An Inconvenient Truth sounded like one of Scott Peck's great messages (paraphrasing from memory): "Sanity is complete commitment to truth." I wondered about the depth of the connection between Gore and Peck. The quote on the back of AOR suggests to me that their connection is deep and decades old.

First a bit about Peck:

M. Scott Peck, M.D. - psychiatrist


Peck's two most important books -- in my humble opinion...



"The Road Less Traveled" was a mega-bestseller in the early 80's. I read it in the 90's while I was doing what I could to recover after the deaths of my parents. The two messages I remember most vividly from the book are (again, paraphrasing): "Sanity is complete commitment to truth." and "Love is not a feeling. Love is an action taken to support one's own or another's spiritual growth."

Peck's quote on the back jacket of TAOR is about Earth in the Balance -- "Earth in the Balance is a brilliantly written, prophetic, even holy book, clearly pointing the way we need to change to assure the survival of our grandchildren. I pray it will have the dramatic impact it deserves - and must have for our collective salvation."

If Al and Scott weren't friends before Peck wrote that quote, it is a safe bet that they were afterwards.

Peck died in September 2005. Al seems to be carrying on with the mission of helping us recover our sanity. TAOR is an invitation to intellectual and personal and spiritual growth.

You might want to check out Peck's Foundation for Community Encouragement Mission Statement. So far each time I read the word "democracy" in AOR, I've been able to substitute "community" and deepen the message that comes through.

FCE encourages people, in a fragmented world, to discover new and better ways of being together. Living, learning, and teaching the principles of community, FCE serves as a catalyst for individuals, groups, and organizations to:

* communicate with authenticity
* deal with difficult issues
* welcome and affirm diversity
* bridge differences with integrity
* relate with love and respect

FCE's approach encourages tolerance of ambiguity, the experience of discovery, and the tension between holding on and letting go. In our work to empower others, we remember our reliance upon a Spirit within and beyond ourselves.

[fooj]

5. What I've learned...

that the SAME players who destroyed his father's political career are trying to do the very same thing to him. I didn't realize that his father lost his Senate seat. Like Al said...he GAINED so much more.

[54anickel]

33. I didn't realize that Peck passed away - missed that one. Loved his work, had

a big influence in my life during some trying times. Sorry to hear that he passed and still don't know how I missed it.

[SharonRB]

2. I'm about halfway done.

It's been a lazy day around here, so I've been reading and sleeping on and off. I just got up from a 2-/12 hour nap (my daughter woke me at about 7:30, or I'd still be sleeping) and hubby just went to pick up Quiznos. I may try to read some more after I eat. I've been putting markers in some of the more interesting points so I'd remember them later, but all in all, he's hitting all the important points of what's gone wrong.

One thing I thought was funny -- on page 32, where he talks about the mirror neurons, the ones that feel other people's pain. He says he calls them the Dalai Lama neurons. I wondered why he didn't call them the Bill Clinton neurons. :rofl:

[IndyOp]

3. Bill Clinton neurons? Oh, no!

:rofl:

I haven't gotten that far. I don't know if I'd call mirror neurons "Dalai Lama neurons" - mirror neurons allow/cause us to feel aggression watching other people being aggressive -- we don't just feel other people's pain or sadness or joy.

[movonne]

4. I sure hope Al Gore runs for president....if he runs he would be my

first choice...we really need Gore at this time...if he doesn't run, then Edwards...

[IndyOp]

6. Introduction: Points that jumped out at me...

The present threat (to our nation) is not based on conflicting ideas about America's basic principles. It is based on several serious problems that stem from the dramatic and fundamental change in the way we communicate among ourselves.

1. Television is one-way communication: "Individuals receive, but they cannot send. They absorb, but they cannot share. They hear, but they do not speak. They see constant motion, but they do not move themselves. The 'well-informed citizenry' is in danger of becoming the 'well-assumed audience.'"

2. Distortion of journalism by entertainment values - the news has been tarted up & dumbed-down as Dan Rather put it.

3. Concentrated ownership of electronic broadcasting firms. The expense of owning/operating television means fewer news outlets (as compared to many independently-owned newspapers).

I quoted #1 because it is delightful prose...

Historically: Printed information accessible to all begat the age of reason (Enlightenment) which begat democracy...

People without knowledge feel helpless.

My thought about this: Printed information accessible to all begat the age of reason which begat democracy in the Western world. This is an appropriate focus for Gore - his audience is steeped in the history of the Western world.

Still, many indigenous peoples, including Native American tribes operated democratically. Zinn indicates that the difference in social structure are often due to the bounty of the environment in which the people live. People who live in forests with food available in abundance are peaceful and democratic. People who live in regions without sufficient food, water are often violent and authoritarian.

I would argue, based on information from ethologists, that democracy is GENETIC -- we see democratic social decision-making in insects, fish, deer, birds. Ethologists watched groups of animals for decades thinking that the alpha male or alpha female would make decisions and that other group members would follow their lead. What has been seen over and over again is that many group decisions are democratic. For example, a herd of deer has been eating grass in a particular location for a while, many are becoming full and getting a drink of water might be the next group activity. How do they decide when to go? At some point individuals in the herd will stop eating and turn to face in the direction of a particular watering hole they have visited before. When 51% of the herd is standing and facing in the same direction - they go! Similar phenomena are seen in insects, birds. It is evolutionarily adaptive for groups to use the information gathering and decision-making power of many/most individuals in the group.

Democracy is not the product of the information age -- it is genetic. The tendency to behave democratically can be squelched by fear of violence or want; by cultural/religious teachings that authoritarian structures are "right" or "necessary"; and/or by lack of information.

Transition from print to television age...

Page 6: "And yet, today, almost forty-five years have passed since the majority of Americans received their news and information from the printed word. Newspapers are hemorrhaging readers."

Page 7: "All of a sudden, in a single, generation, Americans made a dramatic change in their daily routines, and started sitting motionless, staring at flickering images on a screen for more than 30 hours each week."
:wow:

Page 7: "Not only did television take over a larger share of the time and attention Americans devoted to news and information, it began to dominate a larger share of the public sphere as a whole. Moreover, as advertisers quickly discovered, television's power to motivate changes in behavior was also unprecedented. The advertising of products, of course, is the principal business of television. And it is difficult to overstate the extent to which the pervasiveness of modern electronic advertising has reshaped our society."

:applause: :applause: :applause: :applause: :applause:

Ads created demand for products we did not need and then political campaigns, adopting marketing techniques, became ever more expensive to run and now there are more wealthy people in House and Senate...

"To the extent that money and the clever use of electronic mass media could be used to manipulate the outcome of elections, the role of reason began to diminish.

As a college student, I wrote my senior thesis on the impact of television on the balance of power among the three branches of government. In the course of that study, I point out the growing importance of visual rhetoric and body language over logic and reason. There are countless examples of this, but perhaps, understandably, the first one that comes to mind is from the 2000 campaign, long before the Supreme Court decision and the hanging chads, when the controversy over my sighs in the first debate with George W. Bush created an impression on television that for many viewers outweighed whatever positive benefits I might have otherwise gained in the verbal combat of ideas and substance. A lot of good that senior thesis did me." ;-) :D

If you are interested in the use of propaganda in marketing and politics, there is a FANTASTIC BBC series on GoogleVideo called "Century of the Self." It started with Sigmund Freud's nephew Edward Bernays who founded modern marketing techniques. "Century of the Self" takes us all the way through Bill Clinton's "use of powerful computers to parse and subdivide the American people according to "psychographic" categories that identify their selective susceptibility to individually tailored appeals" that have magnified the power of propagandistic electronic messaging" - page 10 TAOR.

Century of Self - Program 1 of 4

The medium is the message -- McLuhan, Postman & Neuroscience of Emotion and Reason...

Reading print - interpreting symbols on a page - activates brain regions central to reasoning.

"...vividness portrayed on television has the capacity to trigger instinctual responses similar to those triggered by reality itself - and without being modulated by logic, reason, and reflective thought."

"An individual who spends four and a half hours a day watching television is likely to have a very different pattern of brain activity from an individual who spends four and a half hours a day reading. Different parts of the brain are stimulated repetitively.... the human brain...is hardwired to immediately notice sudden movement in our field of vision. We not only notice, we are compelled to look. passed on to us the genetic trait that neuroscientists call "the orienting response." And that is the brain syndrome continuously activated by television - sometimes as frequently as once per second. That is the reason the industry phrase glue eyeballs to the screen is actually more than a glib and idle boast."

I've not read McLuhan, but I've read Neil Postman -- "Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985)"



Foreward to "Amusing Ourselves to Death" --

We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn't, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell's dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions". In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.

[lildreamer316]

7. Wow.

I just learned a lot.
Thank YOU.

I am reading, but have another book discussion going in another group; so I may be erratic here.
Looking foreword to what you all, and you especially, IndyOp; have to say.

[IndyOp]

8. One more reflection on the introduction...

"...vividness portrayed on television has the capacity to trigger instinctual responses similar to those triggered by reality itself - and without being modulated by logic, reason, and reflective thought."

Gore also comments on the "mean world" effect - my phrase, not his. Here is a brief description of the "mean world" effect -

According to Jeff Smith, director of the Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy, mean world syndrome means, "that (TV viewers) think the world is actually more dangerous than it might be because that's what they're being saturated with."

"Research has shown that (TV violence) desensitizes people to violence, it limits their ability to respond to conflict with nonviolent means," Smith says.

Muskegon psychologist Patricia Groessl agrees."Children become less sensitive to the pain and suffering of others if they watch a lot of violent TV," Groessl says. "They're more fearful of the world around them and they're more likely to behave in an aggressive or harmful way toward others. Children are watching long hours of (violent TV) and then identifying with the aggressors.

http://tinyurl.com/36qx3s">Link

TV IS REALITY for frequent viewers. The most recent, dramatic example of this that I've seen is the impact of showing torture on "24". West Point professors are now having to battle their students' convictions that torture may be necessary or effective in certain situations. Why are the students so convinced that torture may be necessary or effective? They've lived it with Jack Bauer week after week on "24". More horror? The U.S. troops at Abu Ghraib came up with ideas about what to do with Iraqi prisoners from TV and movies -- the Abu Ghraib torture was based on the reality they had lived in TV and movies.

DemocracyNow! - Is Torture on Hit Fox TV Show “24” Encouraging US Soldiers to Abuse Detainees?

The hit television series on the Fox Television network has a weekly audience of 15 million viewers. Each season of 24 depicts an impossibly tense day in which counter-terrorism agent Jack Bauer has just 24 hours to stop a terrorism plot that endangers the country. Faced with this “ticking time-bomb” scenario, Bauer invariably chooses torture to force suspects to divulge critical information.

Some of the torture tactics on 24 include drugging, water-boarding, electrocution or power-drilling into a man’s shoulder. In five seasons of the show, there have been no less than sixty-seven torture scenes according to the Parents Television Council - that’s more than one every show.

<snip>

TONY LAGOURANIS: Well, when David Danzig from Human Rights First asked me to go out there and speak to them, I thought it was a good idea, because I did see interrogators copying some of the methods and the posture of -- not specifically 24, but certainly television programs, which increasingly have gotten more egregious with regard to torture.

AMY GOODMAN: What did you see? Explain what you saw in Iraq and where you were.

TONY LAGOURANIS: Well, the problem was that when we were interrogating in Iraq in 2004, we were being told that Geneva Conventions didn't comply. So we didn't have training that informed us what to do anymore, because we were taught according to Geneva Conventions. So people were getting ideas from television. And among the things that I saw people doing that they got from television was water-boarding, mock execution, using mock torture. They wanted to hook up one of our translators to an electric generator and pretend that they were torturing him and allow prisoners to see that so that they thought that they would experience the same thing. These were techniques -- I’m sorry, go ahead.

AMY GOODMAN: Did you see soldiers watching 24 in Iraq?

TONY LAGOURANIS: You know, I wasn't aware of the show 24 in Iraq, but I do remember seeing people watching television shows that depicted torture, and 24 might have been one of them.

<snip>

AMY GOODMAN: Tony Lagouranis, does torture work?

TONY LAGOURANIS: In my experience, no. I saw torture in Iraq. I even employed some torture methods. In my experience, it doesn't work. I think that you’re going to get false intelligence when you employ torture methods.

<snip>

TONY LAGOURANIS: We used things like hypothermia, stress positions, sleep depravation for long periods of time. I used military working dogs, sensory overload with music and strobe lights. These things were ineffective. And when people did talk, they either told us things that we already knew or they tended to mislead us. A far more effective method of interrogation elicitation, is getting the person to engage you and to speak to you at length. And that way, you know, if you get a large volume of information from the person, if they're speaking for a long time, you can use what they're saying to check their own information, to get them to contradict themselves or to get specific details. With torture, you might get a confession or you might get, you know, a single statement, and that's really very hard to verify in the interrogation booth, what they’re saying.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And, David Danzig, when you approached Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan about this, had he been watching the show already? Was he familiar with it, or did you introduce him to it?

DAVID DANZIG: He was familiar with it. And, in fact, one of the reasons that he was particularly interested in participating in this trip was that he and other educators, not just at West Point, but other people who taught interrogators, who we have spoken to, have told us that in their classes, Jack Bauer comes up all the time. When I first talked to a colonel at West Point about this, he said, “Oh, my god! 24 is one of the biggest problems I have in teaching my classes. Everybody wants to be like Jack Bauer. They all think that it may be possible or there are times when you should have to cross the line.”

AMY GOODMAN: According to Jane Mayer's piece on 24, it’s a favorite of the White House. Surnow, who called himself the rightwing nut, has met with Karl Rove, as well as Tony Snow and Mary Cheney and Lynne Cheney, the wife and daughter of the Vice President. Tony Lagouranis, what do you think of 24's response from your meeting with them?

<snip>

TONY LAGOURANIS: But I’d like to add also that I think that -- a larger impact than what -- you know, how the interrogators or how the military is affected by 24, it’s really affecting public opinion, too. I’ve been speaking about torture since I returned from Iraq, and people always bring up the ticking time bomb scenario, and they always bring up 24 as a reason why we need to legalize torture. The professionals -- professional interrogators don't want to torture, the military doesn’t want to torture, the FBI doesn't want to torture. The CIA did studies, and they said that torture doesn’t work and it produces false intelligence. Where is this idea coming from that we need to torture to combat terrorism? It’s coming from the media, in my opinion.

[KoKo]

11. Great Post..IndyOp....Thanks for pulling that all together!

My worry is that Television has replaced communities. When it was first invented it promoted community as those who had TV's would welcome family and friends over to watch shows as a social event. As more people got TV's it wasn't necessary to "share" when one could just watch in convenience of home. Back then there were only a couple of channels and most folks watched pretty much the same shows.

Then came more choices and with cable it's now possible for anyone to watch whatever they might desire (unless one wants "real news") and so people are now segmented out into their own TV Worlds. It isn't social unless one counts groups of folks who are sports fanatics who still invite buddies over for beer and pizza for the football..etc. games.

Television which once united us in a commonality of interests has now become a commercial medium designed to seduce greater numbers of people into greater choices where they can be "targeted" for advertisers by their "individual viewing choices" rather than their collective.

The internet has broken through that so we are on the cutting edge of what might bring us back to collective interest participation which is "interactive" even though our choices are greater we are not isolated in to individual content boxes where we are a passive viewer. In our individual choices we can now connect with people all over the world who share our choice.

That's a hopeful sign. And might be our only hope for the future... :shrug: I'm so glad Gore is focusing on this. He's always ahead of his time.

[IndyOp]

12. Very good points about TV and community...

It makes me think about how even families often have one TV for each person -- and sometimes wind up watching the same show in different rooms. When I was a kid my family had one TV and we had to work out compromises about what we would watch and sometimes you just didn't get what you wanted and had to go read a book. As I got older, I got a black & white TV in my bedroom and left the bedroom only when I could watch what I wanted on the color TV. (Now I don't watch TV...)

Internet allows us to connect with people who share our choice and, still, I long for a new source of trustworthy information that nearly everyone encounters -- a new Walter Cronkite. I'd vote for putting DemocracyNow! on every TV channel at 6:00 p.m.

So long as we separate into groups and access different sources, we won't be getting the same information and can't have rational public discourse. People who watch FOX just don't have the same information as do people who watch PBS. Check out the disappointing ending to the following Alternet article about Gore - the author concludes that we just can't know "the truth"...

Al Gore: Modern Politics' Movie Star
http://www.alternet.org/story/52359/

<snip>

And that's what's so weird about these electrified times. Gore can intone with "99 percent certainty that we're facing the greatest threat" ... and that the threat in question is climate change. Yet Savage and his ilk would complete that sentence with something else entirely: terrorism, most likely, or immigration. Gore can ask, "Why was our beloved country so shockingly vulnerable to such crass manipulation?" Savage and his ilk would start that sentence with the same nine words, then end it with: "a terrorist attack?"

It's like a game of Mad Libs. To each side, each version is glaringly true, with that soul-wracking resonance that makes Gore gaze intently into an audience and thump his heart. Some parts of both versions even totally overlap. But Gore's imprecations that we begin "the hard work of rebuilding a conversation of democracy," drawing on a cosmic "truthforce" that will help us "see together what the best choices are," are -- to borrow a word that he used over and over that evening -- troubling. Because history has so splintered and subdivided us that the truth and reason he hails in principle can in practice be as individual as -- well, your eyes and mine. Postmodernism has labored away for impassioned decades convincing Americans that nothing is objective, that nothing is ultimately, absolutely true.

Which makes me want to laugh and cry when Gore assails "our failure to see clearly." I want to see what he sees. Or some of it. Or do I? Truth decay, as it is called, dissolves our trust in each other. In anything.

Afterwards, attendees streamed through the doors, most of them bearing autographed books, some waving yellow signs printed with "Run, Al Run." Because of the font, and because only the first letter of each word was upper-case, the signs could be misread at first glance as "Run AI Run" -- AI being "American Idol" fans' standard acronym for that show, and Wednesday night's episode being the season finale. At that moment, or somewhere between right then and the transit center, 29.5 million Americans would see whether they had elected twentysomething argyle-sweatered beatboxer Blake of the pert bottom and do-me eyes or 17-year-old devout-Christian plus-size pageant queen Jordin. Because to 29.5 million Americans, that was truth.

[KoKo]

13. I don't know the age of the Alternet writer but

while the point about, quote: "Postmodernism has labored away for impassioned decades convincing Americans that nothing is objective, that nothing is ultimately, absolutely true." makes alot of sense, I wonder if the audience for American Idol isn't much less than the audience for any sitcom in the 50, 60 and even the 70's compared to the audience they "hype" today.

The Buzz about American Idol seems to be more creating the Buzz on every cable channel because of the media controlled by the corporations with interest in this than the reality that all America is really watching it. Corporate MSM wants us to watch what they can get most ad revenue from on the cheap and that's why (according to some articles I've read) we don't have the kind of quality programming that we used to have. Some would argue there are very good shows out there like "Boston Legal" and a few others that I hear DU'ers mention. But, with all my cable channels I find very little to watch. I think folks with kids probably tend to stay on Animal Planet and Discovery and singles and those without children to the Food and HDTV channels. That might be the most commonality we can hope to have these days. :shrug:

[IndyOp]

14. I don't think we need community when it comes to entertainment

as much as we need community when it comes to facts - the problems we face that we cannot solve as individuals.

On C-SPAN2 today, Gore listed 3 steps that used to be in place to make the news media a responsible participant in democracy -- the fairness doctrine, the requirements that X amount of time be devoted to programming in the public interest, and a "standards" rule? He was talking fast and I missed the last one. In any case - two out of three went by the wayside during the Reagan administration and the third is ignored today.

We need to require the news media be responsible rather than profitable again -- if all media outlets towed this line then maybe we would have community again when it comes to news. There ARE absolute truths out there - the Niger documents were forged, the majority of hijackers were Saudi Arabian, Bush asked NO questions during meetings just before 9/11 and just before Katrina...

We've got to get the TRUTH back in all of the news outlets...at least closer to the truth in the major outlets, anyway.

[KoKo]

17. Bring BACK FAIRNESS DOCTRINE!

Like you and other old timers on DU...that's been my HOPE for so long. AND..add to that we "PUBLICLY FINANCE CAMPAIGNS!" If you get the TV MONEY out of POLITICS you limit the LOBBYISTS! But, that would also mean that Campaign Finance would be LIMITED ON THE INTERNET as WELL AS CABLE.

Lots of Internet Free Traders would get really upset about that because they would be looking for WINDFALL PROFITS to their WebSITES which really ARE the NEW MEDIA!

BUT...if we DO NOT GET THIS MONEY OUT....we will always be beholden to the Lobbyists...and that's Lobbyists on BOTH SIDES.

If you could get this money out of the Political System then the Lobbyists/Think Tanks, etc.. would be FORCED to CONVINCE THE PEOPLE of their IDEAS and not just WRITE BILLS that CONGRESS SIGNS OFF ON!

(excuse my full caps shouting...but this is an issue I care so much about and have for so long...I get freaky when I post about it)

[Kahuna]

9. Don't forget to buy the book and show President Gore some love.

:loveya: President Gore.

[NastyDiaper]

10. In transit. Argh.

Order Date: February 12, 2007
May 25, 2007 02:14:00 PM PHILADELPHIA PA US In transit

I'll be back.

[blm]

15. Gore is now talking my language - Truth Matters and we can't afford any more lies

Here's hoping that I can get behind another candidate who represents the anti-corruption, open government wing of the Democratic Party.

Please run, sir.

[Dr Ron]

16. Another post on The Assault on Reason

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=greatest_threads

This is a review of the book, with additional quotes, originally posted at Liberal Values:

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=1593

There's also many more posts on Gore at the site

[Nickster]

18. I just listened again to a speech from last year. Tell me this speech isn't the short-version of his

book. This is a great speech, one of many of course.

http://www.acslaw.org/node/2096

[IndyOp]

20. I haven't gotten through the book, but of what I remember of the speech -

which was wonderful - there is overlap including responding with appropriate outrage at outrageous situations...

Gore goes much further in TAOR in terms of why "we the people" were so vulnerable to the manipulations and led us into the war and why we had not reacted decisively, effectively to the sorts of outrages he bring up in the ACSLAW speech.

Al is giving a lecture on TAOR on Tuesday, May 29th at 7 p.m. that will be aired on C-SPAN (maybe C-SPAN 2). I'd love to see him just as passionate in Tuesday night's speech as he was in the ACSLAW speech.

:hi:

[SharonRB]

19. Well, I reached my goal for the weekend

I just finished TAOR, and all I can say is "Wow." I thought I knew a lot, but I learned so much that I didn't know about this administration. I'm even more appalled than I was before, and that's saying a lot.

[IndyOp]

21. Yeah you finished! I am still in Chapter 2...

Let us know what you thought was most appalling. :(

[SharonRB]

22. It's hard to pick just one thing

I stuck some markers in some of the pages I wanted to remember when we start our discussion. Here's one thing, though, at the bottom of page 237 to the top of page 238:

The Republican leaders of the House and Senate even started blocking Democrats from attending conference committee meetings, where legislation takes its final form; instead, they let the president's staff come to the meetings to write key parts of the laws for them.

Can you fathom Karl Rove writing legislation? I was sick to my stomach when I read that. And even though I know about an awful lot of the influence of big corporations and the people who run them, the pervasiveness of placing all of these people in government agencies goes way beyond what I even imagined. I knew it was bad, but it's beyond comprehension.

[IndyOp]

24. My biggest surprise so far - Election Fraud via Homeland Security...

On page 40 --- DeLay as embroiled in an effort to pick up more U.S. Congressional seats from Texas by forcing a highly unusual redistricting vote in the state senate, he was able to track down Democratic legislators who fled the state to prevent a quorum -- and thus prevent the vote -- by enlisting the help of the Department of Homeland Security. As many as thirteen employees of the Federal Aviation Administration conducted an eight-hour search, joined by at least one FBI agent (though several other agents were asked to help and refused to do so). DeLay was admonished by the House Ethics Committee but refused to acknowledge any wrongdoing.

Did DeLay appeal to Karl Rove or Bush himself to get HOMELAND SECURITY involved in gerrymandering Texas in a year in which Congressional Districts should NOT have been re-assessed.

I remember vividly when the Democratic legislators from Texas fled to Oklahoma and were in hiding - it was high drama but I did not realize that Homeland Security was involved in tracking them down. Were they arrested and drug back to Texas?

Abuse of power anyone?

Election fraud directed by the White House? By whom?

[SharonRB]

25. Yes, this was another of those appalling things

I had no idea Homeland Security had tracked them down and brought them back so they could vote. I wasn't paying as much attention in those days.

[YvonneCa]

23. Great discussion...

...in this group. Please post some of these comments in GD-P, here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3285245&mesg_id=3285245

One of the problems I see is that when Al Gore spoke in January, 2006 (ACS) and laid out the framework for what he has written in this book, it had almost NO coverage. This book needs to get covered. If the MSM won't, then blogs should push it.

One premise of the book is that Gore is perplexed and incredulous that the American people are tolerating and not questioning this administration's actions/abuses. One possible cause he sets out is that TV is a one way communication. Another premise is that TWO-WAY communication (such as the internet and blogs like this one provide) are the hope for the future...if "We, the people" use these avenues to save our democracy from government abuses.


Let's not let down President Gore! :7
:patriot:

[SharonRB]

26. We've certainly been doing our part here on DU

as well as DailyKos, Firedoglake and numerous other sites. We need to get more of the populous involved in the netroots and the discussion. Unfortunately, the majority of people go about their daily lives and pay no attention -- they just think things will take care of themselves -- or not. They don't think they can do anything about it, so they just ignore it.

[YvonneCa]

29. I've decided to buy this book for my family ...

...and friends. Can't make them read it, though. :)

[MasonJar]

27. Al Gore is brilliant. He truly cares. He said in an interview that he

put his heart and soul into this book. If you had the opportunity to see his speeches sponsored by Move-On over the past three years, you know clearly the depth of his concern for the misdirection being forced on the country and the planet. As he often says, he is fed up with Bush/Cheney and their cabal. If you haven't read (or re-read) Earth in the Balance, do so. It is powerful. I am 1/3 through the Assault of Reason and it is just as impressive.

[IndyOp]

28. I haven't read "Earth in the Balance" -

I don't know where I've been, but I didn't "discover" Gore until I started to understand how the 2000 election had been stolen. The opening scene of Farhenheit 911 was a wake up - I had no idea the electoral college votes from Florida had been in question.

:(

I am in progress on TAOR and will read "Earth in the Balance" afterwards...

[Dr Ron]

30. David Brooks attacks The Assault on Reason

Response to David Brooks' attacks at Liberal Values:

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=1603

[Mabus]

34. David Brooks is an assault on reason

Sorry, couldn't help myself. I read Brooks' review and saw his bias showing. What I think frightens Brooks is, in many respects, Gore is talking about Brooks and his ilk of cronies who have abandoned reason for ideology.

[mopinko]

31. our choice is clear.

yes, sir, it is. and you are it.
great book.

[Pierzin]

32. Independant Media is what we need-More than Ever

If we could convince the American people of what is happening, if we could get them off of their duffs and read, and participate, and think and learn about their country and what it has done, if we could ignite a fire in a more participatory electorate, if if if!!!! I am convinced myself that Gore is correct so far in everything he has written in the book, and I am half way through.
If you do not listen to Democracy Now, if you do not have LinkTV on your cable programming, if you do not listen to or look for foreign news media on the Internet, if you do not participate in forums like DU, or talk to your friends and neighbors about the world, then I urge you to do all of those things.
This nation is at a crossroads on so many levels. I listen to progressive radio, and I constantly listen to Hartmann, Malloy and Randi Rhodes. I found LinkTV by accident on my cable channel.
The MSM is hopelessly corrupt. They are not covering the stories that are bankrupting the nation. IN 1992 the big story was the economy and the budget deficit. Ross Perot shook up the election by challenging the status quo. The DLC is compromising their moral convictions about this war.
The MSM should be REQUIRED to spend more JOURNALISM(REMEMBER THAT?) coverage of the war, the economy, everything. They should be REQUIRED to spend more time airing broadcasting of government actions. I Beleive if the Founders were around today they would have quite a debate over what the Media should be doing to involve the electorate, for the citizens of this nation are asleep.
Many of them are apathetic, half of them brainwashed, and too many are NOT INVOLVED or engaged. The mere fact that we do not have people protesting this war of lies en mass in the streets shutting cities down nationwide is jsut apalling.
IF the Founders were alive today see what was going on they would be screaming for Impeachment, imprisonment, indictments of the entire Bush Cabal for the brainwashing they inflicting on the public.
Gore is totally spot on regarding everything he has talked about. If a former Vice President of the US is saying that our leaders are corrupt and guilty of lying, our movement has moved out of the crazy left wing conspiracists that the media loves to paint us as being. But really, what is the rest of the nation doing?
When in 2004 no WMDs were found in Iraq, why was there almost no outcry?
Corporations are getting a free ride now more than ever, if you look at history.

[YvonneCa]

35. Are you...

...all still reading? :7

[SharonRB]

36. I read the whole thing over Memorial Day weekend

[YvonneCa]

41. Me...

...too! Best book I've read in AGES!

[Bjornsdotter]

37. I'm still reading

....I just found this thread, I'll have to read faster.

Cheers

[IndyOp]

38. I am still reading... Got distracted by my j-o-b. :( (n/t)

[Mabus]

40. Yes

My husband was wanting us to read it out loud to each other. The problem is finding time when we are both available. Earlier today I said forget about that plan. I'm going to start reading it on my own.

[marlakay]

39. On Chapter 5

Didn't realize that it was pres lincoln that started the power to corporations during the civil war I had always thought it was mostly Reagan although I know he had a big part in it.

I really feel for Gore, I just can't imagine how it must be to lose to a absolute nutcase like Bush but I think he really gets why...our society is so tuned into looks, 30 sec commercials, I have noticed even on the job, when I first started working in the early 70's everything was taken so seriously and now people are lax on the job, people call in sick just to have fun all the time. People joke during the work day and talk all the time...not that its bad but we live in a very relaxed, let's party lifestyle in America, not many places take life as serious as they use to.

And so they thought they wanted a pres to party with just like everything else they see on tv, reality shows, etc. But I think now a big group of them are waking up and realizing what you get with a party pres. Some and a big group of them will NEVER wake up.

[YvonneCa]

42. He REALLY does...

get why. Now if he can just get heard by the public.