Mind Manipulation

IM:  I hear a lot of my fellow Republicans now saying Trump is a catastrophe and do not want to support him; some are even talking about voting for Hillary.

Old Gadfly:  Does that come as a surprise to you?

AM:  What I see playing out in the news is a very deliberate attempt to not only control what we see and understand, but to control our reactions as well.  Take the news today.  All the networks focused on how Trump claimed to have seen a video of an aircraft carrying $400 million in cash as ransom for four hostages released by Iran.  Trump later corrected this claim by saying it was actually another clip of an aircraft carrying the hostages.  The focus was Trump’s incorrect claim.  There was no interest in the $400 million in cash in exchange for the hostages.  In other words, Trump is dishonest or a loose cannon.  How about a glib president that chuckled away the $400 million in cash for four hostages, saying this was not ransom money?

IM:  Remind me what glib means.

AM:  Glib means “fluent and voluble but insincere and shallow.”  Voluble is “characterized by a ready and continuous flow of words” in order to dominate the narrative.  See how the press reacted?  They focused on Trump’s erroneous video clip—something considerably trivial compared with a ransom for hostages.

Old Gadfly:  Remember, F.A. Hayek made two important observations related to these dynamics.  The first was about how the political elite shape reactions to any opposition to their established values in the Chapter, “The End of Truth,” in his book, The Road to Serfdom.  Those sufficiently indoctrinated with these values are to spontaneously attack those who express any opposition to these values.  This explains the vitriolic reporting following George Stephanopoulos’s questions to Trump following the Kahn attacks at the Democrat National Convention.  The second observation in his book The Fatal Conceit:  The Errors of Socialism is that “the mind is the product of cultural evolution and reflects more imitation than reason.”

IM:  I hear a lot of people repeating what is in the news.  When I ask them to provide more detail or examples to support allegations, they go silent.  So, this must be a form of imitation.  Just this morning, I read Michael Morell’s op-ed, “I Ran the C.I.A.  Now I’m Endorsing Hillary Clinton” in the New York Times.  This evening, quotes from his article were all over the news—a classic echo chamber.

AM:  I read the same article—pure propaganda.  He said, “Mrs. Clinton is highly qualified to be commander in chief. . . . I spent four years with Mrs. Clinton when she was secretary of state, most often in the White House Situation Room.  In these critically important meetings, I found her to be prepared, detail-oriented, thoughtful, inquisitive and willing to change her mind if presented with a compelling argument.”  These are called platitudes.  If this is representative of the type of analysis he provided as the acting head of the CIA, no wonder we did so poorly on the international stage.  None of these qualifications relate to actual achievements.  But they do “glibly” disguise the tremendous foreign policy failures during her tenure—Benghazi, Libya, Egypt, Syria, ISIS, a resurgent Russia (who took Crimea and threatened Ukraine), North Korea, China, Cuba, and so forth.  None of these were successes—they were all setbacks.  Obama had no foreign policy expertise when he ran for president.  When McCain confronted him with this realization, Obama laughed at him and said, “but I have superior judgment.”  As if judgement is in one’s DNA and has nothing to do with experience and the wisdom that follows.

IM:  Morell, obviously pandering for a Clinton administration appointment, then went on to criticize Trump for his character traits:  “The traits include his obvious need for self-aggrandizement [nothing compared with the narcissist in chief, Obama], his overreaction to perceived slights [there have been no vicious attacks of Trump—they are all in his imagination], his tendency to make decisions based on intuition [he offers no examples, but don’t forget intuition is what Obama’s superior judgment depended upon], his refusal to change his views based on new information [even Hillary refuses to change her views about lying to the people even from old information on the record from Director Comey], his routine carelessness with the facts [nowhere near to Obama’s characterization of the ISIS threat, the economy, and so forth], his unwillingness to listen to others [Obamacare is the right thing to do even though the majority of Americans didn’t want it], and his lack of respect for the law [enforcing immigration laws do not count and Obama is exempted from similar criticism because it would be racist].

AM:  In my view, the most egregious part of his article is when he suggested Putin “recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.”  Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation were involved in very serious “pay to play” actions with Russian actors.  Joy Overbeck provides a detailed expose in her article, “None Dare Call Her Treasonous.”  On the same page of The New York Times is another op-ed article by Arkody Ostrovsky, the Russian and Eastern European editor of the Economist.  The title of his article was “For Putin, Disinformation Is Power.”  The ideological zealots who make up the editorial staff at The New York Times completely missed the irony of these juxtaposed op-ed articles.  The Morell article is disinformation.

IM:  Mr. Ostrovsky said, “After Mikhail Gorbachev opened up the Soviet media, the contrast between socialist and capitalist economic systems had become too apparent.”  Yet, the progressive Democrats in America are pushing socialism while condemning capitalism.  Trump represents capitalism, which is why the progressive Democrats must diminish him as a candidate.  Ostrovsky continued, “Mr. Putin has reason to fear in one respect.  His system does face an existential threat from the Western model of governance.  Just as the economic inadequacies of Soviet Communism were exposed by comparison with the wealth produced by Western capitalism, Mr. Putin’s authoritarianism cannot match the appeal of an economy based on the rule of law, openness and competition.  The best way for the West to resist Russia, now and then, is to uphold its own values.”  Obama’s vision for fundamentally transforming America took us away from these values.  Hillary Clinton wants to accelerate this transformation.  Trump wants to reinstate them by “making America great again.”

Old Gadfly:  In the cold, gray month of January 1980, my wife and I traveled to Berlin, which included a visit to the Berlin Air Safety Center, a facility manned by officers from the four occupying nations—the United States, Great Britain, France, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.  As we met those on duty who were controlling flights into and out of Berlin corridors, two Soviet officers were in the room.  A younger one was sitting near the wall with his feet resting on the desk, reading the Pravda newspaper.  I shook hands with the senior Soviet officer on duty.  We were told by a younger Soviet officer, who spoke fluent English, the senior officer was a lieutenant colonel and a former MIG-25 pilot.  He was a first lieutenant, but the colonel reported to him—in other words, the lieutenant was the political officer for their unit.

AM:  The Russian word Pravda means “truth” in English.  We know Pravda was the government-sponsored and controlled paper.  It was the propaganda machine for the communist party—it reported on what the people were allowed to know or believe.

          Old Gadfly:  If the communist party controlled what was reported in the Soviet Union, then is it possible for an American ideology to have similar control over news reporting even in so called free societies?  Obviously it is.  American progressives—politicians, media, academia, and Hollywood—control the narrative.  The Trump and Clinton we see is the Trump and Clinton they want us to see.  Aggressive research is contrary to these images.  Hillary Clinton is unapologetically corrupt.  Peter Schweizer reveals some of this corruption in Clinton Cash (here is a free video that provides some of the evidence).  The last couple weeks I have asked friends, family, and complete strangers if they had seen Dinesh D’Souza’s movie or read his book:  Hillary’s America:  The Secret History of the Democratic Party.  Nine out of 10 have never heard of it.  The media is suppressing it.  This is called censorship because the facts and analysis are so contrary to the progressive idea of “truth.”  Americans—all Americans--need to realize this.

A Dark Vein of Intolerance

AM:  The media is engaged in “wolf pack” attacks on Trump because he responded to the Islamic “Gold Star” parents of a son killed while serving in the American armed forces.  The Kahns are receiving 50 times more coverage than the grieving mother of her son who was killed in the Benghazi attack.  The Kahns verbally attacked Trump during the Democrat National Convention (DNC) by suggesting that Trump wanted to violate the U.S. Constitution as indicated by his rhetoric on Muslim immigration.  It was not clear to me what was unconstitutional in regard to Trump rhetoric, notwithstanding the fact that Obama has clearly issued unconstitutional executive orders related to immigration.  This episode reminded me of General Colin Powell’s notorious allegation to David Gregory on Meet the Press that as a registered Republican he voted for Barack Obama twice because of his economic plan and that there was a dark vein of intolerance within the Republican Party (see also this interview).

Old Gadfly:  Where you are going with this, AM.

AM:  First, the Democrat Party had a clear agenda in inviting the parents of a Muslim soldier killed in combat while serving in the American armed forces.  The idea is to make Trump appear (a) bigoted because he wants to ensure Muslims coming from parts of the Middle East are sufficiently vetted before entering the United States, and (b) xenophobic by wanting to enforce immigration laws while confronting those who are here illegally.  Second, the Kahns could then attack Trump because their Muslim and gold star status would be a shield against any rebuttal.  This was a trap.  If Trump responded in any way, it would come across as unsympathetic to grieving parents.  This is exactly what we see playing out in the media.  If, on the other hand, Trump did not respond, then the message that Trump is intolerant to those wanting to come to America, whether Muslim or as an illegal alien, would still be reinforced without any rebuttals.  Third, there are some opinions that the soldier’s father is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.  Currently, there is no evidence of such membership.  However, recall our conversation on June 15, 2016 regarding Hillary Clinton’s close adviser, Huma Abedin, and her connections to the Muslim Brotherhood.  If Kahn is connected, and I strongly suspect he is, this is part of a much bigger story that aligns with Obama’s vision for fundamentally transforming America—mostly through demographics and its effect on culture.    

IM:  A lack of evidence about Kahn’s motivation or membership does not minimize the sinister tactics employed by the Democrats.  Obviously, the parents did not just appear on the schedule.  The DNC organizers had a particular narrative in mind.  You nailed it, AM, in the intent to set a trap, and the complicit media are relishing in the intended reaction, not just from Trump, but from those who are sympathetic to the grieving parents.  This is how people get coopted into aligning themselves with another politically-oriented policy issue.  Support the parents of a Muslim soldier lost in action and then feel good about Muslims coming to America.  Advertisers associate sexy images with a particular product and, because the sexual component attracts, the product becomes attractive by association.  This is how propaganda works.  Stalin was a master at this with his mind control propaganda.

AM:  In the flurry of media spin on the Kahn story, when confronted by George Stephanopoulos about not sacrificing anything or anyone, Trump could have responded, “No, I have not; but Hillary sacrificed four Americans and the video fall guy at Benghazi.”  But, he did not respond that way.

Old Gadfly:  AM, tell me how this story and its corresponding broader public narrative remind you of General Powell’s “vein of intolerance.”

AM:  Given that General Powell is an African-American who unabashedly accuses the Republican Party of having a vein of intolerance tells me that despite his tremendous accomplishments on behalf of America, he appears to have no idea of how hypocritical that accusation is within the context of American political history.  While progressives love to create truth while obscuring the actual truth, there is far too much documented history that demonstrates the vein of intolerance has actually run throughout the Democrat Party ever since it was founded by Andrew Jackson.  Dinesh D’Souza does a fabulous job presenting this very readable history in his book and movie, Hillary’s America:  The Secret History of the Democratic Party.  I watched the movie and am now reading the book.  The book provides far more detail with a compelling and cohesive set of evidence-based arguments, citing actual source documents and credible historians.  Ironically, his treatment of pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions had little to do with religion and a great deal to do with political power.  Democrats, in both the southern and northern states, were pro-slavery.  The abolitionists, many of whom were Christian, were Republicans.

Old Gadfly:  What did General Powell refer to regarding intolerance?

AM:  He said some Republicans still use “racially tainted language” regarding minorities; he offered a couple of examples based on comments by Sarah Palin and John Sununu.  When I heard the General say this, I inferred that since Republicans opposed the Democrat candidate, an African- American, the real opposition must be due to race, as if Obama’s stated intentions to fundamentally transform America in an egalitarian—where equality trumps liberty—and socialistic direction had nothing to do with the opposition.  Redistributing the wealth sounds good to a socialist (and struggling minorities) but not to those who believe in individual liberty, a limited government, and a capitalistic free market.  These are competing worldviews, and a social psychology professor, Jonathan Haidt, from the Stern School of Business school at New York University does an excellent job explaining these different views in this video.

Old Gadfly:  Democrats have been masters at projecting their own sins upon the Republican Party.  As D’Souza clearly establishes in his book, Democrats were the racist Party of slavery; and, today, they have evolved into the progressive Party of enslavement.  (Recall our conversation on indentured classes on August 28, 2014).  The great champions of American progressivism were the Democrat Party Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson—all three were documented bigots.  The late Democrat Senator Robert Byrd was a member of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), but this did not stop President Obama from attending his funeral, even though he chose not to similarly honor Margaret Thatcher or Justice Scalia.  The racist to progressive transformation was complete when an African-American President felt compelled to attend the funeral of a known racist.  And General Powell wants to accuse Republicans of having a vein of intolerance.

IM:  Recall President Obama’s National Prayer Breakfast speech last year.  Of course, the immediate context involved public concerns about the Islamic terrorism taking place across the world.  After opening his speech with “Giving all praise and honor to God,” which is a similar pattern to opening lines for various chapters (or suras) in the Qu’ran (“In the name of Allah [God], the Gracious, and the Merciful”), Obama said the following:

And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.  In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ. . . . 

So this is not unique to one group or one religion.  There is a tendency in us, a sinful tendency that can pervert and distort our faith.  In today’s world, when hate groups have their own Twitter accounts and bigotry can fester in hidden places in cyberspace, it can be even harder to counteract such intolerance. But God compels us to try.  

 Old Gadfly:  Aside from Obama’s distorted understanding of the Crusades, what does this passage tell us?

IM:   I particularly noted the sanctimonious assertion, “There is a tendency in us, a sinful tendency that can pervert and distort our faith.”  Obama is perverting and distorting the truth and terrible deeds in the name of Christ.  Democrats promoted slavery, spawned the KKK and Jim Crow laws, advanced segregation and obstructed legislation to advance freedom for all in the form of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution.  And, Obama gets on his high horse when he said, “In today’s world, when hate groups have their own Twitter accounts and bigotry can fester in hidden places in cyberspace, it can be even harder to counteract such intolerance.”  It was Obama that said if I had a son he would look like Trayvon Martin and has supported the Black Lives Matter group, the latter of which spawned from the Michael Brown incident in Ferguson, Missouri.  Judgments in both these cases were made before they were even fully processed in our legal system.  Incidentally, Democrats convinced FDR to block anti-lynching legislation in the 1930s.  It seems lynching remains a Democrat tactic in today’s politics.  D’Souza can attest to this.

          Old Gadfly:  When there is a dark vein of intolerance running throughout the progressive Democrat Party, truth does not matter.  When a complicit mainstream media drink the same progressive poison, legitimizing a distorted truth, then stand by for more metaphorical lynchings.