begin_within
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:44 AM
Original message |
Why do so many people buy into the right-wing bullshit? |
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Why do so many people drink the kool-aid? It seems like the right-wing should just be a lunatic fringe of American society, not a massive number of people.
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lateo
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:45 AM
Response to Original message |
1. Because the media presents it as fact. |
jobycom
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:46 AM
Response to Reply #1 |
4. That's word for word exactly what I was going to post. |
bearfan454
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:50 AM
Response to Reply #1 |
10. I truly believe that Democrats are of a higher intelligence level. |
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Seriously. We are able to think for ourselves. We don't have to go along with something just because someone tells us to. Most of the pukes are easily manipulated people. They are brainwashed into thinking that sending all of our jobs out of the country is good, that cutting benefits to themselves is good, that giving wealthy people tax cuts helps them, and so forth and so on. In other words, they're fucking stupid.
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bearfan454
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:46 AM
Response to Original message |
2. They don't want to admit they have been duped. |
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They would rather not know the truth, but sadly, they do know it and are ashamed of themselves for being so gullible, so they just go along with the lies.
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KittyWampus
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:46 AM
Response to Original message |
3. 35% isn't massive. Any occassional periods of higher support comes from |
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very successful marketing and use of mass psychology.
The far-right understands human psychology and how to manipulate it.
The Left seems almost totally clueless or down right hostile to the notion of using symbolism to move people.
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alarcojon
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:08 AM
Response to Reply #3 |
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The tools the Right uses are crude, simple, and effective. Keep people in a constant state of fear and submission. Divide and conquer. Repeat the Big Lie often enough and peope will believe it. And so on.
We look at these methods and are rightfully disgusted. Yet I'm sure there are ways to use symbolism to reach many people in an honest, compassionate way. We need to find them and use them.
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salin
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:23 AM
Response to Reply #3 |
31. to point three - the left actually thinks policies are more imp |
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than symbols, and that matching policy to rhetoric (rather than the orwellian mismatch between rightwing rhetoric vs policy) matters.
I believe that the focus on policy is important - and why, as a country, we have fared better under democratic presidents. However the use of symbols to market and better highlight those policies would be a vast improvement.
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lateo
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Sat Oct-01-05 12:39 PM
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brainshrub
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:46 AM
Response to Original message |
5. They have a strict-father worldview of politics. |
KingFlorez
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:48 AM
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6. A nation always has a time |
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Where a lot of people believe a radical fringe party
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cdb
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:48 AM
Response to Original message |
7. Telling them what they want to hear |
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not telling them how it really is. Painting a rosy picture or fear-mongering....
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henslee
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:48 AM
Response to Original message |
8. The daddy syndrome? Not grasping that the country so many |
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bought into for so long has jumped the shark and morphed into a corporate-tocracy.
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flyarm
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:49 AM
Response to Original message |
9. they own the media!!!!!!!!!!! n/t |
Greyhound
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:51 AM
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11. It gives them permission, even encourages them to voice their |
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repugnant racism, classist, crap. I'm better than you, and 'myGovernment' says so. :banghead:
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Boomer
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:52 AM
Response to Original message |
12. Same thing happened in Nazi Germany |
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Hitler undermined the German middle-class with legislation favoring big business over small business, and yet the middle-classes were his staunchest supporters.
Sound familiar?
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RagingInMiami
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:53 AM
Response to Original message |
13. This country is divided into two groups |
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Those who think for themselves and those who let others think for them.
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CTD
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:53 AM
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14. People filter news/info for "facts" that support their existing worldview |
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Edited on Sat Oct-01-05 10:55 AM by CTD
Just like we don't see "weakness" in behaving with compassion and acceptance, they don't see "ignorance" in believing the things they choose to believe.
It's a worldview thing. Everyone does it to some extent.
It's just that, as enlightened people, we find that core 35% of die hard Republicans to be so incomprehensibly ignorant more or less because their views are just so at odds with our own worldview.
It's fun to call them ignorant (and many are VERY ignorant) but there's a bit more to it than that.
And when our candidates speak to these people in ways that barely masks their contempt for them, as Kerry did (hell, I do it too sometimes), we lose elections.
Clinton (Bill not Hil) embraced these folks and effectively pretended to speak their language. And he won. Twice.
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KharmaTrain
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:06 AM
Response to Reply #14 |
22. It's "Feel Good" Stuff |
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A lot of the right wing rhetoric is bred in years and decades worth of stereotypes...seen and unseen that provide a basis where their lies and deceptions can operately freely and flourish.
They've learned which emotions can be played with...racism, sexism, religion, class...and found ways to create themes and memes with feel good concepts that once they "embrace" an individual, provides them with plenty of re-inforcement of these "core" convictions.
Remember, for years, these sanctimonious schmucks pretended to be truly moral and didn't have the paper trail and track record they do now in their hypocrisy. They were able to hide in decades of minority status to build up an inferiority complex that makes xtians believe they are being "persecuted" and "libruls" so strong and evil.
Sadly, this country has been exploited for what divides us, not unites us. The Repugnicans have tapped into these divisions and pretended come across as the defender of some of these "exploited" people...like those poor white 35 year old males who believe driving a Hummer is a god-given right...and how dare those Iraqis keep our oil under their sand.
:rantoff:
Peace...
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fasttense
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:55 AM
Response to Original message |
15. Luck. They came at the right time and were willing to tell the lies |
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people wanted to hear. They came when corporate media was developing and they were able to use and manipulate it to their advantage. They came at time when (despite the right wing rhetoric) the Dems got most people to trust the government and the media. Another day and age and they would have gotten nowhere because most people would NOT have trusted them.
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tularetom
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:56 AM
Response to Original message |
16. It's all about marginalization of groups |
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No matter how shitty your life is, how crummy your job is, how stupid and uneducated you are, if they can make you feel like there is somebody stupider, uglier and more disgusting than you, you suddenly feel better. Why else would so many working and lower class whites support a political philosophy that kicks them in the nuts, gives their tax dollars to wealthy people, sends their kids off to be slaughtered in some godforsaken place and leaves them to die in poverty with no social safety net or health insurance. "I might be the lowest life form on the face of the earth but by god I'm better than them (fill in name of minority here)!!"
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smirkymonkey
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:06 AM
Response to Reply #16 |
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It's really not that complicated - give them someone to feel superior to and they won't be directing their anger, frustration and hate toward their oppressors.
Most people are too lazy and cowardly to actually do anything about their situation, so having a scapegoat at least makes them feel better about it.
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EST
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:58 AM
Response to Reply #16 |
37. Crudely put, but this is the more succinct description. |
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You have put your finger on the essence of hate in the entire world. One needs only to appeal to that fundamental nastiness in people to get all the help required to enslave the masses and exalt those willing to use such methods. There appears, again and again, in these DU threads, a plaintive appeal to "getting our own KKKarl Rove." Such an overt gesture toward using the methods common to haters indicates a lack of faith in the fundamentals of honesty and tolerance and a surrender to the abandonment of higher moral values.
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AmandaRuth
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:57 AM
Response to Original message |
17. because a lot of people don't understand what the wingers are really |
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trying to do.
Like labor - if people understood that the conservatives truly believe that an employment contract is strictly between the employer and employee, which means no guarantees for equal pay,overtime pay, laws regulating hours worked, minimum wage, child workers, safety concerns, and if they understood how this translates to their specific lives, attitudes might be different.
Also, left leaning organizations do not talk or coordinate with each other, (as far as I know).
And the right owns the media.
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dave123williams
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Sat Oct-01-05 10:59 AM
Response to Original message |
18. Look; most think they're buying in to baseball, hot dogs and apple pie. |
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Middle America...well, there *are* some stupid people out there, but mostly they're just folks, like you and me.
They have some funny ideas that they like to hang on to; 'Republicans are better protectors' is one such canard, 'Tax Cuts are always good' (once the GOP figured out that they could bribe voters with their own money, they had it locked)...but mostly....
The GOP carefully positioned Bush as a symbol of a working class hero. A tough, hardworking guy who clears brush and is married to a librarian. A guy that you could relate to. Maybe not the brightest bulb, but a good man. A guy who sure believes in God, and isn't afraid to tell you that.
A lot of people identify with that symbolism. A lot of people voted for it.
Too bad it has nothing to do with who the man actually is.
A lot of people are having a hard time admitting they had the wool pulled over their eyes. Some already are waking up to the open greed, the willful demagoguing, the corruption. As they do, it's going to get ugly for the GOP.
Let us all remember; this fuck-stick lost one of our coolest cities, two world trade towers, a chunk of the Pentagon, and is losing his little war to spread freedom at the point of a gun.
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CrispyQ
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:01 AM
Response to Original message |
19. Here's one take that I think is pretty right on for most of them. |
salin
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:05 AM
Response to Original message |
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a) things are presented binary - either this OR that - no complexities thus don't have to dwell on things to sort them out for oneself.
b) things are presented as an angry us vs them - and allows me to villify "the other" - and thus not have to deal with my own flaws - lets me actually feel self-righteous with my own flaws.
c) a fear of letting go of the "ideal" of America - where public service is a value (and thus, those we elect wouldn't act in ways to intentionally hurt us) - where your vote counts and is based on the "merits" of the candidates rather than upon slick marketing and propoganda to where I am voting the exact opposite of my intentions. This, imo, is the biggest thing, but is related to point a in that to work out the cognitive dissonance (what I hear as news - before GOP spin comes to "reframe" it) vs my view of the US and the US govt would require a heck of a lot of thinking about complexities, a lot of reevaluation, and perhaps reaching some painful conclusions about people that I trust (often including more than political figures but also local leaders, ministers "representing God", etc.)
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Chi-Town Exile
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:07 AM
Response to Reply #20 |
Chi-Town Exile
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:05 AM
Response to Original message |
21. They throw the word "God" out there |
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so most people believe that the RW's intentions are good because they are religious.
As I mentioned during the flame wars about ANSWER, the average American passes out every evening in front of the t.v. after a long hard day of getting the kids to school, going to jobs they hate, trying to make ends meet ... they don't have the time or the inclination to delve any deeper.
I know it is fashionable on here to say, "Fuck those people, who needs them?" The reality is, we do need them because these people vote against their own best interests all the time.
That is where we Democrats miss the boat. The DLC is so busy being scared and trying to be right-wing lite that they forget to offer these people something different that would actually IMPROVE their lives.
I seriously can't understand why the Dems are so cautious. They've lost EVERYTHING, there is nothing left to lose. Offer the country some hope, something different, stop cowering in the corner with your hands over your eyes, DLC!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Man, they piss me off!!!
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Mayberry Machiavelli
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:07 AM
Response to Original message |
25. Because it tells them what they want to know. |
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It's okay to be greedy.
It's okay to hate.
Nothing America does can ever be wrong.
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leeman67
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:09 AM
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27. why? because it's easier. |
WritingIsMyReligion
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:27 PM
Response to Reply #27 |
45. Yeah; "God" forbid that they should |
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actually have to think about anything, or worry about anything... it's far more convienient to have your head shoved up your ass...
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newportdadde
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:14 AM
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28. Its not that many, 1/3 of half that bother to vote. |
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For the reasons? Greed and lack of empathy.
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0007
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:15 AM
Response to Original message |
29. Letting others do your thinking is easy, and this administration |
dretceterini
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:40 AM
Response to Reply #29 |
35. Notice how many right wingers |
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also buy into religion and faith as having all the answers, so they don't have to think?
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TheCowsCameHome
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:18 AM
Response to Original message |
30. Being brain-dead wasn't illegal the last time I checked |
WritingIsMyReligion
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:28 PM
Response to Reply #30 |
tlsmith1963
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:29 AM
Response to Original message |
32. I Used to Just Laugh at Them... |
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...but Bush & the neocons have done so many bad things, & people *still* support them? Yes some people on the other side are waking up, but what is up with the others? Have they been brainwashed into a cult? Time to deprogram!
Tammy
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B Calm
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:32 AM
Response to Original message |
33. Those damn liberals want to take our guns... |
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Thank the NRA for misinforming the toothless red necks..
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seabeyond
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:34 AM
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34. feeds into fears, and lack. allows them to hold on to all and not share |
tom_paine
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Sat Oct-01-05 11:42 AM
Response to Original message |
36. Because they have the most coordinated, sophisticated propaganda machine |
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and lie laundry as has ever existed in human history.
It has thoroughly infiltrated, bullied, and parasitized conventional media to the point where what is left of the Formerly Free Press also by and large functions as an extension of the Bush Party Loyal Sub-Media, sometimes without even knowing it.
Finally, Americans who once just a short time ago lived in the Free World with a very good Free Press are very slow to pick up on the Sovietization of the Nation.
It make take a long time before people understand that the Bushevik are merely Free-Market Bolsheviks, and akin to the Mafia.
We will see because only time will tell, but as has been known ever since "deep penetration" advertising and propaganda (they are really one and the same thing) the people who are easiest to manipulate are those unaware of being manipulated.
Everything depends on if and how fast the great mass of Americans awake.
If they don't: The New Kinder and Gentler Nazi Germany. A horrific One-Party State thatactually makes even the Bush Occupation 2005 look like "The Good Old Days".
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Hello_Kitty
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:08 PM
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39. America (a sizeable portion anyway) loves bullies |
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Ruthless, cutthroat, winner-takes-all and leaves the loser in the dirt. The right wing appeals to this dynamic heavily.
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neweurope
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:09 PM
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40. They play on base fears and base desires, that's why. It works |
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Edited on Sat Oct-01-05 01:09 PM by neweurope
every time.
If you couple that trick with religion you've won.
----------------
Remember Fallujah
Bush to The Hague!
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Parche
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:09 PM
Response to Original message |
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Gullible....that is the reason, they are Gullible
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Cyrano
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:18 PM
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42. People will buy camel shit,, as long as it's well packaged. That's why |
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Madison Avenue succeeded and is still in business.
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ComerPerro
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:19 PM
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43. Its easy to just turn off your brain and buy into it. Plus, the truth is |
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bleak, dark, and depressing as hell.
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WritingIsMyReligion
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:26 PM
Response to Original message |
44. Because they are Pavlov's Dogs, |
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conditioned to believe every word the media says, conditioned to accept all things unquestioningly...
I can hear Orwell groaning in his grave now...
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omega minimo
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:55 PM
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PowerToThePeople
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Sat Oct-01-05 01:58 PM
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48. Low IQs. Or a self-centered attitude towards life. n/t |
SoCalDem
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Sat Oct-01-05 02:04 PM
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49. They ARE a minority, but they have wrestled control of the media |
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Edited on Sat Oct-01-05 02:05 PM by SoCalDem
who presents their wacky ideas as FACT...
Listen for key phrases..
People say We all know Everyone says polls favor the public thinks the nation is etc etc etc..
They present these things as a given,. and since the other side has no opportunity to refute their assertions, it becomes part of the public mythology.
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