The "Leo"-cons and the "Noble" Lie

The current chatter and accusations regarding Iran by the war cabal in Washington are prime examples of the Straussian interpretation of what Plato called the noble lie. The difference between Strauss and Plato's versions of this tactic is that Plato's noble lie was ficticious in details but at the core had a profound truth, whereas Strauss takes this to the nth degree and believes that society of deception is the odd justice of the wise. Justice, Strauss also thought, was only a product of the stronger labeling what was in their best interests as such.

Plato and Strauss were both proponents of the rule of the wise, however Plato came to the conclusion that this ultimately was not attainable. He then arrived at rule of law as the best alternative. The rule of law is imperative to the idea of American Democracy. Strauss did not follow Plato's logic to the rule of law conclusion, and instead postulated that a covert rule of the wise was not only the ideal but also attainable. This is the arrogant philosophy of the Bush Administration. The term Bush adminstration may be misleading since I somehow doubt Bush himself has read much Strauss, Neitzche, et. al. But people like Cheney, Wolfowitz, Perle, Murdoch, in all liklihood, have. Their belief that they are the "wise" is borne of nothing more than their belief that they hold what Neitzche called the will to power, certainly not that they are truly wise.

Another tenent they hold is that there are three types of men, the wise, the gentlemen, and the vulgar many. The wise, who are concerned with the ugly and untainted truth, use the Noble Lie to decieve the gentlemen who will faithfully execute the neccessary actions to achieve the goal of the lie. These persons genuinely believe the lie whereas the "wise" are not only aware of the lie, but are the ones who create it. The lie also serves the second purpose of placating the vulgar many, many of which do not share the desire to know the unadulterated truth. Personally I agree with Patrick Henry when he said: "It is natural for man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth … For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it." Unfortunately it seems Americans are not of that mind.

Irving Kristol, another member of the Strauss camp and the father of neo-conservatism said:"patriotism springs from love of the nation's past; nationalism arises out of hope for the nation's future, distinctive greatness…. Neoconservatives believe… that the goals of American foreign policy must go well beyond a narrow, too literal definition of 'national security'. It is the national interest of a world power, as this is defined by a sense of national destiny … not a myopic national security." Sounds a bit like manifest destiny, which in the rearview mirror of history, was a deplorable policy. The "American foreign policy" referred to by Kristol above is likewise deplorabe. Getting the masses to go along with this foreign policy is where this "noble" lie come into play. This is neccessary because what the so-called wise percieve to be the best interest may or may not actually be so. In addition the means to this supposedly best end may not be justifiable in the minds of the many.

One of the many fallacious assumptions of the Noble Lie is that the target audience would ideally be full of people who are at the best not very independently minded. This is flagrantly false, many individuals are capable of critical thought. When these types of individuals discover they have been decieved they may then distrust any other information from the same source in addition to likley having a negative emotional response to having been treated as if the source considered them idiots. There are a few mechanisms through which the Leo-cons attempt to circumvent these logical pitfalls.

The first of which is known as "poisoning the well," ( a form of argumentum ad hominem, a logical fallacy that will be explained later) which is basically leaking false information to the press or public that the independent thinkers are likely to initially support, only to be proven false. Example: Donald Rumsfeld's statement that a missile hit the Pentagon on September 11th.

The second method used, like the first, is not new. The Third Reich was well versed in the "Grand Lie." A concept that purports that if a lie is big enough many people will believe it simply because they themselves do not have the audacity to tell a lie that effects events on that grand of a scale and can't concieve of anyone else doing so.

What the Leo-cons believe, as evidenced by Brzenski in American Primacy and its Geostrategic Imperatives, is that regime change in several key regions of the mid-east is neccessary to secure the flow of energy resources to the west and away from China and Russia, to clip their political and economic wings before they become legitimate threats to American Supremacy. Brzenski, however, has recently heavily criticised the current administration and warns that war with Iran would be a huge mistake. The accusations against high ranking Iranian officials, particularly Ahamedinijad are suspicously similar to those laid out against Iraq and Saddam, and the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan before that. In any legitimate court of law here these arguments would be quickly dismissed as arguments ad hominem and post hoc (ergo prompter hoc), in addition to being purely circumstancial. This explains why Osama Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, etc, have never been indicted in U.S. courts.

So today we are faced with yet another flimsy accusation against the Iranians with a newly discovered cache of weapons in Iraq, supposedly of Iranian origin. Also Vice President Cheney was attacked while at a meeting with with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, the former UNOCAL (oil consortium with a contract to build a pipeline across Afghanistan, which conveinently also borders Iran) consultant. Iran is a largely shi'ia nation, many of the "insurgents" in Iraq are of the same Islamic doctrine. It would be strange if these followers of the same religious traditions were not in league with each other. This by no means would require the involvement of high level officials in the Iranian government, as the proponents of regime change in Iran would have you believe.

Covert weapons sales often occur without the knowledge of the highest ranking officials to retain plausible deniability and avoid larger wars. Take the Iran-Contra incident that took place under the Reagan Administration. Military and CIA operatives and assets sold U.S. Military equipment to Iran to raise money to fund a terrorist organization in Nicaragua known as the Contras because they were fighting the elected Communist officials. It was exposed when a U.S. military plane carrying supplies to the Contras was shot down by the Nicaraugan military and one of the occupants on board parachuted to safety. Notably he was disobeying orders by carrying a parachute on that flight. Reagan knew nothing of this, and stated it was untrue in a public address. The evidence then came to light and Reagan denounced it when he found out. Oliver North was mostly to blame and suffered most of the fallout, and even convicted. He now has a show on Fox (Faux) News.

The problem now is that the Defense Contractors, Oil Service Companies, and the Israeli lobby, wield enormous power in the highest echelons of our government, and they want a larger war. Let us not forget the words of Nazi Gestapo founder Hermann Wilhelm Göring at War Crimes Trials at Nuremberg:

"The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

So how can we spot these "Noble" Lies? Well, for starters words and phrases like "policy," "position," "we do not currently have information on," "the federal government requires that we state," and "some people say," the Faux News people are particularly fond of the latter. Now that Wolfowitz and company have already admitted that the real motivation for the Iraq war lies more in furthering American hegemony in the Mid-East and the securing of the oil and natural gas reserves in the Caucasus and Caspian Sea, the largest untapped reserves of those fuels in the world, why would their motivations for the coming war with Iran be any different?

Iran is currently capable of greatly reducing oil flow to the west, even completely stopping it for short periods. We are unwanted in the region and have done nothing there but promote regional instability. Iran is well aware that they cannot take the U.S. in an all out war, but they can hurt us where it really hurts the Leo-cons, in the pocket book by shutting off the petroleum we are so horribly addicted to in this country. The propoganda ministry for the current administration is gearing up to put the hard sell on the American public that Iran now poses an immenent threat to this nation.

Do not believe this "noble" lie. We are being treated as fools and the more we realize the more we become very, very pissed off. While the Platonic Noble Lie can serve an important purpose in a utilitarian sense, the Straussian notion of the Noble Lie has the intent of creating a culture of deception, which would be a regretable state of affairs.

The neo-conservatives in Washington are excellent at fear mongering. Fear is the Greatest Ally of Tyranny. Be careful what you believe

Hillary said what?!

A lot of people who are fairly progressive are in support of Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Presidential Nomination. I fear many of her supporters are unaware of some of her more radical positions. In some respects she seems to embody some of the neoconservative foreign policies. Here is an interesting quote from an interview from the Jewish Press in October of 2006.
Sen. Clinton: First, I don't think we should have pushed for an election in the Palestinian territories. I think that was a big mistake.
If we were going to push for an election, we should have made sure we did something to determine who was going to win instead of signing off on an electoral system that advantaged Hamas.
So is all about democracy as long as we support who wins, right? This type of nation building is not what America needs to restore its credibility in the rest of the world.
And from the same interview:
In this new type of war, we have several big tasks ahead of us. First, we must do everything possible to prevent any of them – Iran, Al Qaeda and the like – from getting nuclear weapons or other types of weapons of mass destruction. That's the ballgame.
This "by any means necessary" attitude is also harmful to diplomacy and peaceful solutions.
Then earlier this month she refused to rule out the use of nuclear weapons against "terrorists," such as Osama Bin Ladin and others in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but i imagine this group also includes Iran.
What a great way to discourage other countries from developing nukes, using them for intimidation when dealing with other countries. Sorry, only the U.S. can use this as leverage in diplomacy, no one else...
And as for the bogus "War on Terror" (War of Error, War of Terror, etc) she disagrees with John Edwards' contention that the war on terror is simply a political slogan and said in the June 2007 Democratic debate that she believes Americans are now "safer than we were."
I couldn't disagree more (as does the Senate Intelligence Report). Does anyone really think the War on Terror will be any more effective than the War on Drugs? If anything its easier to stop a boat full of cocaine from entering the country than to prevent a fanatic from blowing up himself and some others anywhere in the world. Read the docket from almost any court in the country and you'll most likely see at least one person, usually more, there for possession of some type of cocaine. Interesting side note, the war in afghanistan has resulted in the 95% cut in opium production under the Taliban to a whopping 1500% increase. In 2006 Afghanistan broke its own world record for opium production... but i digress.
Then there is also the refusal of Clinton Library archivists to provide documents regarding Hillary's time as first lady, more than 1,000 pages of which relate to healthcare. Has executive privilege been expanded to the First Lady? I suppose if she were to claim to not have been part of the executive branch, it would be more believable than Cheney's similar claim.
Suffice it to say I won't be supporting Hillary, and I think electing her would further our country's twisted amalgamation of McCarthyism, Eckbom Syndrome and Munchausen by proxy disorder in our foreign policy.

Fox vs. Wikipedia

The Wikipedia Foundation uses a piece of software called the Wikipedia Scanner to identify IP addresses and cross-reference them with data on which block of IP addresses are owned by what company, thus revealing some of the edits origins. Here are some recent interesting findings.
I recently found out that an IP address traced back to a Fox News computer was used to make a number of interesting changes to Wikipedia. For a full list click here. Here are a few interesting interesting tid-bits:
Changes Made to entry "Keith Olbermann"
Some conservatives feel that Olbermann's reporting carries a liberal bias.
To
Conservatives feel that Olbermann's reporting carries a liberal bias.
ADDED
This move was widely ciritcized by the the media and the blogosphere and Olbermann was attacked for making the death of news icon Peter Jennings about himself.
From
O'Reilly's show, "[[The O'Reilly Factor]]", airs on the Fox News Channel at the same time as Olbermann's show on MSNBC, garnering ratings six times higher than Olbermann's.
To
O'Reilly's show, "[[The O'Reilly Factor]]", airs on the Fox News Channel at the same time as Olbermann's show on MSNBC, garnering ratings ten times higher than Olbermann's.
REMOVED
Ultimately, Olbermann's dissatisfaction with Bristol contributed to his departure from ESPN in 1997. Even several years after his departure, many people still consider Olbermann to be one of the best anchors that SportsCenter ever had, and his pairing with Dan Patrick the best tandem ever.
In high school, Olbermann compiled an extensive list of first and third base coaches in baseball history. This documentation now sits in the Hall of Fame, and is considered the definitive compendium of first and third base coaches in baseball history.
… mocking O'Reilly's purported fetish for loofah sponges, as alleged in a sexual harrassment suit against O'Reilly.
According to Dash Riprock of americanpolitics.com, Olbermann "tells the truth, and he does it in a sharp, subtlety stated, but unmistakable style. It's sad to realize that it is truly such an oddity these days to see someone with those qualities on TV." [http://www.americanpolitics.com/20030401punditpap.html]
Changes To: "CARL CAMERON"
REMOVED:
Cameron has been criticized as being a partisan Republican in his reporting, often interjecting subjective labels on Democrats in order to attack them. In one segment, for example, Cameron attacked three separate Democrats in a time period of only fifteen seconds, deaming them variously, "fairly typical liberal partisan", "Angry liberal," and "extremist"[http://mediamatters.org/items/200501130003].
== Journalistic Fraud ==
Media watchdog groups have documented a number of occassions in which Carl Cameron has fabricated statements by Democratic politicians, seemingly to boost their Republican opponents. Among other quotes, Cameron once claimed that John Kerry labeled [[George W. Bush]] a "warmonger" who intended to create "perpetual war" around the world - no such instance of that criticism ever occurred. In another instance, Cameron fabricated an interview with Kerry in which Kerry referred to Bush as a "Cowboy" and spoke feminently about getting his "nails done", a more open attempt to humiliate and belittle Kerry, for which Fox News eventually apologized for.[http://mediamatters.org/items/200410040006][http://mediamatters.org/items/200409210009].
Changes made to "Brit Hume"
…with the criticism led by [[Media Matters for America]], an organization that critiques the press in search of conservative bias and bloopers.
To
…with the criticism led by [[Media Matters for America]], an liberal organization that critiques the press in search of conservative bias and bloopers.
From
Many groups and commentators, including [[Media Matters for America]], and liberal broadcasters [[Al Franken]], and [[Keith Olbermann]], have claimed that Hume distorted Roosevelt's views.
To
Many groups and commentators, including [[Media Matters for America]], and liberal broadcasters [[Al Franken]], and [[Keith Olbermann]], have claimed that Hume distorted Roosevelt's views in an attempt to ride Mr. Hume's coat tails in the ratings race as Mr. Hume hosts the highest rated political program on cable television.

Changes to "AL FRANKEN"
CHANGEDFrom
The lawsuit focused a great deal of media attention upon Franken's book and greatly enhanced its sales. Reflecting later on the lawsuit during an interview on the [[National Public Radio]] program "[[Fresh Air]]" on [[September 3]], [[2003]], Franken said that Fox's case against him was "literally laughed out of court" and that "wholly (holy) without merit" is a good characterization of Fox News itself.
To
The lawsuit focused a great deal of media attention upon Franken's book and greatly enhanced its sales. Reflecting later on the lawsuit during an interview on the liberal [[National Public Radio]] program "[[Fresh Air]]" on [[September 3]], [[2003]], Franken said that Fox's case against him was the best thing to happen to his book sales.

Here are a few more interesting findings from Wikipedia Scanner:
CIA has edited articles about the President of Iran.
The Vatican has removed content from articles about Gerry Adams, the leader the Irish Republican party, Sinn Fein.
Diebold, the company that delivers the electronic voting system for elections, has edited articles about the company, its controversial technology and its ties to the Republican Party.
Wal-Mart has wisely left consumer criticism in an article about the franchise giant, but made minor edits and additions about its employee policies.