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["Melody O." <melody AT crecon.com>]

At 09:35 AM 5/17/05 -0700, you wrote:
>or,
>That Pesky Downing Street Memo,
>or,
>The Insignificance of You and Me,
>or,
>To Hell With Truth
>
>
>Secret Way to War
>
>By Mark Danner
<snip>
>The last century's most innovative authority on power and truth, Joseph 
>Goebbels, made the same point but rather more directly:

>    There was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For 
>intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the 
>stronger, and this will always be 'the man in the street.' Arguments must 
>therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and 
>instincts, not the intellect. Truth was unimportant and entirely 
>subordinate to tactics and psychology.

<snip>
One 
>might debate their ultimate responsibility for these grave errors, but it 
>is difficult to argue that these officials merited the highest recognition 
>the country could offer.
>
>Of course truth, as the master propagandist said, is "unimportant and 
>entirely subordinate to tactics and psychology." He of course would have 
>instantly grasped the psychological tactic embodied in that White House 
>ceremony, which was one more effort to reassure Americans that the war the 
>administration launched against Iraq has been a success and was worth 
>fighting. That barely four Americans in ten are still willing to believe 
>this suggests that as time goes on and the gap grows between what Americans 
>see and what they are told, membership in the "reality-based community" may 
>grow along with it. 


"Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present
controls the past." (_1984_ by George Orwell)

Best wishes,
Melody