https://redsails.org/masses-elites-and-rebels/
I always find this Roderic Day essay pretty useful in analysing this in terms of what will and agency the actual masses have, not that people don't get fooled at all by propaganda but that on some level they often want to be fooled, and perceive a benefit to being fooled and going along with it.
I find it really funny that Osama’s speech to the American people, he blames them for the faults of the government. But at the end he becomes a liberal and just says “you must vote for better representatives.”
:maybe-later-kiddo: "See, even Osama knew the solution wasn't violent revolution but voting!"
Like for example with this excerpt.
Backers of such military action against Iran undoubtedly would sell the war as an effort to keep nuclear weapons out of the Middle East, and many Americans would believe that sales pitch, even though that is not at all what would be happening.
If we look at it through the lens provided in the essay, many Americans would be indifferent to the reality of the pitch, because they can read the same pitch that the guys making it are reading, which is that it furthers US hegemony and dominance, as well as other specific US geopolitical goals like keeping Israel secure as a western enclave in the region.
Damn, that’s a banger
*(little bit sectarian in one place, anarchists of today seem incomparable to anarchists of nihilism, who, for one, murdered lots of dudes and were first “terrorists”)
He's basically been arguing for a while that Nietzsche is a kind of ur-fascist thinker, and anytime he argues that there seems to be a handful of leftists that start telling him that actually thats his sister distorting his writings or whatever.
I dont usually see leftists otherwise try and quote or use Nietzsche, but theres definitely a tendency to go in defense of him against accusations of fascism.
I guess he disagrees with that interpretation and finds Nietzsche fundamentally reactionary in more ways than just antisemitism.
But truth be told I'm not particularly read into these arguments cause I neither read Nietzsche nor have I ever had to argue with anyone who did. Just providing context for why he randomly veered into yelling about left-Nietzscheans.
.... and this is a problem because of its damage to "US Credibility"
The failure of the makers of the Iraq War to consider broader follow-on consequences includes not only insurgency and retaliation but also effects of the war on the global standing of the United States and its ability to influence other states on other issues. Relevant to this failure is Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine and the U.S. effort to sustain an international coalition in opposition. In defending his operation against U.S. criticism, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been quick to mention the U.S. invasion of Iraq and to accuse Washington of hypocrisy. To American ears, this rhetorical line is annoying whataboutism, but Putin has a point.
Yeah I think it's safe to say we learned nothing. The public are easily directed into whatever foreign boogyman the media tells them to hate.
Yup. Fucking shame. It made me flip my entire political ideology. But alot of the ppl that had the same beliefs as me are still there, still quoting the media without an ounce of reflection. Christ.
