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- Jun 28, 2004
In these trying times, clarity, in our language and our words, is essential. Unfortunately, both the political left and the political right have taken important words, related to important issues related to society, politics and morality and changed them into something completely different and have created confusion and have caused us all harm in doing so.
Right Wing Distortions:
Family Values:
Old: The recognition that strong and stable families are the corner stone of a strong and prosperous society
New: Hatred of homosexuals and every single show on HBO
Morals
Old: Adhering to a system of ethics and in doing so making the world a better place
New: More hatred of homosexuals and abortions too
Spiritual Strength:
Old: The centuries' old notion that not everything is life can be measured and that there are non material things that matter.
New: An obsession with Jesus and a rejection of science
Capitalism:
Old: A system of Private property for those who produced and a system where profits and losses that were based on the ability or lack thereof in keeping down costs and supplying what people wanted and using prices as signals to know the relative value of the various inputs needed for your firm and to see the the amount of demand for your products
New: A rhetorical device used by Wall Street tycoons that clutch their copies of Atlas Shrugged when their risky investments are yielding huge returns but will run to Uncle ben when things go bad and who in consumed in 2008, more Federal dollars then did every single recipient of food stamps, public housing and medicaid.
Pro Business
Old: The notion that government should get out of the way and minimize the burdens on the businesses that create jobs and that create a higher standard of living
New: The idea that workers, tax payers and those that breath air or drink water do not matter, the belief that by giving firms tax payer money, they will do a great deal of good (and from the stand point of GOP campiagn coffers, they do)
National Defense
Old: The ability to deploy an overwhelming number of troops, planes and ships and missles, which would act as a deterant to potential adversaries and will keep the peace where war would otherwise occur.
New: A means for Blackwater and Halliburton and Hamid Karzai and the House of Saud and other friends of the Bushes to make money in costly, colonial conflicts on the otherside of the world that we do not need
Drugs:
Old: chemicals that altered how the brain and body worked and something whose ingestion thereof was the concern of the individual person, just like food, sleep and water.
New: A handful set of said chemicals, that induce euphoria, and allow ordinary people to feel good on the cheap. Their affects are so harmful that we must save those people from them by using brutal coercion to prevent them from buying, selling or consumng them. Every knows that if you feel said or stressed just tap into your trust fund and go on a shopping spree or if you really feel bad, go to your Cape Cod or Carribbean beach home like normal people, you junkie!
Left Wing Distortions
Liberalism
Old: The notion that human beings are entitled to be free from the caprices an all powerful state
New: The notion that our salvation lies in the caprices of an all powerful state
Liberty
Old: Something to be celebrated, the remarkable and rare condition across time and space and a situation that should be preserved at all costs
New: Something that is dangerous because ordinary people cannot be trusted with making any serious decsions and something to be mocked
Assimiliation:
Old: The knowledge that we can be a great multiethnic Republic where people can privately keep their own cultural traditions but agree to use English as a common language and agree to abide by anglo-American common law because a society with people following completely different sets of laws and customs and not speaking a mutually agreed upon langauge is liable to implode
New: Cultural Imperialism, a demand that people submit entirely to a narrow and bland Anglo-Saxon world view and set of customs and since all cultures are either equal or non Western cultures are superior, no one should assimilate whatsoever and everyone in America should be loyal to their thnic tribal group because similar places, with multiple tribes living in one state like Rwanda and Yugoslavia and Afghanistan are so peaceful and prosperous
Regulations
Old: Laws that prevented fraud and made it easier to do business because rules were established for producers and consumers and they were widely known and evenly applied
New: Edicts issued from Washington, a source of instability and a job creation programs for lawyers, who petition the government to let their large and well connected employers either be exmepted from these regulations or better yet, to have those regulations structured to crush smaller, less politically connected competitiors
Free Markets
Old: A process where buyers and sellers work out voluntary transactions and produce wealth and a system where bad investments means that your business will fail
New: A situation where banks, working with the assurances of the Federal Reserve Bank and the help of the Government run mortgage buyers made it profitable, in tehe short run, tp make risky loans and pass the long run costs onto the public
Unions
Old: The primary means for private sector workers to collectively bargain with their bosses for a bigger share of the wealth that they, in conjunction with the owners' capital, produced
New: Government workers that fund Democratic politicians campaigns and that get out the vote on eelection day and will raise hell when governors of nearly insolvent states make any cuts to spending.
Mass Transit
Old: Someting that is useful when a city gets so densly populated that it benefits the citizens to pay for subways, busses or light rail as a substitute for cars because life in very densly populated urban areas tends to not require a car
New: Forcing people in areas, where cars are far and away the best and most conveneient form of transportation, to take busses and light rail or subways even if they run through places that are esentially suburban in population density.
The Rich
Old: people who had so much acumulated wealth that even if they lost 90% of that wealth, their standard of living would not change
New: Anyone who makes more money then you do and deserves to be taxed so they are just as poor you are (unless they are trust fund babies, with their wealth all hidden in tax sheltered bonds)
Electricity
Old: One of the main sources of our standard of living bein gso high by historical standards, something worth building dams and nuclear plants in order to obtain
New: Something to be generated by solar panels and windmills only but they had better not block my own ocean views that I enjoy in my stately vacation home
The South/The American People
Old: Idiots that voted for George W Bush in 2000 and a Republican Congress in 2002 and both in 2004
New: An enlightened people that voted for a Democratic Congress in 2006 and Obama in 2008
Newer: Idiots that voted for a Republican Congress in 2010
Media Distortions:
Trade Imbalance
Old: An arbitrary number based on abstraction national boundaries and the nationality of buyers and sellers in a global economy
New: The downfall of America and something that must be corrected with debasing of our currency (a tax on anyone with a savings account and/or anyone who spends most of his or her check on food and fuel and rent) and more subsidies for the country's largest firms
Unemplyment/ Unemployment Rate
Old (before January 2009): A massive and painful occurance, anything above five percent was unacceptable and everything other day we must ru na sob story about some who is out of work
New: (After January 20th 2009) some abstract number that is fretted over by academic egg heads and talking heads and is no big deal as long as it is below 11% or so, anything below 9% is cause for celebration
Scandal/Sex Scandal
Old: When a politician in power uses public funds, his own power or his own access to state secrets to illegally and unethically advance his own personal interests and.or uses his coercive power to force himself onto an unwilling female
New: Any public figure, such as a professional golfer or Congressman engaging in legal, though perhaps strange or immoral behavior
Feel free to add some more NT.
Right Wing Distortions:
Family Values:
Old: The recognition that strong and stable families are the corner stone of a strong and prosperous society
New: Hatred of homosexuals and every single show on HBO
Morals
Old: Adhering to a system of ethics and in doing so making the world a better place
New: More hatred of homosexuals and abortions too
Spiritual Strength:
Old: The centuries' old notion that not everything is life can be measured and that there are non material things that matter.
New: An obsession with Jesus and a rejection of science
Capitalism:
Old: A system of Private property for those who produced and a system where profits and losses that were based on the ability or lack thereof in keeping down costs and supplying what people wanted and using prices as signals to know the relative value of the various inputs needed for your firm and to see the the amount of demand for your products
New: A rhetorical device used by Wall Street tycoons that clutch their copies of Atlas Shrugged when their risky investments are yielding huge returns but will run to Uncle ben when things go bad and who in consumed in 2008, more Federal dollars then did every single recipient of food stamps, public housing and medicaid.
Pro Business
Old: The notion that government should get out of the way and minimize the burdens on the businesses that create jobs and that create a higher standard of living
New: The idea that workers, tax payers and those that breath air or drink water do not matter, the belief that by giving firms tax payer money, they will do a great deal of good (and from the stand point of GOP campiagn coffers, they do)
National Defense
Old: The ability to deploy an overwhelming number of troops, planes and ships and missles, which would act as a deterant to potential adversaries and will keep the peace where war would otherwise occur.
New: A means for Blackwater and Halliburton and Hamid Karzai and the House of Saud and other friends of the Bushes to make money in costly, colonial conflicts on the otherside of the world that we do not need
Drugs:
Old: chemicals that altered how the brain and body worked and something whose ingestion thereof was the concern of the individual person, just like food, sleep and water.
New: A handful set of said chemicals, that induce euphoria, and allow ordinary people to feel good on the cheap. Their affects are so harmful that we must save those people from them by using brutal coercion to prevent them from buying, selling or consumng them. Every knows that if you feel said or stressed just tap into your trust fund and go on a shopping spree or if you really feel bad, go to your Cape Cod or Carribbean beach home like normal people, you junkie!
Left Wing Distortions
Liberalism
Old: The notion that human beings are entitled to be free from the caprices an all powerful state
New: The notion that our salvation lies in the caprices of an all powerful state
Liberty
Old: Something to be celebrated, the remarkable and rare condition across time and space and a situation that should be preserved at all costs
New: Something that is dangerous because ordinary people cannot be trusted with making any serious decsions and something to be mocked
Assimiliation:
Old: The knowledge that we can be a great multiethnic Republic where people can privately keep their own cultural traditions but agree to use English as a common language and agree to abide by anglo-American common law because a society with people following completely different sets of laws and customs and not speaking a mutually agreed upon langauge is liable to implode
New: Cultural Imperialism, a demand that people submit entirely to a narrow and bland Anglo-Saxon world view and set of customs and since all cultures are either equal or non Western cultures are superior, no one should assimilate whatsoever and everyone in America should be loyal to their thnic tribal group because similar places, with multiple tribes living in one state like Rwanda and Yugoslavia and Afghanistan are so peaceful and prosperous
Regulations
Old: Laws that prevented fraud and made it easier to do business because rules were established for producers and consumers and they were widely known and evenly applied
New: Edicts issued from Washington, a source of instability and a job creation programs for lawyers, who petition the government to let their large and well connected employers either be exmepted from these regulations or better yet, to have those regulations structured to crush smaller, less politically connected competitiors
Free Markets
Old: A process where buyers and sellers work out voluntary transactions and produce wealth and a system where bad investments means that your business will fail
New: A situation where banks, working with the assurances of the Federal Reserve Bank and the help of the Government run mortgage buyers made it profitable, in tehe short run, tp make risky loans and pass the long run costs onto the public
Unions
Old: The primary means for private sector workers to collectively bargain with their bosses for a bigger share of the wealth that they, in conjunction with the owners' capital, produced
New: Government workers that fund Democratic politicians campaigns and that get out the vote on eelection day and will raise hell when governors of nearly insolvent states make any cuts to spending.
Mass Transit
Old: Someting that is useful when a city gets so densly populated that it benefits the citizens to pay for subways, busses or light rail as a substitute for cars because life in very densly populated urban areas tends to not require a car
New: Forcing people in areas, where cars are far and away the best and most conveneient form of transportation, to take busses and light rail or subways even if they run through places that are esentially suburban in population density.
The Rich
Old: people who had so much acumulated wealth that even if they lost 90% of that wealth, their standard of living would not change
New: Anyone who makes more money then you do and deserves to be taxed so they are just as poor you are (unless they are trust fund babies, with their wealth all hidden in tax sheltered bonds)
Electricity
Old: One of the main sources of our standard of living bein gso high by historical standards, something worth building dams and nuclear plants in order to obtain
New: Something to be generated by solar panels and windmills only but they had better not block my own ocean views that I enjoy in my stately vacation home
The South/The American People
Old: Idiots that voted for George W Bush in 2000 and a Republican Congress in 2002 and both in 2004
New: An enlightened people that voted for a Democratic Congress in 2006 and Obama in 2008
Newer: Idiots that voted for a Republican Congress in 2010
Media Distortions:
Trade Imbalance
Old: An arbitrary number based on abstraction national boundaries and the nationality of buyers and sellers in a global economy
New: The downfall of America and something that must be corrected with debasing of our currency (a tax on anyone with a savings account and/or anyone who spends most of his or her check on food and fuel and rent) and more subsidies for the country's largest firms
Unemplyment/ Unemployment Rate
Old (before January 2009): A massive and painful occurance, anything above five percent was unacceptable and everything other day we must ru na sob story about some who is out of work
New: (After January 20th 2009) some abstract number that is fretted over by academic egg heads and talking heads and is no big deal as long as it is below 11% or so, anything below 9% is cause for celebration
Scandal/Sex Scandal
Old: When a politician in power uses public funds, his own power or his own access to state secrets to illegally and unethically advance his own personal interests and.or uses his coercive power to force himself onto an unwilling female
New: Any public figure, such as a professional golfer or Congressman engaging in legal, though perhaps strange or immoral behavior
Feel free to add some more NT.
