< HOME  Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Distracted Not Duped

This is a great post I found at Le Colonel Chabert that demonstrates once again how the media is responsible for distracting America from the issues that matter most.
I mentioned elsewhere once the ill-conceived pr campaign the NY State chamber of commerce ran very briefly some years ago. They had an ad on television boasting of the rate of exploitation in NY State. It said "NY workers produce five dollars for every dollar they are paid" or something like this. People were really annoyed: "Wait, you mean every time I make a dollar, the company makes five dollars?" "Four." "For what I did they make five dollars and give me one." "Right." "So there are a hundred of us, we each make a dollar every five minutes, and the boss make four hundred dollars every five minutes?" "Right." Capital schmapital, risk shmisk, that is not fair! The ads disappeared in three days.

This is managed simply with spin. The biznews doesn't lie about this but it looks at it from a slightly different angle. Well, somebody else would settle for fifty cents every five minutes! In Haiti they'd work for fifty cents a day! The main tactic is simply to tell all the stories from the shareholder's point of view.
Ah ha! So, that's why the economy is so lousy when they describe it as rosey!
On a bizchat programme on CNBC last year, the garrulous hosts went silent when a guest investment analyst accidentally mentioned that people with either a half a million dollars or more in the bank or an income of at least $150k yearly made up 3% of the US population. They stared.

You mean 30%, one said, quietly, practically holding his breath.

The guest reiterated: three.

The hosts looked at eachother. There was a pause. It was clear they really were very surprised, mouths hanging open. Some flash of something rare and human moved across their faces. As if to say, shit, everyone's living on less than that? That's not right!
But, that's exactly what's happening! And it's no coincidence--the rich are feeding off the poor.

4 Comments:

At Thursday, March 30, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

What I find to be funny/sad is when I saw Ann Coulter on Real Time with Bill Maher. Bill Maher mentioned that African American males are more likely to commit crimes than white people, but it is not their blackness, but rather their poverty, that has led to that. Ann Coulter laughed at him. "Yeah, right," she said. She actually laughed at him.

THESE PEOPLE ARE BLIND AND DELUSIONAL! That is how they go through each day of their lives. They live lives that are total lies. It's really astonishing.

Meanwhile, our polar ice caps are melting and we are running out of oil. If nothing changes and we don't get smart about the environment, wars with nations over oil will only increase.

The biggest threat to national security right now is the environment. We are entering an age when we will be fighting to the death over oil and clean water. And the oil company lobbyists really just do not care. Bush claims we are "addicted to oil," when in fact he is the first one to kowtow to every oil lobbyist's demands.

It is only a matter of time until vast parts of NYC (not to mention other parts of the world) are under water, unless we decide to wise up. It's not just me saying this - it's Pentagon and NASA officials the Bush administration tried to silence. It's every reputable scientist out there. Evidently, the polar ice caps will be completely melted within a decade, unless we do something.

The rich don't have to worry. They have ten homes across the world and enough money to live a life of luxury. It is the poor that will be left high and dry.

Katrina was just the beginning. It is no coincidence that many prominent politicans do not want to rebuild New Orleans. They expect hurricanes of a Katrina magnitude will hit the Gulf Coast again, and they don't want to lift a finger to do anything about this. It's easier to count the money and continue to rape and pillage the environment.

 
At Thursday, March 30, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

Let me edit one thing. The polar ice caps will be irreversibly melted within a decade, unless we act now, not totally melted.

 
At Thursday, March 30, 2006, Blogger AJ said...

Miss r,

As much as I appreciate you, I must say I question your stand that the polar ice caps will be melted within a decade. There is no proof that we are in a "tipping point" climatic change, although I do agree the weather has gotten a bit chaotic of late.

 
At Friday, March 31, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

AJ,

I feel I am not being paranoid when I say we are reaching the tipping point with global warming. Most prominent scientists are saying exactly that.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article344690.ece

http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,12374,1546824,00.html

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/lifescience/0,70393-0.html?tw=wn_technology_5

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1176980,00.html

http://in.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-03-16T033146Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-240788-1.xml

 

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