Stepping up the rhetoric | 32 comments (32 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Stepping up the rhetoric (4.00 / 3)

I tend to agree with Crazy Horse. Who is this delirium aimed at? What constituency will it influence? I'd suspect a shrinking one. At the very least, this is preaching to the choir.

So it's meant to edify and firm up the base? Probably. So let them spend their time doing that. They won't be making new converts with this nonsense, anyway.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 08:18:39 AM EST

It is preaching to the choir (none / 1)

of course, but the fact remains that quotes like the above are the only thing that the business/political elites that read the WSJ will get, and, just like advertising, this shapes their underlying beliefs.

Leftists = communists = totalitarian
US = WWII victor
WoT = WWIII

Maybe those that read this don't agree that the president cannot be criticized, but in the meantime, they won't challenge the underlying assumption that the War on Terra needs to be fought, and they absorb that the parties of the left were financed by totalitarian communist regimes and thus can never really be trusted.

A lot of people read this. Many won't read it as critically as we do.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 08:36:32 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: It is preaching to the choir (4.00 / 4)

Considering the kind of retards who are likely to read the WSJ and take it at face value, I think it's more likely that the WSJ is being paid to say what they already think, rather than trying to shape their opinions.

It's an interesting insight into Bubble World and the mindset of the perpetually shrinking twenty-x-percent.

This is as clear an admission as you'll find that the US values fantasy - especially warrrr porn fantasy - over reality.

It's only in comic books and Dan Brown novels that the president is all knowing and wise and must be supported at all costs, lest the Other get in.

Oh - and the WSJ, apparently.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 09:23:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]

I disagree (4.00 / 3)

The WSJ is the main daily newspaper of the business world. Not of the FoxNews watching dittoheads (although some may belong to both groups).

As such, its influence goes much farther, as it is part of the echo chamber of financial analysts and pundits that spout the conventional wisdom that gets regurgitated mindlessly by the markets and all its cheerleaders.

That tripe gets processed and repeated endlessly (in slightly toned down versions), allowing the process to be repeated a while later with, each time, slightly more outrageous stuff.

The WSJ Op-Ed pages are one of the early sources of the talking points of the hard right (in their legitimized version) and, as such, need to be fought.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 09:50:47 AM EST
[ Parent ]

One thing you're forgetting... (4.00 / 2)

...is the rather complete disconnect between the Op-Ed pages and the journalistic part of the WSJ. Most people at the level of business leaders already recognize that news staff (until now anyway) operates independently, and that the decently reported "news" is often completely at odds with the wacked-out editorials. i venture to say that even many conservatives accept that.

It's our task to focus on the alternative views within the forums we can influence. Why dignify the wack-jobs with trying to refute all the propaganda?

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin

by Crazy Horse on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 11:24:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: I disagree (4.00 / 2)

When I was a young man working in New York most people who read the WS Journal also read the NY Times. I'm not sure it's the case today but I doubt that many people who read the Journal do it for its editorials. They are about the dumbest around-almost like a joke. Who knows, its editorial page might improve when Murdoch takes over.

Hey, Grandma Moses started late!

by LEP on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 11:36:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: It is preaching to the choir (4.00 / 3)

Jerome,

The GWoT is considered WWIV by the neo-conservatives. If you are wondering what happened to WWIII: They consider The Cold War to be WWIII.

They also believe that the President should never be criticised. Dick Cheney has a long history of voicing this view both when he was Nixon's chief of staff and when he was a Congressman. The GWoT is just their best excuse.

Money is a sign of Poverty - Culture Saying

by RogueTrooper on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 09:43:20 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: It is preaching to the choir (4.00 / 5)

I notice how they applied this with Clinton.

Hey, Grandma Moses started late!

by LEP on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 11:37:39 AM EST
[ Parent ]

It's WSJ: Total propaganda, total lie (4.00 / 3)

Who is this delirium aimed at?

This question is key in considering a response.

But first, consider how bogus this all is: The real, inside dope from a defector spy! Listen up! And if he is telling you to obey your leaders like sheep . . . you should smell a fish--if appearing in the WSJ weren't warning enough. But who IS this guy? Does he even exist? Or is he, maybe, the creation of an ad copy-writer's imagination?

So who is it aimed at?

Well, firstly, people who will buy the whole Cold War thing. With Putin resisting the US claim to ownership of the world's remaining oil, will you buy the New Cold War? With the Iraq war gone bad, the US desperately needs a new war--preferably one it hasn't lost yet. Iran is out--the Army and Navy have as much as refused it. But a New Cold War against the Russians might fill the bill. Plenty of cost-plus contracts for new weapons systems, the Air-Force is happy, plenty of thrills (and fear) but no real action--at least for a while.

Who better to kick off the New Cold War than a player in the old one--a defector spy!

Why did people fall for the old Cold War? Answer that and you know who will fall for the New one.

The essential problem is the US needs war the way a junkie needs dope. Without war, reality begins to set in, and that is very, very bad.

(The unfolding implosion of the US economy--promising to include the best features of the Great Depression and the Wiemar hyper-inflation--just adds to the urgency.)

Reality setting in. Almost unthinkable. Desperation is only beginning.

The Fates are kind.

by Gaianne on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 11:02:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Say that again! (none / 1)

The essential problem is the US needs war the way a junkie needs dope. Without war, reality begins to set in, and that is very, very bad.

To make it global, I would trade US for neoconlib.

Our knowledge has surpassed our wisdom. -Charu Saxena.

by metavision on Wed Aug 8th, 2007 at 12:07:19 PM EST
[ Parent ]

PS--Can you read the second and third boxes (none / 1)

and NOT believe they were written by an American--and Republican? NOBODY else writes like this.

Romanian--hah!

The Fates are kind.

by Gaianne on Tue Aug 7th, 2007 at 11:12:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Stepping up the rhetoric | 32 comments (32 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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