Americans are not too stupid to see through the lies...

[Melodybe]

A week ago I talked to an elderly black woman outside of our local jail house, her son was in jail for having a gram of cocaine. Now I won't go into how if one of the frat boys here had the same amount of coke, the police probably wouldn't even take it away, but anyway I can bet a million dollars that every white poster here would have assumed that given the situation this woman would be too stupid to see through the lies of the media. Guess what she wasn't she happens to remember the 80's and Iran Contra, and that 10's of thousands of black voters were disenfranchized in 2000, she knew that the tv news does nothing but lie. My question is why does everyone here have such a hard time believing that Americans are not too stupid to see the truth. Is it because of the polls?

Tell me why, if we all know that the media does nothing but lie, why are we so quick to believe all of the bad things that they say.

[el_gato]

1. Some people can't resist the siren song of the media

the process of reification, i.e. it ain't real until it's been on the t.v. is just too strong for minds that have been constantly manipulated since birth.

[tom_paine]

8. I agree completely. It is trainig, it is ingrained

We have been accustomed from birth to millions of little lies told to us every day in commercials.

Carl Sagan's final book, written just before his death and the first that didn't have that optimistic feel (he was beginning to see the beginnings of where we are now, a Totalitarian Ignroocracy/Kleptocracy), called "The Demon Haunted World", addresses it quite well.

[el_gato]

9. thanks, I'll have to look that up

I went to see him speak about a year or so before he died.

[On the Road]

2. Black Voters are More Likely to be Aware of Media Lies

because they've been on the wrong of things since forever. During the bad old days of segregation, the world depicted by the papers bore no relation to the one they experienced.

I worry more about white folks.

[edbermac]

3. About half of America voted for Bush; so the other half are not too stupid

:mad:

[Ripley]

17. Actually that is not true.

I don't have the stats handy, but I believe only about 50% of Americans voted in 2000. And since Gore won, less than 1/2 of the 50% voted for the Smirk. Since 2000...we have been attacked, the economy is hemorrhaging on many fronts (maybe not the DOW, but in REAL life), and we are in another Vietnam.

Lots of the 24%ers won't be voting for him again. The challenge is to get them to vote for Kerry instead of just sitting this one out.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. My questioon to you is

is she going to vote? I knwo sounds corny but I ask because many a times people at or bellow the poverty level knwo things but don't vote no more.

[Melodybe]

5. Hell yes! she is going to vote, every black person I have talked to

is going to vote.

That is the first thing I ask people.

[candy331]

22. What did you get out the post that says she is at/below the poverty level?

[librechik]

6. I think the polls are scary,also a lot of us here watch Washington Journal

The moderators seem to do their best to heavily weight the callers in favor of a bunch of self righteous idiots from Hellabama, so we get a bizarre impression of the great mass of America. Seventy Percent of people thought Usama and Saddam were partners, and that's pretty ignorant and stupid to believe that (and we have pictures of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Hussein, and stupid wingnuts brush that off as nothing!)

Sorry, It's hard to believe that many many Americans, certainly not most (but enough to ball things up annoyingly) are quite stupid. Add to that the miserable mess our education system is and how the media misinform us so shockingly, and we have a serious serious problem here. Add to THAT the fact that many Americans are raised and consitioned to hate intellectuals, and it's, IMO a hopeless situation.

I try to take the postmodern attitude--sure it's a ruinous mess. Let's build a house on it! It's fun, and what the hell else can we do since we are powerless against the machine. It's a farce, so piss on it.

[Melodybe]

7. Seventy percent OF PEOPLE POLLED believe that Saddam had links to 9/11

[asthmaticeog]

21. That was like two years ago. n/t

[Tsiyu]

10. Very sad about her son

I was fired a few weeks ago by my Repuke boss. Why? The general manager she hired was snorting so much cocaine, and taking Hydrocodone and Zanax'z ( four bars a night AT LEAST), he was impossible to work for. He tried to convince her I was a meth addict one night. Another employee who overheard him said that a half hour after calling me a cranker, he came and asked this employee if there was any coke residue in his nose!
I can only assume that this Repuke boss does massive amounts of coke as well, since she allowed anyone and everyone to go snort it in the restrooms whenever they liked. And I was the one fired. Oh well. Those Republican values really show!!!!!But try to talk to her about the insanity of the drug war? HA! About all the blacks thrown in jail for smaller offenses than hers? HA! WHO CARES? Just like with *, there is a different legal standard for * bootlickers.

Americans are smart enough. But Repukes are not unselfish or concerned enough to care if their media lies. They like the comfort of never seeing dead babies. They like the comfort of not acknowledging the deficit. They like thinking * is in control and is ready to wipe their nasty butts should they soil themselves. They are like the fools who supported Hitler. Too selfish to care about anyone but themselves.

[Javaman]

11. Sometimes it's not a matter of being stupid...

It's the heard mentality.

[BiggJawn]

12. One old black woman with ehr eyes open, versus....

Millions of stupid Teee-Veeee-numbed Murkan Sheeple with their minds closed to anything but who's gonna be first off the island and oh, yeah, Bush is strong, saw some ad on Teee-Veee that said that, and they couldn't put it on Teee-Veee if it wasn't true, could they?

it's not the polls, it's the stupid Sheeple I come into contact with every day, all the "W '04" stickers I see, the LTTE I read in the papers that tell us it's a bad idea to change leaders during a WAR....

[Melodybe]

13. Then do something about it, be part of the solution not the problem.

[BiggJawn]

16. And that *IS*???????

Only thing more annoying than a dull sheeple is some self-styled "activist" shouting buzz-phrases...

All the smart ones are already going "WTF???" the ones who aren't upset aren't paying attention (I know buzz-phrases, too) and IMO, aren't too keen on having their little consumer fantasy disrupted. "Bush is a STRONG leader! Kerry is a Flip-Flopper! Those nice good-looking people on Fox (they're Fair and Balanced, didja know that?) said so! Bush is gonna let me have some more of my own money back! Kerry is gonna raise my taxes!"

I *AM* doing something about it, FYI....Everyday, I talk to people. some are receptive to a message of hope and an idea of America that Could Be, and others stick their fingers in their ears and go "la-la-la-la-la, I can't HEAR you! Rush is RIGHT! Smoke 'em OUT! Bring it ON! Terra is everywhere! Be strong! Kick their asses! Woo-Hoot!"

I don't waste my time or breath on those morons.
<grumble>

[Character Assassin]

14. Hold on a sec. I don't know where you are, but I'm a cop

and where I work in CA, a gram of coke gets you to the pokey regardless of the color you happen to be.

but anyway I can bet a million dollars that every white poster here would have assumed that given the situation this woman would be too stupid to see through the lies of the media. Guess what she wasn't she happens to remember the 80's and Iran Contra, and that 10's of thousands of black voters were disenfranchized in 2000,

I'm white, and I have zero recollection of the disenfranchizement of 10's of thousands of black voters in FL in 2000.

That's because it's a myth. It didn't happen.

[Ripley]

18. Disenfranchisement of black voters in FL DID happen.

Maybe not 10's of thousands, but certainly thousands were wiped off the voter rolls by Katherine Harris who paid Checkpoint (?) 1 mill to purge the ineligibles which turned out to completely inaccurate.

Read Palast's "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" if you are so inclined.

[Character Assassin]

20. Not to the mythical proportions that so many try to claim.

The list was indeed inaccurate and it listed people who shouldn't have been on it. OK, but that doesn't somehow make the list a tool or purposeful method to prevent black citizens from voting.

[Melodybe]

23. MS, they are a little different in these parts.

[CityZen-X]

15. The Manchurian Nectar!?

ASPARTAME!!?

[skygazer]

19. I wonder how many of these people never get polled

I don't know how polling works or how they choose who to poll but I wonder how much of a percentage of people polled are poor, minority or youth voters. All of those demographics are going to be more likely to vote Dem and I just have a gut feeling they're under represented in polls.