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Earwicker, I appreciate what you are saying and unfortunately a useful response (*not* a response that "proves" me right and you wrong, but rather adds more light to the discussion) would be even longer than what you've posted. So I'll just try to be brief.

While we would like to pretend otherwise, and there is some ethical pressure to treat others as if they are, the truth of it is that people are not wholly rational. There are good reasons why people can look at the same set of facts and come to entirely different conclusions. There are mounds of psychological evidence that show that even at the level of basic perception people tend to see what they expect to see.

So you have person A and person B and they look at the same situation and they come up with radically different interpretations. This is not entirely unexpected because they bring to the viewing radically different expectations.

What unfortunately happens, however, is that sometimes person A (say) is so convinced of their interpretation that it is *literally* unimaginable to them that person B could really believe what they say they believe. A simply can't put himself into B's frame of reference enough to see how B could possibly believe what he says he believes. It becomes all too tempting for A to dismiss what B is saying as a lie, and for A to synthesize an alternate explanation for B's behavior. B must have some hidden profit motive or some other sub rosa agenda.

We've seen this happen on this very board. I hope that even if you view my point of view as being wrong to the point of delusional, you don't doubt that it is my true point of view and not a pack of lies concocted for some cynical gain.

I mean, what gain could there possibly be for *me* to lie on this board? I don't have Haliburton stock. I don't own a munitions company. I am not a powerful person interested in aggregating more power.

But then you have someone like Clocker Bob. To him it is inconceivable that I could possibly believe what I believe. It is a belief system so foreign to his expectation set that the only way he can make sense of it is to synthesize an explanation...or two or three. So on various occasions you have him accusing me of being a lying propagandist.

I only bring this up to cite an example in this microcosm of EA to point out what I think also happens in the larger world.

To be sure there are numerous examples in history of the powerful acting so as to consolidate power. There is a sort of evolutionary pressure to do so. Those with power who don't act to consolidate power are replaced by those who do.

And it's certainly possible to note the correlation of wealth with imperialism and war making and so on.

But in each of these instances there is a parallel track of core values. Now I'm not saying these core values are "good". Some of them are quite evil. But there are core values, nevertheless, that track with the actions of these powerful people and institutions. There are remarkably few historical examples of powerful men so machiavellian that they fluidly change from Christian to Atheist to Jew, or communist to capitalist to anarchist, simply to aggregate power.

Core values, I contend, are real and persistent, and you can't understand the machinations of power without factoring in the core values that drive decision making.

Even a Hitler or a cowboy advocating the genocide of American Indians has a set of core values that provide a foundation for their actions. It's not just a question of power over the less powerful. In these cases there is also a value system that allows them so see others as subhuman. It's a twisted, sick, incorrect value system. But it's there.

So if your expectation set is one that diminishes the importance of core values in steering the behavior of the powerful, and you're predisposed to interpret the world through pure power relations which are unanchored...then your expectation set is going to greatly influence not only what you believe about a new situation, but also how you evaluate the honesty of other people involved.

In short...people tend to see what they expect to see. You expect someone like Bush to operate from a system of unanchored power, and so when you hear him speak about core values as being his motivation, the only way you can make sense of that is by calling him a liar.

For now I'm just happy you're not calling *me* a liar.

It dawns on me that someone could read the above and think that I think that I'm somehow above and immune to the same critique.

I'm not saying that at all. I'm sure someone might say that *my* expectation set is skewed towards core values and that I tend to overlook motives which stem from valueless greed.

I try to keep a proper balance, but it's ultimately impossible to stand outside of yourself and take an objective inventory. Expectations color everything, even (perhaps especially) one's view of oneself.

galanter wrote:In short...people tend to see what they expect to see. You expect someone like Bush to operate from a system of unanchored power, and so when you hear him speak about core values as being his motivation, the only way you can make sense of that is by calling him a liar.

For now I'm just happy you're not calling *me* a liar.

First I earlier called you dishonest on account of you making a post insisting you answered all questions and wanted more. Calling you dishonest was in response to that as I have asked you many questions over these last months that you've not answered (I haven't been inclined to go through and find them but they're there).
Sure you get a lot, fair do's but the post I responded to was insisting you were answering all questions and you weren't (I've not been back and looked but it was something like that). In other words I didn't call you dishonest because of your political position and I understnad now why you said it.

Secondly, I dig what you're saying above but it doesn't answer the question. Or rather it does if your answer is that you believe they are telling the truth and hold these values because they say they do.

I would suggest their actions show their talk to be cheap.
I could understand your position if I heard why you are so willing to believe them. I cannot understand your position without some explanation because just taking them at their word seems hopelessly naive to me.
I believe you believe it I just don't know why.

galanter wrote:But focusing on WMD's in the UN was not an unreasonable thing to do, and it certainly wasn't dishonest.

From 60 Minutes, earlier this year:

According to former top CIA official Tyler Drumheller, CIA Director George Tenet delivered the news about the Iraqi foreign minister at a high-level meeting at the White House, including the president, the vice president and Secretary of State Rice. At that meeting, Drumheller says, "They were enthusiastic because they said, they were excited that we had a high-level penetration of Iraqis." What did this high-level source tell him? "He told us that they had no active weapons of mass destruction program," says Drumheller.

"So in the fall of 2002, before going to war, we had it on good authority from a source within Saddam's inner circle that he didn't have an active program for weapons of mass destruction?" Bradley asked.

"Yes," Drumheller replied. He says there was no doubt in his mind at all.

"It directly contradicts, though, what the president and his staff were telling us," Bradley remarked.

"The policy was set," Drumheller says. "The war in Iraq was coming. And they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy."

Drumheller expected the White House to ask for more information from the Iraqi foreign minister. But he says he was taken aback by what happened. "The group that was dealing with preparation for the Iraq war came back and said they're no longer interested," Drumheller recalls. "And we said, 'Well, what about the intel?' And they said, 'Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change.'"

---

And:

In a subsequent interview on 60 Minutes, Paul O'Neill, present in the meeting as the newly appointed secretary of the treasury, remembered being surprised by the degree of certainty: "From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go.... It was all about finding a way to do it."

---

And:

In the spring of 2004, Greg Thielmann, the State Department officer responsible for assessing the threats of nuclear proliferation, said, "The American public was seriously misled. The Administration twisted, distorted and simplified intelligence in a way that led Americans to seriously misunderstand the nature of the Iraq threat. I'm not sure I can think of a worse act against the people in a democracy than a President distorting critical classified information."

---

This administration is neither honest nor acts in good faith. This is why the poll is a landslide.

Incornsyucopia wrote:Reagan did a lot that I'm not a fan of, but at least he seemed to actually believe in the idea of small government ...

and yet he, like every post WWI Republican President GREW the size of government AND the deficit.

it's only propaganda... don't believe their advertising.

between Bush and Reagan it's almost too close to call.
both horror shows.

the only difference is that Bush has more crazies around him

Lars, I didn't say the intel wasn't mixed. It was. There are two points of view on this kind of question, and it has to do with which side you want to err on.

Some folks feel like the US shouldn't have taken out Saddam unless there was proof they still had WMD's. Since there wasn't absolute proof we should have waited.

Others feel like Saddam had 17 resolutions calling for him to *demonstrate* he had disarmed. That the burden of proof was on Saddam and he refused to meet that burden. This lack of proof, combined with some evidence of an ongoing program, and the certainty that such weapons existed in the past, meant erring on the side of caution called for taking Saddam down.

The UN debates don't tell the full story. As the quote you previously posted noted, the administration felt there were a host of reasons for taking Saddam out, but they focused on the WMDs at the UN for essentially bureaucratic reasons. That's the kind of thing you get with the UN.

You should also keep in mind these two facts.

First, so far as I know to this very day we *still* don't have a full account of what happened to the WMD's that everyone agrees Saddam once had. Some speculate they were taken to Syria, similar to the way Saddam sent his air force to Iran.

Second, we now know that when Saddam said all the WMD's had been destroyed that was a lie.

And again, it's not like Bush and Co. were the only ones who contended Saddam were non-complaint regarding WMD's. The entire UN Security Council was in agreement that Saddam's WMD's were an open question, and Saddam was non-compliant.

Given Saddam's track record leading up to the war not taking Saddam's word for it that the WMD's had been destroyed was a very prudent thing to do. And we now know some, in fact, had not been destroyed. The whereabouts of the rest of his WMD stash remains a mystery.

Earwicker wrote:Secondly, I dig what you're saying above but it doesn't answer the question. Or rather it does if your answer is that you believe they are telling the truth and hold these values because they say they do.

I would suggest their actions show their talk to be cheap.
I could understand your position if I heard why you are so willing to believe them. I cannot understand your position without some explanation because just taking them at their word seems hopelessly naive to me.
I believe you believe it I just don't know why.

To really get into this I suppose we would have to specify which statement of truth is in question. But I'll try to fill that in in the following...

Keeping in mind that the question here is not whether Bush is right, but rather that he believes what he says...i.e. he isn't saying things he doesn't believe simply to manipulate the public and gather power for its own sake with no particular ideological anchor...

And if the body of statements in question are things like "this is a war against terrorists who hate democracy and our freedoms" and "after 9/11 the threat of Saddam having WMD's that might find their way into the hands of terrorists was an unacceptable risk"...

Then I believe that *he* believes what he is saying for a number of reasons.

* Such statements are plausible.
* Such statements are commonly held by a large number of people. (eg. the people who elected him.)
* People, in general, speak from core values. It is a rare person who is so Machiavellian they have no core values, and can lie about such matters for purely material gain.
* The Republican party is highly ideological and demands purity. Those who don't share in that ideology are quickly sniffed out and denied power.
* Bush's life story prior to his gaining political power is consistent with the core values which would provide the foundation for the statements in question.
* To some extent I trust my ability to read tone of voice, body language, and so on in assessing honesty. On matters of core values Bush strikes me as the kind of person who means what he says.

This isn't to say I think he is immune to lying. Everyone tells lies. I just don't think he is lying about these important statements which are presented as being deeply rooted in core values.

galanter wrote:* Such statements are commonly held by a large number of people. (eg. the people who elected him.)

A handful of supreme court judges cannot be considered a large numebr of people. Or are you talking about some other people who elected Bush? The American people didn't.

galanter wrote:* People, in general, speak from core values. It is a rare person who is so Machiavellian they have no core values, and can lie about such matters for purely material gain.

A person with massive amounts of power should not be seen as a person 'in general'. These people are Machievallian. They have had to be that way to attain the positions of power they have 'they have no core values, (beyond that of financial and political advantage) and can lie about such matters for purely material gain..'

galanter wrote:* The Republican party is highly ideological and demands purity. Those who don't share in that ideology are quickly sniffed out and denied power.

I would agree with this but need you to describe what you think the ideological stance of the republican party, generally, is.

galanter wrote:* Bush's life story prior to his gaining political power is consistent with the core values which would provide the foundation for the statements in question.

Here you really need to start to talk about what these core calues are because we are obviously talking at cross purposes. Bush was an oil man. He was also an alcoholic and he also lied about his national service record (or someone lied for him) so what part of his past backs up his current moral conviction? He's obviously buddies with a lot of people who would otherwise, if his word were to be believed, be his enemies.

If we forget about Bush specifically, do you still believe that all his buddies believe what they peddle?

Ultimately, what you are saying, so it seems to me, is that the massive benefits and advantages that Bush and his adminstration have bestowed upon his wealthy benefactors and his administration partners are really just a coinicidence.
He has behaved totally with conviction and advantages his funders may have received as a result are a fluke?

Do you really believe this?

It is plausible yes. But surely it is much more likely that he has behaved, deliberately, in a way that benefits those who have provided him with the means to attain the power he has attained.

I would like others to throw in here. Where do you stand on this?

galanter wrote:If you would keep your eye on the ball (i.e. the topic) you would see why it matters.

To return to the topic at hand...

I was noting that people keep saying things like "the government is banning liquids on flights to keep us in a state of fear so they can control us".

Such statements are statements about intent. As in the government intends to control us by making us afraid. And I disagree that this is the intent.

It matters because the attribution of such an intent paints a picture of a government of 1984 (the book) proportions. And it's a false picture that leads to gross exaggerations of the US as a fascist state and so on.

If you want to make the case that the government is spreading fears to maintain control by referencing threats that they *know* are *false*...that they do this not because they believe the threats are real, but rather because it's a form of mind control by telling lies...that's fine. You just have to show some evidence.

Pointing out circumstances relevent to the backdrop of the content of this thread does not strike me as being off-topic.

What I am saying is that the 'attribution of such an intent' isn't the by-product of 'Legion of Doom'-style cabal meetings, necessarily. It is the simple, obvious mechanism of a powerful group of people with goals acting from within a situation where variables can be 'framed' by PR to aid in furthering these goals.

I sincerely hope that you do not believe our current administration intends to make our country safer by invading Afghanistan, Iraq, and god knows where else. Or by supporting warlike states elsewhere. It is absurd to think so, and several pieces of evidence exist to support the concept that our administration knew this was the case. I hope so, anyway. If people that dense were actually capable of achieving posiitons of responsibility within our government's hierarchy, then we are all in trouble.

The 'intent' of this administration is perfectly obvious to anyone who doesn't simply, mindlessly take them at their word. All you do is look at the results of their actual actions. To do anything else is to live in a bizarre fantasy world.

Regarding who elected Bush...you know what I mean. Even if he only got 49% of the vote, that's a huge number of people who largely claim the same values he claims. Ergo, it's plausible for him to claim the values he claims...they are not uncommon.

You second comment assumes what you would set out to demonstrate. You are saying the mere fact he has power means he is Machiavellian to the point of having no core values. Well, that's the question right? I'm saying such people are very rare. Why couldn't a person with sincere core values that Bush quotes make it into power? Externally everything they say and do would be the same.

On the third, this gets back to my comment that to really pick this apart we would have to be specific as to the truths in question. At this point I'd just say the core values in question correspond closely with the ideology the Republican Party looks for in its leaders. They would state them as self-reliance, viewing the traditional family as the key atomic unit of society, religious faith, strong defense, free market democracy, keeping government small, volunteerism, etc. These people really believe in this stuff. This isn't a cover story adopted by half the American population to fool the other half.

The last part about "massive benefits" etc...one thing about this belief system is that it reinforces a notion that rich people deserve to be rich. On a religious level there is a notion that God want's good Christians to lead a "bountiful life" and that the free market rewards those who back up taking chances with hard work.

The vast majority of rich Republicans don't get that way via government corruption...at least not in a direct obvious way. I'm sure there are Marxist critiques that would demonstrate how the repressive state preserves class differences and so on. But that's lost on the guy who started with a small body shop and now is the President of a chain of franchise transmission repair stores...or whatever.

Every war has war profiteers, but it's not that hard for the rich to become richer. Most or all of Bush's cronies have options outside of government to make more money than they are making now. I'm skeptical that many are thinking "yeah, we start a war, and then I make some *real* money". These guys have better, easier, options than that. This stuff is ideologically driven, and ideology isn't very far removed from core values.