Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Dumb & Dumber -> Bleak & Bleeker

"Fog's rollin' in ..."
Regular readers know that this blog depicts current U.S.eh? politics as various forms of dementia.

These various forms of dementia develop as symptoms of various long-term deceitful practices.

Those practices range anywhere from the realm of spin and "white lies" all the way to intensely professional propaganda which is constantly broadcast through the multi-billion dollar main stream media, which has one "home", one homogeneous origin, yes, a single purpose: to hide various facts and truths from us.

When government officials get dumb and dumber, the reality for the people is that government behavior gets more bleak as time goes on.

To begin with, when "reality" is converted into play pretend by demented officials, through "spin" or propaganda, State Crimes Against Democracy is the driving force which those deranged authoritarians call "reality":
''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''
(Karl Christian Rove). Musicians, poets, and other artists capture this demented essence sometimes, then put it into words wrapped in music that captures the reality in a memorable way:

Fog's rollin' in off the East River bank
Like a shroud it covers Bleeker Street
Fills the alleys where men sleep
Hides the shepherd from the sheep

Voices leaking from a sad cafe
Smiling faces try to understand
I saw a shadow touch a shadow's hand
On Bleeker Street

(Bleeker Street, Simon & Garfunkel, see photo above). Almost to a person the incoming Republican victors to the House of Representatives deny global climate change and global warming.

Once again, however, a new study cuts off the foundation they had rested substantial portions of their skepticism on:
The troposphere, the lower part of the atmosphere closest to the Earth, is warming and this warming is broadly consistent with both theoretical expectations and climate models, according to a new scientific study that reviews the history of understanding of temperature changes and their causes in this key atmospheric layer ...

In the 1990s, observations did not show the troposphere, particularly in the tropics, to be warming, even though surface temperatures were rapidly warming. This lack of tropospheric warming was used by some to question both the reality of the surface warming trend and the reliability of climate models as tools. This new paper extensively reviews the relevant scientific analyses -- 195 cited papers, model results and atmospheric data sets -- and finds that there is no longer evidence for a fundamental discrepancy and that the troposphere is warming.
(Ecocosmology Blog, emphasis added). Other recent studies debunked other facets of their jewel of denial, relentlessly promoted by T-baggers who fancy themselves the same way Karl Rove fancies himself.

They actually think that by making stuff up they thereby change the nature of the universe, basically because they think they are exceptional legends in their own mind.


9 comments:

  1. We should be thankful for the likes of Rove and Cheney, who through their unmitigated arrogance, come right out and state for public consumption what they and most of the radical right actually believe. If their actions lead to the eventual downfall of the US and likely much worse, it won't be that anyone can say that they didn't warn us all ahead of time. The fact that they continue to wield an enormous amount of influence after eight years of Bush disaster politics speaks volumes about the ability of the American sheeple to choose their leadership wisely, a point which Obama has further amplified during his first two misbegotten years, through his countless acts of omission.

    The only question in my mind is, do we get hard right in 2012, someone along the lines of John "Boner." Or do we get hard nutty right along the lines of "Sarah's Alaska," someone who makes even W look like a Rhodes Scholar? Call me a cynic, but I'm still betting on the latter. We really do deserve to have someone that stupid in charge for awhile. Maybe someone that incompetent can at least gum up the works enough to minimize the ongoing damage, which might be as good as it gets these days.

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  2. Yeah, politics seems to be like an explosion in a book store that tore up a book about positive thinking, a self hypnosis book, and a book about a girl named Alice going down a rabbit hole.

    When the pages randomly settled and came together they made one book which became a basis for political strategy.

    Then they blamed the public for the accident.

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  3. I had a good laugh this morning at the latest MSM "non-news news" that the TV audience is all a twitter (in a bad way) that Bristol Palin has advanced to the finals of Dancing With The Stars. I've never actually watched the show, but the first thing that struck me was how truly god-awful ugly Bristol Palin looked in makeup and paraphernalia for the show. I guess there's a legitimate reason why those trailer park people stick to informal "Walmart wear" when headed out to the MikeyD's driveup window with the kids.

    Secondly, I wonder how much her continued popularity, as well as the rest of her whole dysfunctional clan's, signals the continued acceptance of the whole Palin mystique among the great horde of the unwashed masses. I still expect "Mama Grizzly" to be a major factor in 2012, possibly a king maker if not the actual queen, especially if things continue to go as badly as they now seem almost certain to go. "Throw the bums out" will more than likely continue to be the mantra every two years, even if it means "let the idiots in" as well.

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  4. I watched a hearing this morning in the "House Subcommittee on Energy and Environment", Brian Baird Chairman (D-WA).

    It was about global climate change / global warming.

    One Republican on that committee, Roscoe Bartlett from Maryland, was impressive.

    He said I might be a conservative but I am not stupid, I know global warming is real (he may be the only Republican who "believes").

    There were three panels of scientists, and what they said was to the deniers "doomer" talk.

    Especially the parts about ocean acidification and ice cap melt.

    There was a scientist, an Admiral in the Navy, who said the military was at risk and they take global climate change, global warming, VERY seriously as a threat to national security.

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  5. Randy,

    I'll bet ol' Roscoe Bartlett gets an earful from his party bosses for daring to be so indiscreet.

    I wonder if the Navy Admiral is also smart enough to view global warming as a threat to global security as well? You really do have to wonder about these things, cause some of these numbnuts are simply amazing for their ability to compartmentalize (and thus minimize) the most obviously ominous information.

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  6. I don't think Cheney and Rove believe half the stuff they say. They know that ocean rises, starvation and resource wars are upon us - which is why they seek to enact totalitarian government - to protect the 20% of the population that have homes and gold buried in the back yard. I wrote an article about this recently for OpEDNews (summarizing the work of Richard Heinberg and Gwynne Dyer). See http://www.opednews.com/articles/How-Climate-Change-and-Res-by-Dr-Stuart-Jeanne-B-101112-558

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  7. Dr. Bramhall,

    I added your blog "The Most Revolutionary Act" to our list of blogs on the main page of Dredd Blog.

    Also, your link above did not work so I looked up the excellent article for those who want to read it as I did, here is the link: How Climate Change And Resource Scarcity Threaten Democracy.

    Good to hear from you again.

    Anyway, it is difficult for me to tell how much damage the surge of Karl C. Rove's lizard brain (amygdala) has seared his cognitive abilities.

    But I certainly agree that his exceptionalism (a.k.a. self-righteousness) which has replaced his conscience would allow him to protect the elite minority to the demise of the middle class & poor (majority) of Americans.

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  8. I think what Dr. Bramhall said about Rove, that they think they will survive, points out their dementia, their psycho-foolishness.

    The Dredd Blog post "A Closer Look At MOMCOM's DNA - 2" (which shook me up) shows how absolutely, inextricably intertwined with MOMCOM Americans are.

    They, the Rovian demented prima donnas, will be some of the first to go once the public sees the fate MOMCOM has brought upon them (they won't see it in time to avoid it).

    Perhaps Dr. Bramhall could speak to that scenario in other nations - are other nations also slaves to the vastness of MOMCOM?

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  9. Excellent article, reiterating and expounding on many of the same themes that James Howard Kunster and John Michael Greer explore weekly. Greer strongly advocates for the Option 3 "Bottoms Up" approach, while Kunstler suports it as well, but feels Option 1 or 2 is more likely in the long run (I do too), or at least strongly warns of their possibility.

    The point about there being evidence that the US, China, and Russia are already preparing to implement Option 1 is telling, as it really is supported by their current activities. And from a skewed survivalist mentality it makes perfect sense too. The unspoken truth is that a great many people of all ages aren't going to get out of this alive. I would imagine that at some point the triage will commence, and the elderly, infirm, otherwise unproductive, and politically dissident will be rounded up and eliminated.

    On a lighter note, Sarah Palin comes right out with it and tells "Baba Wawa" that she can beat Obama in 2012. And Lisa Murkowski apparently wins her seat back in Alaska on the back of the write in vote, referring to Sarah Palin's Tea Partiers as "the politics of anger," which is something I never thought I'd hear coming from the mouth of a radical Republican! VERY interesting times ahead!

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