The Fruits of A Celebrity World of Illusion

As the winds of violent, instant change approach the poorest and richest two nations, in the form of emerging hurricane Isaac, the celebrity world of illusion appears a bit more naked.

While billions of dollars are spent on illusory political ads of every deceitful sort, some 400,000 Haitians still live in fragile, makeshift plastic/etc. tents, their homes having been destroyed by an earthquake a couple of years ago.

Living in those conditions exposes their little ones to disease epidemics that have already claimed at least 7,000 lives.

Meanwhile, and I do mean mean, the presidential campaign advertising, that both disappoints and angers voters in the U.S., involves more than enough money to easily be sufficient to build housing for all those 400,000 people, who are homeless families because of something well beyond their control.

Meanwhile again, a celebrity movie costing even more millions of dollars, starring Willard Mitt Romney and co-starring Paul Davis Ryan, is being put together in Tampa, Florida, as that tropical storm Issac threatens to visit the Republican Convention and the homeless Haitians.

As the neoCons whoop it up in a cloud of illusion, believing women who are "legitimately raped" won't get pregnant, they have gone even further to make that illusion a plank in their political platform (see NeoCon Planet: Magic Teflon Vagina Juice).

That is not the only illusion they celebrate while they whoop it up in the denial of global warming induced climate change (see The Damage Has Been Done - 6).

They are even making psychological denial a celebrity dogma in sports, so when doping is charged it begins a marathon of legal sports events in courts along with media posturing ("PR"), the likes of which can even take the news cycle away from the political celebrities (see Lance Armstrong Gives Up The Race).

Author, columnist, and journalist Chris Hedges, in a book of modern vintage, put a focus on the tragic mistake of replacing mature policy with celebrity worship:

Celebrity worship banishes reality.  And this adulation is pervasive.  It is dressed up in the language of the Christian Right, which builds around its leaders, people like Pat Robertson or Joel Olsteen, the aura of stardom, fame and celebrity power.  These Christian celebrities travel in private jets and limousines.  They are surrounded by retinues of bodyguards, have television programs where they cultivate the same false intimacy with the audience, and, like all successful celebrities, amass personal fortunes. The frenzy around political messiahs, or the devotion of millions of women to Oprah Winfrey, is all part of the yearning to see ourselves in those we worship.  We seek to be like them.  We seek to make them like us.  If Jesus and The Purpose Driven Life won’t make us a celebrity, then Tony Robbins or positive psychologists or reality television will.  We are waiting for our cue to walk onstage and be admired and envied, to become known and celebrated.

(Empire of Illusion, emphasis added). Regular readers know that Dredd Blog has discussed how George Orwell exposed one aspect of that worship (see the series Bully Worship: The Universal Religion).

Another author informed us about the celebrities of war ("warrior heroes") whom those starring in the Republican Convention movie want as another plank in their platform:

While the me-too Democrats have set a horrible example of keeping up with the Joneses with respect to waging wars, they can never match GOP stalwarts such as John McCain or Lindsey Graham in their sheer, libidinous enthusiasm for invading other countries. McCain wanted to mix it up with Russia - a nuclear-armed state - during the latter's conflict with Georgia in 2008 (remember? - "we are all Georgians now," a slogan that did not, fortunately, catch on), while Graham has been persistently agitating for attacks on Iran and intervention in Syria. And these are not fringe elements of the party; they are the leading "defense experts," who always get tapped for the Sunday talk shows.

(Diagnosing The Dogs of War - 2, quoting Mike Lofgren). That plank, harped incessantly on "the Sunday talk shows", indicates that the political celebrities want to send celebrities of war to Iran and Syria to make an explosive, G.I. Joe entrance there, "so that no more peaceful democracies will be aborted."

That plank is old and rotting, but fundamentally, so is most of their illusive platform of ideology:

For more than quarter of a century Western officials have claimed repeatedly that Iran is close to joining the nuclear club. Such a result is always declared "unacceptable" and a possible reason for military action, with "all options on the table" to prevent upsetting the Mideast strategic balance dominated by the US and Israel.

And yet, those predictions have time and again come and gone. This chronicle of past predictions lends historical perspective to today’s rhetoric about Iran.

(Christian Science Monitor). Celebrity has even morphed into a propaganda tool that is used to forge our ideas about war (see The Government of MOMCOM: Wartocracy).

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Celebrity Ronald Reagan was a McCarthyite snitch / spy against his fellow actors.

He did this while he was head of the Screen Writers Guild when he had access to all the guild's records on actors.

He even had the FBI spy on his daughter Maureen, free speech activists, and had professors of universities fired for their political views.

About 10,000 FBI records about Reagan prove this (See video below beginning at 56:47 for specific Reagan data).

When your president is a McCarthyite informant against his fellow celebrities:

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