The Ruling Class
The ruling class decide which ideas are acceptable, which scientific theories to believe, what speech is permitted.
America is often described as a society without the Old World's aristocracy. Yet we still have people who feel entitled to boss the rest of us around. The "elite" media, the political class, Hollywood and university professors think their opinions are obviously correct, so they must educate us peasants.
OK, so they don't call us "peasants" anymore. Now we are "deplorables"—conservatives or libertarians. Or Trump supporters.
The elite have a lot of influence over how we see things.
I don't like Donald Trump. I used to. I once found him refreshing and honest. Now I think he's a mean bully. I think that partly because he mocked a disabled person. I saw it on TV. He waved his arms around to mimic a New York Times reporter with a disability—but wait!
It turns out that Trump used the same gestures and tone of speech to mock Ted Cruz and a general he didn't like. It's not nice, but it doesn't appear directed at a disability.
I only discovered this when researching the media elite. Even though I'm a media junkie, I hadn't seen the other side of the story. The elite spoon-fed me their version of events.
Another reason I don't like Trump is that he supported the Iraq war—and then lied about that. Media pooh-bahs told me Trump pushed for the war years ago on The Howard Stern Show.
But then I listened to what Trump actually said.
"Are you for invading Iraq?" Stern asked.
Trump replied, "Yeah, I guess … so." Later, on Neil Cavuto's show, Trump said, "Perhaps (Bush) shouldn't be doing it yet, and perhaps we should be waiting for the United Nations." I wouldn't call that "support"—the way NBC's debate moderator and many others have.
I was stunned by how thoroughly the media have distorted Trump's position. That's a privilege you get when you're part of the media elite: You get to steer the masses' thinking.
At the second debate, we all know that Trump walked over to Hillary Clinton's podium, as if he was "stalking Ms. Clinton like prey," said The New York Times. CNN said, "Trump looms behind Hillary Clinton at the debate."
Afterward, Clinton went on Ellen DeGeneres' show and said Trump would "literally stalk me around the stage, and I would just feel this presence behind me. I thought, 'Whoa, this is really weird.'"
But it was a lie. Watch the video. Clinton walked over to Trump's podium. Did the mainstream media tell you that? No.
The ruling class has its themes, and it sticks to them.
When Clinton wore white to a debate, the Times called the color an "emblem of hope" and a Philadelphia Inquirer writer used words like "soft and strong … a dream come true." But when Melania Trump wore white, that same writer called it a "scary statement," as if Melania Trump's white symbolized white supremacy, "another reminder that in the G.O.P. white is always right."
Give me a break.
The ruling class decide which ideas are acceptable, which scientific theories to believe, what speech is permitted.
In the book Primetime Propaganda, Ben Shapiro writes that the Hollywood ruling class calls conservatives "moral scum."
He says, "If you're entering the industry, you have to keep (your beliefs) under wraps because nobody will hire you … they just assume you're a bad person."
They won't tell you why you weren't hired. They just tell you, "You weren't right for the part," explains Shapiro. "Talent is subjective, which means that it's pretty easy to find an excuse not to call back the guy who voted for George W. Bush."
Years ago, the ruling class was the Church. Priests said the universe revolved around Earth. Galileo was arrested because he disagreed.
Today, college lefties, mainstream media, Hollywood and the Washington establishment have replaced the Church, but they are closed-minded dogmatists, too.
We are lucky that now we have a lot of information at our fingertips. We don't need to rely on the ruling class telling us what to believe. We can make up our own minds.
COPYRIGHT 2016 BY JFS PRODUCTIONS INC.
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Quite the opposite - the media was always too easy on Trump. He is a modern day Hitler-wannabe. Yet the worst the press could say is call him a 'racist'. Which is fine - speaking the truth early on could have backfired. Looked at objectively, the press was overly critical of Hillary's foibles and way too lenient on the threat of the Trumpocalypse. I give Hillary credit for her nuke commercials, which speak the truth more than even the liberal networks.
And Trump was clearly mocking the disabled reporter. And Trump was clearly hopped up on amphetamines for the debate - thus his hypocritical call for drug testing. I find this defense of Trump fascinating and troubling. Well hopefully Hillary will provide treatment for the Trumpalogia epidemic.
It's good to see you unquestioningly consume what's placed in front of you. You'll fit into the brave new world very well. Honestly, you accusing anyone of having a warped perspective is laughable.
It's also not as if the Clinton campaign didn't specifically direct the media to give Trump lots of coverage as a "pied piper candidate." This is confirmed by Wikileaks of their e-mail. They gave him positive press specifically to ensure that he got the nomination so they could give Hillary the old shoo-in coronation. The RNC got played. Dems voted in their open primaries, the media colluded to make him seem like a viable candidate, and then they just sat back and let Red vs. Blue partisan thinking do all the rest because people are stupid.
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It's good to see you unquestioningly consume what's placed in front of you.
His mother raised him to eat everything on his plate without complaining. She wasn't able to curtail his addiction to junk food, though.
Stopped reading at Hitler. That game of crying Nazi, err I mean wolf is getting old...
BUT THIS TIME THEY MEAN IT! That last cycle where Mitt Romney was going to re-enslave the black race? Well, of course we'll call that hyperbole now.
Ding ding ding. Sitting VP blatantly race baits and the media says nothing.
I think the strangest thing is that you actually believe this.
You're a 'duckspeaker'--a brainless shell of a human that bleats out the party's position as a response to any stimulus.
It's sad how common your kind is becoming.
Can tell if whether or not thi is parody
It's a troll. Ignore it.
I'll just ignore the first paragraph. But the second makes the point about Trump mocking the disabled reporter. Stossel's defense is that he also mocked other people in a similar way. WTF is that?
Is it okay to call a mentally disabled person a "retard" as long as you also used the same term for non-disabled people? Is it okay to call a gay person a "fag" as long as you also call straight people "fags"? Is it okay to call a black person an n-word as long as you also use that word for white people?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not clutching my pearls at the use of words like that. I don't really give a fuck. But Stossel's defense on that particular point is some weak sauce.
I don't think he called the reporter a retard. He made a hand gesture that was interpreted to be mocking his specific disability. That was the premise of the outrage. As it turns out, he makes that same gesture for numerous people he was mocking, ones that don't have that disability which tells you that he wasn't mocking his disability specifically. At the very least, redirect your outrage about him mocking anyone with that hand gesture, don't just keep riding the high horse like your defending that same journalist retard.
Yeah, didn't mean to suggest that he actually said the word "retard". But, that gesture and face was a common insult (at least when i was a kid) and was usually accompanied by saying something along the lines of, "Durrrr... I'm retarded."
So, yeah my "outrage" is about him mocking anyone with that hand gesture. That he happened to target it at someone with a similar disability... I think it's more than coincidence, but also beside the point.
Again though, I don't have any "outrage" about it. I just think it is an extremely weak defense from Stossel. Especially in comparison to some fairly valid defenses in the rest of the article.
So despite the evidence that Trump uses the same gesture to mock everyone, with evidence to support it, you think it isn't a coincidence that he used that gesture on someone that had a disability that people like yourself could contort into 'Trump hate's disabled people in particular'.
This would be an example of confirmation bias, or as we like to call it in these here parts Trump Derangement Syndrome. It's curable, but you'll need to do a lot of individual research away from mainstream media sources. That's rather the point of the whole article, actually, which you seem to have entirely missed.
People are being forcibly injected with anti-Trump propaganda straight into their brain, which is a shame because he would likely fail on his own merits either way but it's really highlighted how partisan and in-the-bag for the Democrat party media outlets are. The mask has slipped down below their ankles for those people who are paying attention.
They are terrified of having a Republican president. Certainly they loathe Trump more than usual, but they would be leveling the same accusations (with less actual proof) no matter who the nominee was to insulate Hillary from the results of her actions over the past 30 to 40 years.
Not even close. I don't believe Trump hates disabled people in particular and I don't suggest that. Which is why I gave the "fag", "retard", and n-word examples. Let's say he had a habit of calling people that he didn't like "fag". Then, he saw someone who looked gay and called him a "fag". The fact that he calls others "fag" isn't acceptable in the first place and isn't an excuse for calling the gay guy a "fag". The fact is that he made an inappropriate gesture regarding someone who resembled the gesture. That he made a similar gesture towards other is neither acceptable nor excuses his gesture regarding the reporter. And I don't think it's a coincidence; I think that seeing the reporter's arm prompted him to think of and use that gesture.
And, I actually did get the point of the email. Which is why I have pointed out in every comment that the rest of Stossel's examples were good ones. But, this particular example was bullshit and didn't fit in with the rest. Trump didn't stalk Hillary in the debate, he did equivocate on Iraq, and a specific writer did assign different meanings to white dresses. But, Trump did use an inappropriate gesture and Stossel's excuse for it was bullshit.
And I don't suffer from either confirmation bias or TDS. Trump is a shitbag; plain and simple. He is absolutely unfit to be President. Hillary is also a shitbag; a different kind but still a complete shitbag. She is also absolutely unfit to be President.
Her supporters have focused on Trump's awfulness and turned a blind eye to Hillary's awfulness. Many on the other side have focused on Hillary's awfulness and put on blinders to ignore Trump's awfulness. I won't throw you in the latter group because you acknowledge that he likely would have failed on his own merits.
Is the media overall biased in favor of democrats? Yeah... what's new? The shit Trump says is just so overtly bad that he makes it easy on them. I don't think that MSM (including foxnews) has even remotely tried to be subtle about their bias for years.
Regarding Trump's hand waving or gestures: I saw a Clinton campaign commercial this last week, on television here in Texas, that used this hand waving to accuse Trump of being autistic and potentially a dangerous mental case who should not be in charge of the use of nuclear weapons. Almost the same tactic as was used against Goldwater back in '64 by the Johnson campaign. The message was "approved by Hillary Clinton."
Um, yeah, mocking a reporter in a juvenile manner is just as bad as selling out the country to the highest bidders. Of course. Complete moral equivalence.
I'm not even remotely suggesting that. I agree and that's one of the most disturbing parts of this election. People are so focused on how much of a sleezebag moron Trump is. They're completely looking past how bad Clinton's actual policy and history are. Mainly because the areas where she is scary wouldn't be as funny to watch on Jerry Springer.
As mentioned above, I was just pointing out how weak that part of Stossel's argument was. It didn't belong together with Stossel's other legitimate examples of media bias.
Using terms like "retard" and "fag" may be rude, but it isn't illegal or disqualifying for political office.
Furthermore, Clinton seems to use much worse language behind closed doors; the only difference between Trump and Clinton is that she is better at lying and manipulating people.
Illegal?; I'm with you there. Disqualifying?; that's debatable. It's basically a nationwide popularity contest. American Idol with slightly less singing. So,it's borderline on disqualifying. But, technically, no.
As you mention, Clinton uses bad language behind closed doors. Trump says and does stupid shit on the national stage. That's a pretty significant difference in a popularity contest.
But to the original point of the comment, would Stossel have defended Trump's use of the word "fag" towards a gay person on the basis that he also used it towards a few straight people? Simply enough, Trump fucked up when he made that gesture. Excuses/reasons don't salvage that. For the other items in the article, Stossel is right that the media has twisted reality to fit their narrative. But, he's not right on the gesture.
I really appreciate the "retard" expression and its suffix derivatives. There is no more reliable cue for identifying a girl-bullying mystical bigot.
... sorry but is this sacrasm or truth? Its so very hard to tell in this wonderful world we live in today.
Trump is coarse and not very competent. But his policies are pretty much the exact opposite of Hitler's.
The Hitler wannabe in this campaign is Hillary: she runs on many of the same issues as the NSDAP, and she is also a demagogue who has translated public "service" into wealth and power.
Hitler preached a militaristic male-dominated Christian Protestant, closed border, no foreigners welfare state with high taxes, much regulation and old-age pensions, just like the 2016 GOP platform. This is explicit everywhere in the NSDAP Program, in Mein Kampf, and the myriad speeches, laws and articles published over the National Socialist emblem. All of this is instantly accessible at nobeliefs.com and elsewhere complete with photographs, artifacts, translations--the works. The Republican Platform mirrors most of the National Socialist agenda down to the sloganeering. And it should. The Third Reich was protected and enabled by Herb Hoover's Moratorium of 1931, and its ideology imported and localized for America after 1948. This isn't on corporate teevee... but you can find it in these rectangular objects called books.
Why wait until your second sentence to compare him to Hitler? Negative points for not mentioning he likes to stomp puppies to death.
If the press needs to be less lenient on impending threats they should ban you from the comments. That way anyone stopping by for a visit won't think you are a good indicator of libertarianism.
A well reasoned piece but reason doesn't mean shit these days. Get used to it Johnny boy, it's about to get much worse.
Mr. Stossel, and this is not a joke, please run in 2020 for the Libertarian party for President.
We actually have some strong players, but they don't want to be dragged through the mud. I can't say I blame them.
The media will do what they need to do to get attention off their candidate. Hillary for the win!
Two weeks to go, John. Two weeks.
You couldn't have checked this stuff a year ago? Like us 'little people' did?
Because, there's a whole lot of people out here who've been screaming about what the MSM has been doing AS THEY DID IT.
And we were dismissed out of hand.
Instead, trusted people parroted the DNC/Left/Progressive party line--why, even now, Reason is STILL studiously ignoring the mountain of evidence that keeps piling up that's screaming that yes, the Democrats ARE planning to try to commit vote fraud on a massive scale this election.
How loud will you trumpet this, John? and yes, the pun was very deliberate. Because we CANNOT let them win.
Gillespie assured us a couple of days ago that voter fraud is non-existent.
How DARE you question your betters? Next you'll be telling me stuff like how Obamacare is imploding or that our Queen, Hillary The Great, lied to cover up her use of a private email server for classified government communications. Which is crazy talk!
How long after Hillary's coronation will it be revealed that all of Trumps female accusers were directly paid by Clinton's campaign and that the Billy Bush video,was heavily edited. We all know that all of that happened.
One of the many defects in our system is the fact that Hillary herself could go on TV and declare with a mocking smile "Yeah, it was all made up and I arranged it personally! And do you have any ideas how many votes were cast by dead people and illegal aliens? Bwuhahahahaha!" but there would be no way to invalidate the results of the election.
Likewise, AFAIK presidential nominees aren't obliged to be subjected to psychological screening even though the winner of the election will be handed the power to kill millions of people with the careless wave of a hand. But low-ranking military folk who man the weapons have to have such a screening. Does that seem right?
While there would be no way to invalidate the election, our system does have checks to handle both of the situations you raised: criminal activity can be dealt with by impeachment, and mental unfitness can be dealt with per the 25th amendment (Section 4). Now, whether our politicians have the spine to use these remedies is another matter entirely, but the Constitution does empower Congress to deal with all cases of Presidential unfitness. The defects lie not with the system as designed but as implemented by the people.
Aside from the fact that impeachment has never worked the few times it's even been tried, my objection goes beyond that. The problem is the baked-in assumption that no matter how fucked up a president is, he or she is "entitled" to the job for four years except in the most extraordinary of circumstances. I don't think that is justified.
Impeachment may have been an adequate remedy when it was initially designed, but that was for a presidency of far more limited powers than we have now. I think it's unwise to have a system whereby a person who would be fired from a busboy job is virtually irremovable from office.
As far as the 25th Amendment goes, you have to know that the person is mentally unfit before you can invoke it. But we can't screen prospective presidents for that. Again, far smaller positions with far lesser consequences don't see that as acceptable but everybody thinks it's okay for president.
Unverifiable elections are an invitation to robbery, murder and enslavement, just as they were in 1870. And nuclear weapons are no longer designed to kill "millions of people." They are optimized to take out military facilities and bunkers full of dictators and field marshals. This is why all socialist religions fear them so intensely. The defect the Sandwich points to was planted there by Richard Milhous Nixon and Congress using the IRS Code. None of that has been repealed yet, bit getting rid of it has for 4 decades been in the LP platform.
Thanks, John, for telling us what we should believe.
Man, that was dense and missing the point to an extreme - even for you.
It takes a certain amount of arrogance to deride media outlets for offering their opinion, all the while writing an article at a media outlet that offers opinion every day. Just like Stossel does.
There's a difference between offering opinion and making facts disappear.
In your case, it's a social service.
Dishonest? Stupid? Both?
Both.
I know I've said this before, but please bear with me;
In every age and place there have been self-selected elites that seriously believed they were placed on Earth by Divine Providence to tell the rest of us what to do. It's not just the Aristocracy or the Priesthood; the Planter Aristocracy's arrogance and Hubris caused a war that killed more Americans than all the rest of our wars combined. The Social Darwinists that ran rampant from the end of the Civil War to the 1929 Crash weren't too bad, but they weren't good.
From the early 19th Century a class rose of people who had been educated, but not to any particular end. They knew (and know) that they are smart because they have a piece of paper that says so; a degree. That what a non-science or engineering degree qualifies you to do is study for the next degree doesn't occur to them. That having a BA in English Literature doesn't make them an expert in political history or economics would ever cross their mind, because it has never crossed the minds of their professors that the same is true of having a PhD..
These overeducated nitwits latched onto Socialism like limpets from the first; here was a political philosophy that told them what they knew instinctively; that society needed to be run by Experts! And since they had degrees, they were obviously the experts!
We are now living through the slow train wreck of their failure. There theories have been extensively tried, their way of thinking has been spread through society, and it. Has. FAILED.
They aren't going to give up easily, and they are going to drag as much of society as we let them down with the wreck. Shrillary is a prime example; she got a degree, she thinks that matters, she thinks (as most Aristocrats do) that the rules don't apply to her, and she LOATHES people who actually do things.
It is true that every all of documented history has had it's elites - from the philosophically self appointed betters on down to self serving grifters. The ebb and flow to note is when greater Force was used and when lesser Force was used. It is my considered opinion, from a misspent youth reading history - classical, medieval, renaissance, and modern - that we are on the cusp of some very harsh and brutal times. Times that will be beset with the added disadvantage that in ages passed at least some people - a goodly slice - had resources to scratch sustenance out of unlike today. The Western societies (including first world Eastern "Western-like" societies) have existed in a period of relatively low Force being used, but instead of warfare have tilted more toward "book cooking" to appease the "human cattle". This state of "benevolence" by the masters, and docility by the herd, is coming to an end. The smoke and mirrors cannot be sustained any longer, and the return of less subtle forms of "motivation" will be employed.
"It is my considered opinion, from a misspent youth reading history - classical, medieval, renaissance, and modern - that we are on the cusp of some very harsh and brutal times."
I wonder how well things would have turned out in Europe if Hitler and Stalin had had access to all of the mass surveillance tools our modern masters will have at their finger-tips. I live next to a forest in a small town and there are cameras on nearly every trail I walk my dog on, and, of course, at all the major intersections through which I drive.
And how long before there are street-facing cameras mounted in the rear of every vehicle parked in every driveway along every street in your neighborhood? The technology exists and is already being implemented.
the Planter Aristocracy's arrogance and Hubris caused a war that killed more Americans than all the rest of our wars combined.
They had a good deal of help from the equally arrogant and rapacious, northeastern political and financial elite in that regard. Any entity, such as the Union, that was willing to enslave its citizens through military conscription for the supposed purpose of ending chattel slavery or more truthfully - preserving its own political and economic power - can hardly be considered blameless.
Shit like this is why I don't get any news, ever, from any mainstream news source. It's not news, just propaganda.
It's maddening. The only MSM news I watch is the local cable news channel ("NY1") - and that just while I'm getting ready for work. It is absolutely infested with the attitude Stossel describes. From the choice of stories they run to the injection of the reporter's opinions everywhere, it is such an obvious mouthpiece of the DNC that it's painful to sit through.
But I find it's helpful to occasionally endure that pain so you know what you're up against.
AGAIN!
We're living longer and we don't have "dictators". And there's more trees. Anything else that ails us is nothing a robust carbon tax won't cure.
We're actually easing into a libertarian paradise. If you're too cynical to notice, John, that's not my problem.
Saudi Arabia still has a King, and will for as long as These States lack the courage to stand up to econaziism and build some reactors. Canadian reactors, meanwhile, power the whole Northeastern US of A.
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It's funny, you cited a series of lies that the mainstream media was peddling.... right along with Reason who apparently decided to model their journalism after the like of NBC.
Good shit as usual, Stossel.
Great article, John.
This is exactly why I fear a Clinton presidency more than a Trump. Policy wise, it's tough to determine who is actually worse (it may very well be Trump). But this powerful support that Clinton has, selling whatever lies necessary to advance her reign, if far more worrisome.
If Trump somehow defies the odds and wins, you can expect the pols and pundits to oppose his policies. The media will be sure to inform the public of how disastrous they are. With Clinton, you can expect the opposite. All we will hear is how wonderful they are, and when they inevitably fail, they will pin the blame on the opposition.
Listen up elites.
I will not hold my nose and waste my vote on your candidate Hillary Clinton, who is a bigger warmonger than Dick Cheney and who supports the racist and un Constitutional war on drugs.
No elites - I will not hold my nose and waste my vote on your candidate, the racist warmonger and sworn enemy of individual liberty - Hillary Clinton
"I was stunned by how thoroughly the media have distorted Trump's position."
Thank you, John.
If you looked into the
Trump said Hispanics couldn't be judges
and
Trump said he sexually assaulted women
you'll find that both of those narratives are equally lies.
Nice to see that TrumpDerangementSyndrome may be ebbing a bit at Reason.
Some one told me at an astronomy meeting that Galileo was arrested for being a different religion. Someday I need to confirm or deny that.
He was arrested for religious heresy, if I recall my history correctly. Stating that the Earth revolved around the Sun and was not the center of the universe was considered to be religious heresy in those days. I don't recall the Church's exact line of argument regarding this matter though.
John is the looter media the Nixon anti-libertarian law sought to influence back in 1971. Tricky Dick was on the first Christian Prohibitionist ticket to make it past the amnesiac electorate after the Prohibition party and Klan gained control of the Republican party 24 years before. There is a lot of money in those jobs and meddling powers, enough to pay off even a long game strategy. The Church is still the ruling class everywhere else in the Americas south of Brownsville. Surely these huddled masses yearning to be free deserve a better example than to stay glued like a lamprey to a vidiot box making snide remarks about the slanting put in it by the Kleptocracy.
Cyberpunk will save us all.
From your excerpt, it sounds like a bunch of ignorant, inflammatory drivel that has nothing to do with the realities of power and wealth in today's society.
A somewhat better explanation of how power and money work is The Dictator's Handbook.
Of course, that is still guesswork, but it's more plausible guesswork than the crap you recommended.
Actually I rather liked it. True, it's simplified and somewhat exaggerated in spots, but it is bitterly, bitingly witty and accurate in others.
And from your reaction I'd guess you would not have liked Ayn Rand's essay, For the New Intellectual either.