Comment on Krugman's blog, "What's in a Name?", nytimes 7/23/09,
by Patrice Aymes
Talking heads and their public are like children: they want to be told bed time stories, so that their tired little minds can go to sleep.
They cannot handle culture and logic, they are not trained for it. All what appeals to them is what would appeal a little children talking to each other, little anecdotes with a strong imaginary component.
As the Roman republic went down, culture and art went down, and they went down ahead of the military and economic capabilities. Rome became idiotic first, and then was progressively completely incapacitated.
Why did Rome become idiotic? Because the Roman republic had been kidnapped by the hyper rich "Senatorial" class. The hyper rich tolerated only dummies. During the transition to idiocy, those who refused to cooperate were killed. The philosopher and Consul Cicero, saw the hands he was writing with chopped off, and nailed to the Senate door. And that is not an imaginary anecdote a la Reagan. It was meant to impress those too willing to write down smart thoughts.
Finally the plutocracy mixed up with the theocrats, and any knowledge or thinking was viewed as an insult to God. This episode is called the Dark Ages. But it started with the rise of the stupid, paid to reign by the hyper rich.
This is exactly what is going in the media today. The venality and stupidity of the "debate" on health care is deliberate, it is made to increase stupidity, it teaches stupidity. Wisely, Obama is gambling that he can defeat the stupidity head on, by rising the mental level. If he fails the USA will keep on collapsing mentally.
Patrice Ayme
http://patriceayme.wordpress.com/