Dear C,
Thanks for sending this video. http://www.dailyfinance.com/
Notice the first three “user comments” on this Sunday morning, 3-10-13:
Uncle
lies, damned lies, and statisics. Can't believe this stuff while there may be a grain of truth in it. How come all politicians are wealthy?
hfb3rd
This guy's column is the watering hole of the Karl Marx fan club.
John
They have the wealth for a reason, because they worked hard and lived in a time where the government wasn't hindering their potential to create jobs and prosperity. Communist professors develop this stuff with too much time and 'grant' money on their hands.
***
Although it is difficult to prove that anyone can avoid the pitfalls of prejudice, it is striking how many people want to be lied to, want to submit to the "worthy" "makers," want to worship putative success.
In the absence of "a life," the adulation of economic celebrity (think Donald Trump) provides a surrogate teat to suck on.
I first realized the ubiquity of Aggressive Ignorance in America while teaching public high school in the 1990s.
Since that epiphany, it has been an ongoing challenge to "deal" with the fact that the credos of corporatocratic fascism are held as self-evident truths..
"The moral flabbiness born of the exclusive worship of the bitch-goddess Success. That - with the squalid cash interpretation put on the word "success" - is our national disease." William James (To learn more about William James and his towering intellect, I encourage you to visit http://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/Pajares/james.html)
H.G. Wells expressed the conundrum well: “Civilization is in a race between education and catastrophe. Let us learn the truth and spread it as far and wide as our circumstances allow. For the truth is the greatest weapon we have.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satyagraha
American "Exceptionalism" -- at least as it manifests today -- distills to the widespread belief that well-educated people should be held in contempt whenever ideologically convenient. (When well-educated people provide dimwits with medical interventions that save lives of family members, then they sing unmitigated praise for "the best healthcare in the world."
In the words of St. Paul, "The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God."
Despite the tent-maker's genius, I harbor deep doubts about Paul, a repentant murderer who exhibits the turbulent fervor of a passionate convert needing to make amends for the serious crimes "of his youth."
And so, encouraged by Paul, we endure the neo-barbarism of nominally Christian idiots who delight in disdain for Reason and Science, two conjoined phenomena that Paul -- living in a pre-scientific, largely superstitious world -- could not even imagine.
Admittedly, there are forms of "worldly wisdom" that are "foolishnes in the eyes of God."
Mostly, however, the "foolish wisdom" that typifies modern America is espoused by Cowboy Capitalists and their lickspittle lackeys, all of whom prostrate their self-pithed selves at the altar of The Golden Calf.
Make no mistake: Mammon is the complete master of most American "Christians." And no matter how it is sliced and diced, even God's blessing on American "exceptionalists" does not permit service to two masters. http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/03/capitalism-most-powerful-engine-of.html
Note that Yeshua's "Woe Passages" are targeted, even today, at "good church-goers..." just as they were in ancient Israel. http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/12/pharisees-and-yeshuas-woe-passages.html
Not surprisingly, the Pharisees of this generation are still focused on "stoning adulteresses" and splitting hairs over doctrinal minutiae, ever ready to impose unbearable burdens but never lending a hand to lift them.
Pax on both houses,
Alan
On Sun, Mar 10, 2013 at 9:43 AM, CC wrote:
Great, simple, clear video, -CBegin forwarded message:From:Subject: wealth inequality videoDate: March 4, 2013 5:08:27 PM ESTTo:
http://www.dailyfinance.com/on/Wealth-Inequality-in- America-viral-video- Politizane/?ncid=webmail1