http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/239963.php

So it’s likely these people would respond very negatively. You might gain some belief if you were a well-known member of their community, but as a no-name it’s easier for them just to close ranks and say, that’s a crackpot idea, it’s “just” a conspiracy theory, it’s misinformation, there’s no proof. They’re cognitively invested in believing the world is This Way, and can’t consider evne the possibility they’re wrong.

That, friends, is cognitive dissonance. And it can be used to further political objectives. You can do unthinkable things as long as you keep a happy face to the public. Why no, we’re NOT indiscriminately murdering Iraqi civilians, we’re NOT buying third-world sweatshop shoes, we’re NOT promoting illegal immigration to keep our citizens’ wages low, we’re NOT polluting our water supply with pissed-out pharmaceuticals and industrial waste — how can you SAY that, that’s AGAINST everything we believe in! Deniability is all, the people aren’t ready for the truth, we are the leaders of the common folks, and look at that standard of living! You can buy a plasma screen and an iPhone! Good times!

“How can you genuinely believe in these kinds of conspiracies and NOT take action? What would it take to get you to act? I think it’s a bunch of game play. But for anyone who believes it, your whole world is a lie. How can you come to any conclusion other than to fight?”

Well, we got this guy here, he does top of the line industrial video, very smart, he says nothing’s stopping any one of us from having his position, there’s no old boys network, it’s all equal opportunity, you just have to work hard and do EVERYTHING right (which I guess means he has, no mistakes). He’s got a well-paying life that leaves him lots of free time to hang out here and snark with the best, not something you could easily give up.

This guy’s got a great line in Vietnam stories, heartbreaking realistic renditions of the fog of war just like the stories you get from real Vietnam vets. Other people have come to rely on him as a kind of moral compass and Vietnam bona fides are like the gold standard for authenticity.

Now imagine, what if he was making it up? Writing skills like his don’t grow on trees, they have to be practiced, developed. Very few people who go through intense trauma like that are able to articulate it so perfectly in prose, even forty years after the fact. Those skills are halfway to faking it, that’s what they’re for, and there’s no shortage of guys like the late Steve Gilliard who know enough details about Vietnam to make stuff up and get the details right, if they want to. A little real military service and you’d have the attitude down, maybe collect some more stories from people who were really (or knew people who were really) there.

Well, my longer answer to this seems to have vanished, perhaps into moderator hell, so for a shorter one I’ll quote the Group News Blog quoting Steve Gilliard:

“What I’m trying to say to you… What Steve Gilliard said to y’all fifteen months ago… This is outside the ontology you committedly and unexaminedly live. To get this requires shifting into a reality-based non-authoritarian quantum world. Any interpretation you make from where you now live will have as much validity as a kid in kindergarten assessing a Ph.D. physics project: “Oh… shiny.” You just can’t get there from here.”

Well, we got this guy here, he does top of the line industrial video, very smart, he says nothing’s stopping any one of us from having his position, there’s no old boys network, it’s all equal opportunity, you just have to work hard and do EVERYTHING right (which I guess means he has, no mistakes). He’s got a well-paying life that leaves him lots of free time to hang out here and snark with the best, not something you could easily give up.

This guy’s got a great line in Vietnam stories, heartbreaking realistic renditions of the fog of war just like the stories you get from real Vietnam vets. Other people have come to rely on him as a kind of moral compass and Vietnam bona fides are like the gold standard for authenticity.

Now imagine, what if he was making it up? Writing skills like his don’t grow on trees, they have to be practiced, developed. Very few people who go through intense trauma like that are able to articulate it so perfectly in prose, even forty years after the fact. Those skills are halfway to faking it, that’s what they’re for, and there’s no shortage of guys like the late Steve Gilliard who know enough details about Vietnam to make stuff up and get the details right, if they want to. A little real military service and you’d have the attitude down, maybe collect some more stories from people who were really (or knew people who were really) there.

So imagine what if you told people about this possibility. How would they respond? Simply acknowledging the possibility that they could have been faked out would make them feel uncomfortable, because you’re attacking their sense of their ability to know right and wrong, their sense of the way the world is. You’re implicitly attacking their judgement, and nobody likes that, especially these days when certainties are fewer all the time and you have a bunch of jackals in the White House redefining words to mean their opposites for political advantage. People like having their beliefs stroked.

So it’s likely these people would respond very negatively. You might gain some belief if you were a well-known member of their community, but as a no-name it’s easier for them just to close ranks and say, that’s a crackpot idea, it’s “just” a conspiracy theory, it’s misinformation, there’s no proof. They’re cognitively invested in believing the world is This Way, and can’t consider evne the possibility they’re wrong.

That, friends, is cognitive dissonance. And it can be used to further political objectives. You can do unthinkable things as long as you keep a happy face to the public. Why no, we’re NOT indiscriminately murdering Iraqi civilians, we’re NOT buying third-world sweatshop shoes, we’re NOT promoting illegal immigration to keep our citizens’ wages low, we’re NOT polluting our water supply with pissed-out pharmaceuticals and industrial waste — how can you SAY that, that’s AGAINST everything we believe in! Deniability is all, the people aren’t ready for the truth, we are the leaders of the common folks, and look at that standard of living! You can buy a plasma screen and an iPhone! Good times!

Cry, Cry, Cry
Dr BLT cover of Cash classic
http://www.drblt.net/music/crycrycry.mp3

Dr BLT
blog n roll’s ex-troll

Sounds like and old-timey crime novel.

Well, actually, they were bought by a syndicate that includes Mitt’s enterprise, Bain Capital.

Control of Dunkin’ Donuts reportedly is shifting back to the Bay State, with Boston private equity firms Bain Capital LLC and Thomas H. Lee Partners winning an auction for the Canton company for $2.4 billion, along with other brands owned by Pernod Ricard SA.

Reuters and several other news agencies reported the deal will be announced Monday, citiing unidentified sources. Dunkin’ Donuts management is expected to be retained by Bain, Thomas H. Lee and Carlyle Group of Washington, D.C., which also was part of the syndicate.

Linky

(you might also recognize those fine folks at The Carlyle Group…)

As for that shitty “pizza:”

Domino’s rapidly expanded into a global franchise that now boasts 7,400 franchisee- and company-owned stores. There was bump in the growth curve during the early 1990s, but Monaghan turned it around before selling all but 7% of his stake in 1998 to an investor group controlled by Bain Capital. Monaghan now devotes most of his time to conservative causes, and Bain controls Domino’s with 49% of its voting stock and an unspecified number of nonvoting shares.

Linky 2

So, yeah, the highest volume sellers of two of the four most important food groups (1. Pizza, 2. Beer, 3. Donuts, 4. Ice Cream) – actually 3 out of 4, because the Dunkin deal included Baskin Robbins (shitty ice cream), have Mitt’s fingerprints on them.

Hmmm, is there a pattern here?

It’s not the absurdity I’m talking about though: it’s falsehood and definite proof of same. I think we both agree that Christianity itself is absurd.

You never answered my question, so, I’m going to pull a Sean Hannity and ask it again:

What Does 9/11 Mean 2U
Dr BLT copyright 2007 Smash Records
http://www.drblt.net/music/WhatDoesNine11.mp3

By the way, in case you didn’t pay attention to the lyrics, the song is not an confrontation of the left, it is a confrontation of extremism on both ends of the continuum. The “Fox News” shoe doesn’t fit. However, I should be grateful, this is the best compliment on my vocal production that I’ve ever received from you. As far as the guitar-tuning comment is concerned, playing with a guitar that’s tuned has become a hackneyed cliche at best. While anal retentive, purists and perfectionists like you are busy tuning your instruments, the rest of us are writing new songs that you secretly wish you had penned.

Well, yeah, I agree. But like I said, I tend to think the same about most takes on the religion thing…so this isn’t me calling Mormonism not absurd, I just don’t think it’s especially more absurd.

“Those who would assail The Book of Mormon should bear in mind that its veracity is no more dubious than the veracity of the Bible, say, or the Qur’an, or the sacred texts of most other religions. The latter texts simply enjoy the considerable advantage of having made their public debut in the shadowy recesses of the ancient past, and are thus much harder to refute.”

Still, to paraphrase Sam Harris, “The minute you read something about Mormonism, you know it’s bogus.”

The Book of Mormon is, on its face, silly and racist, but I don’t see why, particularly given the benefit of a couple of millennia of historical forgetfulness, it couldn’t be taken as seriously as more mainline Christianity when you treat it metaphorically. Goodness knows there are enough silly things in the Old and New Testaments if you try to treat them as literal things.

Doctrines & Covenants is another story, of course.

What I’m thinking about here is that con-man Joseph Smith could not translate a word of anything, therefore could not translate the plates, therefore the book of Mormon is bullshit.

Christianity is different in that millions around the world are happy to deal with heaven and hell and Christ himself metaphorically.

I’m more interested in knowing what his position on Boston Creme is, myself.

Note that this doesn’t go for Scientology. That shit’s just way out there absurd.

That being said, I find all of it reasonably absurd, so there we are.