The US Intelligentsia and Middle Class Are In the Firm Grip of Fear, Fraud and Denial
by ilene - May 17th, 2010 1:23 am
The US Intelligentsia and Middle Class Are In the Firm Grip of Fear, Fraud and Denial
Courtesy of JESSE’S CAFÉ AMÉRICAIN
The lie is comfortable, an illusion easy to live with, familiar, and safe.
Writing from the ‘disgraced profession’ of economics, James K. Galbraith speaks of the unspoken, the many frauds and deceptions underlying the recent financial crisis centered in the US. Many will read this and shake their heads in agreement, but will be unable to take the next logical step and internalize the implications of the depth and breadth of the dishonesty that enabled it then, and continues to sustain it, even today. Galbraith is asking ‘why’ and framing a further inquiry into the consequences of this unwillingness to reform.
"Some appear to believe that "confidence in the banks" can be rebuilt by a new round of good economic news, by rising stock prices, by the reassurances of high officials – and by not looking too closely at the underlying evidence of fraud, abuse, deception and deceit. As you pursue your investigations, you will undermine, and I believe you may destroy, that illusion."
It is easier to go with the flow, relax, rationalize, and be diverted and entertained by ‘the show.‘ The truth may set you free, but before that it can make you feel very insecure and uncomfortable, especially when it requires challenging the ‘official story’ and policy decisions. Better to say nothing offensive to the oligarchs, and even occasionally to utter intelligent sounding condemnations of those who dare to question the very things you wonder about, and fear, in order to prove your loyalty and to reassure yourself that you are a right-thinking, practical individual. For the disparity that is unavoidably noticed between what is seen and what is said makes one uneasy, fearful that they are losing their bearings, if not reason. And the vested interests play on those fears. See Techniques of Propaganda
The consequences of ‘extend and pretend’ will be to worsen the final outcome, the day of reckoning.
"The initial deviation from the truth will be multiplied a thousandfold." Aristotle
The banks must be restrained, the financial and political system reformed, and balance restored to the economy, before there can be any sustained recovery.…