Posted by parhad (158.252.208.109) on October 10, 2001 at 06:55:22:
In Reply to: An element of truth? posted by Sam on October 10, 2001 at 00:04:57:
That way madness lies.
As tempting as it is to fall for this story instead of the other one, one has to hold back from rushing in emotionally into either camp. Both are "plausible"...if you "unhinge" easily.
I don't find it difficult to believe in the parts which claim there is a move on to control the planet as there has been to control each country by some native power-elite. But it isn't necessary to bomb your own people...doesn't have to be. It wouldn't take a genius to figure out that years of systemtic abuse and maddening "policy" would drive people to despair eventually. America has been able to produce just the "enemies" and "emergencies" it needed. The Soviet Union was another Paper Tiger they managed to scare us out of our wits over....and just incidentally gut our Constitution over, as they will some more after WTC.
I'm reminded of the Jihad in California some years ago over the issue of "soft on crime" waged against Chief Justice Rose Bird and other State Supreme Court Justices who were targeted as being soft on crime, of overturning verdicts willy nilly all with the sole purpose of letting killers back onto the streets.
This was a campaign that took two years and involved countless "reports" in the media, and polls etc. People became so fearful of these sober, caring and thourough professionals that they voted them all out of office and put in their place the most conservative replacements they could find...who still qualified for the job.
A brilliant editorial some time later made the observation that it hadn't been over crime, or community safety that the battle had been waged. It was to rush into place justices conservative enough to vote a certain way on the host of pending legislation and the suits they would engender regarding attacks on the environment...product safety issues, the right of the consumer to sue companies...of patients to sue HMO's, which were just being brought online then and had the potential of causing huge disruption with the possibility of endless litigation that had to be nipped in the bud.
Of course there would be a "tough on crime" shift, but not to guarantee little Johnny's security...just to appear to have made good on their promise...it's what they never mentioned they would do that was the whole purpose of the campaign...it worked, as this one will, for awhile.