Personal Account of Journalist or Professor – education and deconstruction.com

Liar’s Circus – BONUS POST

The Bonus Book of the Week is “Liar’s Circus, A Strange and Terrifying Journey Into the Upside-Down World of Trump’s MAGA Rallies” by Carl Hoffman, published in 2020.

Beginning in October 2019, the author attended several rallies held by president Donald Trump. Anyone can reserve online tickets, which are unlimited, regardless of venue size. The author started with Minneapolis–the president’s four hundredth rally since June 2015.

The author spent hours or days driving around the Midwest, South, Deep South, and the Northeast to the different venues. When he finally arrived, he stood in a queue for hours and hours, and at later rallies, two days (but got off the queue at intervals) before he was allowed, hours early, into the stands, or the front-row railing (which was more of a participatory location). At St. Louis, Trump bragged about the size of the crowd. However, in October 2008, then-presidential candidate Obama attracted about one hundred thousand people, “…more than have ever attended a Trump rally, it’s worth noting.”

The author spent a significant chunk of time talking with attendees at these extravaganzas. He found out who they were. Most were the kind of people who would automatically believe some tabloid garbage on the idiot box about, for instance, a book with which the Republicans were less than thrilled. They would then parrot what they’d heard, without having read a word of the book. Most have never read a book in their lives. Some were star-struck social climbers.

One specific kind of Trump supporter was a man who was seeking a savior who would make it socially acceptable for him to blame all his troubles on his political enemies. Another kind was a total Goldwater Republican (once and always a Republican) who would vote for anyone who let his greed go hog-wild through deregulation.

Yet a third kind was neither an aggrieved victim nor greedy but was doing fine economically– wasn’t selling anything; who simply wanted to see what all the fuss was about, and had nothing better to do than meet some people. And of course, who wanted to meet the president.

The author got friendly with this third kind. For, they were familiar faces at consecutive rallies. Like the premise of the TV show Cheers people want to go “… where everybody knows your name and they’re always glad you came.”

There were a handful of non-Caucasian people, and Jews at every rally. They were shown prominently on-camera– to deceive viewers into thinking there were lots of them– though there were tens of thousands of white people surrounding them. Every rally had the same agenda, which included (but were not limited to) songs from the Village People– a 1970’s music group with a reputation for diversity. Ironically.

Every rally’s atmosphere was reminiscent of an American church, “… but instead of the peril of losing our souls to Satan, the peril was the Democrats, and the demons were the news media, immigrants and Muslims.”

At every rally, the author heard Trump trot out the same false statements. One was, that he would keep Medicare forever but the “Social Democrats” wanted to completely eliminate it. Further, while his administration was litigating to get rid of the provision under which preexisting conditions are covered by national health insurance, he claimed he would keep that provision forever, and grabbed credit for coming up with it. But it was actually a provision in the original Affordable Care Act. Just like the late president Reagan, Trump was saying one thing and doing another.

Read the book to learn much more about the personal experiences of the author on his quest to understand Trump supporters. And along these lines, here’s a parody of what Trump supporters would say about themselves:

RALLY TOWN

sung to the tune of “Allentown” with apologies to Billy Joel.

Well, we’re living here in Rallytown.

And Trump has got his routine down.

At the stadium we’re having a time,

making new friends, standing in line.

Well, our fathers fought the Vietnam war.

They were patriotic to the core.

And our 401(k)s at an all-time high.

Under the Dems, we were just getting by.

And we’re living here in Rallytown.

It’s the liberals who put us down.

But Trump makes everything okay.

Well, we’re waiting here in Rallytown,

for we think that Trump deserves a crown.

All the promises he makes he keeps:

taxes, the Wall– take that, liberal creeps!

He’s actually going to build the Wall,

and create new jobs for us all.

His economic plans are really real!

Oil, factories, coal– Bleep Green New Deal!

And we’re waiting here in Rallytown.

Democrats bring our cities down.

And they’re taking all our guns away…

Every time Trump tweets another thing,

the media launch another “gotcha” or sting.

They’re sore losers from 2016.

They took away our American dream.

Well, we’re winning here in Rallytown.

And no one will ever keep Trump down.

I can’t wait to worship Trump today…

And Trump makes everything okay.

And we’re living here in Rallytown.

The Education of An Idealist

The Book of the Week is “The Education of an Idealist, A Memoir” by Samantha Power, published in 2019.

“The news coverage quickly became saturated by sensationalized fear,” Power wrote of the 2014 Ebola epidemic that was largely contained in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. A whopping 134 members of the United Nations voted in favor of contributing resources to stem the spread of the disease. According to Power, there were a few major reasons American president Barack Obama, along with other nations vanquished Ebola before it became an international crisis:

Obama refused to impose a travel ban because a ban would deter American: medical, aid, diplomatic and military personnel, from going to affected areas to contain Ebola; by so doing– he inspired other world leaders to pitch in, and it became a global effort that worked.

The cooperation among nations meant the spread of the disease could be tracked, and fast and appropriate action could be taken.

More lives were arguably saved with the joint international effort rather than with a travel ban. Whipping up a panic, saying that there would be adverse consequences if people weren’t stopped from entering the United States!!! was just nonsense.

Born in September 1970 in London, Power grew up in Dublin, Ireland until she was nine, then in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and finally, Atlanta, Georgia. Her father, a medical doctor, died when she was fourteen. Her mother, also a medical doctor, established the first kidney transplant and dialysis center in Kuwait.

In the early 1990’s, Power began her career as a journalist, becoming obsessed with genocide. She reported on it from Bosnia and later, Darfur, Sudan. To push the point, she wrote a six-hundred page book on the subject, that came out in 2002. In 2005, she transferred her communications skills to the political arena. In 2009, she was afforded three months of unpaid maternity leave by her employer, the National Security Council of the United States government.

Power became an international-affairs adviser to president Barack Obama. She steeped herself in the ills plaguing the world, such as putsches, civil wars, atrocities, terrorist attacks and natural disasters. She helped found a federal agency that alerted the president to horrendous goings-on so that they could be dealt with as soon as possible (which, sadly, wasn’t very soon).

There were numerous parties involved arguing over what to do– send in US peacekeepers, or impose economic sanctions, or do nothing, etc. She participated in the discussions that led to offering rewards for information leading to the capture of war criminals in the Balkans. One criminal was caught and put on trial in an international tribunal. U.S. troops made their presence known in Central African Republic in order to successfully stem unspeakable horrors by a political group in neighboring Uganda– where civilian deaths allegedly plummeted between 2010 and 2014 inclusive.

Each new crisis posed dilemmas for the United States. In 2010, America refrained from pushing for free and fair elections in Egypt because putting too much pressure on Egypt would jeopardize its keeping the peace with Israel, and countering terrorists. An added difficulty for president Obama was that Republicans would oppose everything he did, big or small, even if secretly, they thought he was doing the right thing. They would criticize him with childish fury.

In 2011, what made taking action to oust Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi easier, was that Muslim countries in the United Nations actually agreed with the United States on that. Two major communications outlets– The New York Times and Rush Limbaugh created a sexist smear of a distraction by saying that three females in the Obama administration influenced Obama regarding policy on Libya. The (mostly male) debaters tried to imagine how much and what kind of violence there would be with Qaddafi’s remaining in power, and with his removal.

In the case of Burma, the policymakers had to consider the oppression of a minority ethnic group, and the adverse conditions occurring when refugees flooded neighboring Bangladesh.

Power met with 191 of the 192 ambassadors (excepting North Korea) at the United Nations. Read the book to learn lots more about Power’s life in the professional and personal realms, including how she engaged in spousification with her young son.

Worldwalk

The Book of the Week is “Worldwalk, An Incredible Tale of Adventure and Inspiration: One American’s Four-Year Journey Alone and On Foot” by Steven M. Newman, published in 1989.

At 28 years old, the author decided to walk long distances in various countries of the world. He began his trek in Ohio in April 1983. His goal was to restore his faith in humanity by gauging the friendliness of strangers, but of course, he also took advantage of the hospitality offered to him by his contacts and friends of friends.

In October 1983, while walking in Calders, Spain, near the Mediterranean coast, he met some nice Spaniards fluent in English. One was troubled by the American government’s behavior. He said, “We are so baffled why your president Reagan wants to direct everything that happens in all the countries. It’s as if America is trying to be like Rome was.”

Much later on, while fraternizing with two low-level soldiers in the former Yugoslavia, the author was arrested. A law officer told him, “You must tell the names and addresses of everyone you have spoken to since you entered Yugoslavia.” Currently, tech companies don’t need to ask for any such data of Americans– wherever they go in the whole world. The companies already have all that from those who live their lives mostly online!

In Turkey, the author met a 25-year old medical doctor who said the government paid for his medical school education, but after graduation, he was obligated to work for the government for six years at minimum wage. Then he had to do two years of military service. After that, his life might become his own.

Later on, when the author was sorting his camera-film rolls in a teahouse, the secret police roughed him up and detained him. They pegged him for a Jew, yelling “Yahudi!” That was a serious ethnic slur in Turkey. The cops told the author their impressions of America: sex-craving, money-hungry, selfish drug addicts.

The main interrogator said, “You are fools… We’ll take American dollars or Russian rubles, and laugh at you both.” The author had taken a photo of a truck going to Iran, hauling an American tank to be used in the Iran-Iraq war. At that time, Turkey was an ally of Iran, too. The author also saw an Iran-bound roadside truck containing a wooden crate labeled, “Communication Equipment: MADE IN U.S.A.”

The author met rural peasants in the towns of Harayana in India who told him that their obtaining gainful employment required contacts or bribery rather than merit.

Read the book to learn a wealth of additional details about the author’s international travels.

BONUS POST

“But, over time, I learned to hate as blindly and viciously as any of them.”

No, the above was not said by American viewers or listeners of political pundits in the last forty years. But it might as well have been.

At every opportunity, pundits bash their political enemies. Then they complain, “The nation is more divided than ever.”

It is the pundits who have made spewing hatred socially acceptable and perceived as even a good thing!

That is why hatred is still a “thing” in this country. Politicians too, pile on.

In addition, scapegoating is also all the childish rage these days. Pursuant to what they’ve heard, American viewers and listeners can feel free to blame any or all of the following for all of their troubles (in no particular order):

illegal immigrants, the Iranians, Robert Mueller, Hillary, James Comey, Obama, Lisa Page, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, red state governors, Democrats, police officers, Republicans, Donald J. Trump, Adam Schiff, Hunter Biden, the Chinese, conservatives, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, Peter Strzok, the North Koreans, blue state governors, the Squad, liberals, the ladies on “The View,” Joe Biden, teachers, Antifa, Jerrold Nadler, the NRA, and numerous lesser attention whores.

Renewing threats is apparently in vogue, too. A Google search reveals who, of the most recent three presidents, has renewed the most threats.

The following is all Google search results (duplicates of headlines were deleted for the same date) of actual headlines of news or information outlets with the exact phrase, “Trump renews threat to” (Warning: this might get a little tedious):

Dec 9, 2015 Trump renews threat to run as an Independent GOP presidential…

Mar 3, 2016 Trump Renews Indie Threat

Aug 8, 2016 Trump renews threat to leave NAFTA in speech on economy

Nov 28, 2016 Trump renews threat to prosecute Clinton for joining recount

Aug 2, 2017 Trump renews threat to scrap NAFTA

Aug 27, 2017 Donald Trump Renews Threat To Scrap NAFTA Amid Negotiations …

Aug 28, 2017 Trump renews threat to scrap NAFTA going into next round of talks …

May 23, 2018 Trump Renews Threat to Scrap North Korea Summit

May 29, 2018 Trump Renews Threat To Impose Tariffs On High-Tech Chinese Goods

Apr 23, 2018 Trump renews threat to tie border crossings to new NAFTA deal

Jul 29, 2018 Trump renews threat to shut down government over border wall

Jul 30, 2018 Trump renews threat to shut down government over border wall

Aug 2, 2018 President Trump renews threat to shut down the …

Nov 22, 2018 Trump renews threat to close Mexico border over migrants

Nov 23, 2018 Trump renews threat to close US border with Mexico

Nov 29, 2018 Trump Renews Threat To Impose Tariffs On Imported Cars

Dec 28, 2018 Trump renews threat to close southern border

Dec 29, 2018 Trump renews threat to close US-Mexico border

Jan 6, 2019 Trump Renews Threat to Declare National Emergency in Border Wall

Jan 7, 2019 Trump Renews Threat to Declare Emergency Over Border …

Jan 10, 2019 President Trump Renews Threat To Declare Emergency To Get Funds …

Jan 25, 2019 Trump renews threat to declare national emergency over border …

Mar 28, 2019 Trump renews threat to close the southern border, blasts Mexico on …

Mar 29, 2019 Trump renews threat to shut down US-Mexico border

Mar 31, 2019 Trump Renews Threat to Close Border, Cuts Aid to Central America

Apr 1, 2019 Trump renews threat to close southern border, calls on Congress to fix …

Apr 2, 2019 Trump renews threat to close border, possibly affecting commerce …

Apr 24, 2019 Trump renews threat to close Mexican border, send more troops …

Apr 25, 2019 Trump renews threat to close Mexico border

Apr 26, 2019 President Trump Renews Threat to Close U S Border with Mexico …

Jun 10, 2019 Trump renews threat to against French wine (sic)

Jun 11, 2019 US President Donald Trump renews threat to impose tariffs on Mexico

Jul 14, 2019 Trump renews threat to close Mexico border.

August 14, 2019 Trump renews threat to pull US out of WTO

Aug 21, 2019 Trump renews threat to end ‘ridiculous’ birthright citizenship

Sep 20, 2019 Trump Renews Threat to Dump IS Fighters at Europe’s Border

Nov 3, 2019 Trump renews threat to cut wildfire aid to California

Jan 5, 2020 Trump renews threat to Iran after rockets land in Baghdad’s Green Zone

Jun 18, 2020 Trump renews threat to cut ties with Beijing, a day after high-level U.S.-China talks

Jun 18, 2020 Trump renews threat to cut ties with China.

Jun 23, 2020 Trump renews threat to cut ties with Beijing

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The following is all Google search results (duplicates of headlines were deleted for the same date) of actual headlines of news or information outlets with the exact phrase, “Obama renews threat to”:

Jul 15, 2009 Obama Renews Threat to Veto Military Spending Bill Over F-22s

Jul 26, 2011 Obama Renews Threat to Veto Boehner Debt Plan

Jul 27, 2011 Obama Renews Threat to Veto Boehner Debt Plan

Jan 13, 2016 Obama Renews Threat to Suspend AGOA Benefits for South Africa

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The following is all Google search results (duplicates of headlines were deleted for the same date) of actual headlines of news or information outlets with the exact phrase, “Bush renews threat to”:

Aug 24, 2001 Bush renews threat to boycott racism conference over Zionism

Dec 5, 2001 Bush renews threat to Iraq

Dec 6, 2001 Bush renews threat to veto defense bill

May 25, 2005 Bush renews threat to veto stem cell …

Mar 28, 2007 President Bush Renews Threat to Veto Bill on Iraq Troop Withdrawal

Apr 25, 2007 Bush renews threat to veto war funding bill from Congress

May 2, 2007 Bush vetoes war spending bill with Iraq …

Jul 19, 2007 Bush renews threat to veto health bill

Aug 24, 2001 Bush renews threat to boycott racism conference over Zionism

Sep 21, 2007 Bush renews threat to veto children’s health legislation

Sep 25, 2007 Bush renews threat to veto spending bills

Oct 3, 2007 Bush renews threat to veto children’s health legislation

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It remains to be seen whether overpaid bashing, hating, scapegoating, threatening noisemakers and/or patronage pigs will triumph over:

the refinement of national healthcare (even the second draft of ANY extremely, extremely, extremely complex system such as this, is going to have numerous problems)

human teachers

the cleaning up of and future prevention of pollution in various places in the United States

freedoms of religion, speech, assembly, etc., and

reducing even a little– the usual corruption, incompetence and waste that is always present to some degree in even a democratic nation.

By the way, the Bonus Book of the Week is “Makes Me Wanna Holler, A Young Black Man in America” by Nathan McCall, published in 1994.

The line preceding the first line of this post is, “I wondered, ‘Where did those white people learn to hate so deeply at such a young age?‘ “

Born in 1955 in Portsmouth, Virginia, the author detailed how his life mirrored his ethnic group’s mentality (African American) in his generation. When he was an adolescent, the forces governing his behavior included: the need for a feeling of tribal unity, peer pressure, hating all white people, and vendetta against rival gangs. If those gangs had acquired the kinds of writing, speaking and debating skills valued by the ethnic group (Caucasian) politically dominant at the time, those gangs could have become pundits or politicians.

Instead, they wasted their time and talents on physical fighting against each other, sexual conquests, and committing street crime. Such activities were destructive to their own ethnic group. Read the book to learn how that worked out for the author.

Blinded By the Right

The Book of the Week is “Blinded By the Right, The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative” by David Brock, published in 2002.

Born in 1962 in Jersey City, New Jersey, the author was raised Catholic. His mother– who was embarrassed that he and his younger sister were adopted– forced them to behave dishonestly to keep that secret.

As is well known in the United States, people have been displaying childish fury at emotionally-charged political issues, it seems like, forever. In connection therewith, the author recounted an incident at his liberal arts college, the University of California at Berkeley in the autumn of 1982.

As a believer of Republican rhetoric, he attended an event featuring a speech by United Nations ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick. The United States was interfering with the politics of El Salvador. In protest, hecklers who had poor impulse control threw blood at the podium and their screaming drowned out the speaker. Security lifted nary a finger to dispel such rudeness. The takeaway was that the hecklers had more of a right to free speech than did the speaker whose views they opposed.

The author wrote that upon realizing his homosexuality, he channeled his self-loathing into writing petty, vengeful and mean-of-spirit articles that attacked his political enemies– liberal Democrats. Here is an illustration of how political influencers indoctrinate impressionable young people:

A man is walking past a mental institution and hears all the residents chanting, “Thirteen! Thirteen! Thirteen!” Being curious about all this, he finds a hole in the fence and looks in. Someone pokes him in the eyes. The residents start chanting, “Fourteen! Fourteen! Fourteen!”

Anyway, in 1986, the author completed a fellowship for the Heritage Foundation, a tax-exempt group that (illegally) fronted for conservative Republicans. By the 1990’s, writing for American Spectator magazine, he had gone off the deep end with his propaganda, viciously defaming liberals. He got really famous (a dubious distinction) after his book, The Real Anita Hill was published. As was becoming more and more common among political propagandists, he was highly compensated for his ability to spew hatred articulately, and rationalizing his hurting others by saying they were hurting him, or his party, or his country.

Long story short: for a long time, the author was living a lie, socializing with largely shallow, homophobic (ironically!), anti-feminist, anti-intellectual conservative social climbers like Arianna Huffington, Laura Ingraham and Ann Coulter.

About his tenure at American Spectator, the author remarked, “In twelve years of right-wing journalism, my work had never been fact-checked.” That’s comforting.

The 1990’s saw the start of a trend (which is only getting worse) in which people who call themselves journalists, cobble together some hearsay and tabloid articles and call it a book. Gary Aldrich was one such author, who used a third-hand quote from Brock in his salacious tell-all about then-president Bill Clinton.

Read the book to learn when, how and why Brock’s political views changed.

Breaking News

The Book of the Week is “Breaking News, A Stunning and Memorable Account of Reporting from Some of the Most Dangerous Places in the World” by Martin Fletcher, published in 2008.

Fletcher began his career in his mid-twenties in the early 1970’s, when he found he was super-focused with a news camera. He recorded wars, famines and revolutions in the world’s hotspots. He himself was at peace only when he was telling the world about traumatic events involving mass deaths and ruined lives. He asked, “How could the world have stood by as so many were slaughtered, in so many places?”

Fletcher and his family’s permanent residence was in Israel. Fletcher interviewed dozens of bad guys (terrorists, dictators’ aides, etc.) and wrote, “These gunmen were not my friends; they were just professional sources. However much I might understand their plight, I kept reminding myself, these men wanted to kill my children and their friends.”

On a few different occasions, Fletcher had been following a developing story, but his news-organization employer sent him to get a scoop (which he got) only when the number of white people involved reached a significant number, or when their assets were threatened. In Zaire, he spoke into his tape recorder for a later NBC radio broadcast, to report on eighty Americans taken hostage and Zaire’s endangered vast mineral deposits, even though thousands of native Africans had already become casualties.

From 2001 to 2005, there was a rash of suicide bombings in Israel. The nation took precautions by stationing an armed guard at the door of its every cafe and restaurant; funding this through charging an additional fifty cents to every customer.

Fletcher spoke with the mother of a teenage girl who was killed in one of the attacks. The mother didn’t seek revenge but merely wanted peace. She personally knew Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu. She felt that he thought like a terrorist– provocative, petty, vengeful and mean of spirit. With his words and actions, he invited the enemy to blow themselves to glory, and kill his own side.

Read the book to learn the details of the author’s extreme career, of his near-death experiences, and the mentalities of the reporter and his subjects.

ENDNOTE: Fletcher was an old-school adrenaline-junkie-TV-journalist. His goal was to cover and convey a story about other people. In the next week or two, the leader of the free world doesn’t want the post-virus-scare re-opening of society to steal HIS headlines. Is it any wonder that attention whoredom among ALL Americans, “news” reporters included, is at an all-time high?

The Four Days of Courage

The Book of the Week is “The Four Days of Courage, The Untold Story of the People Who Brought Marcos Down” by Bryan Johnson, published in 1987.

The story had yet to be told by anyone because “We [journalists] each published one version or another [of the story of Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ removal], many of them tremendously exciting– and none of them came even close to the truth.”

The author, a Canadian journalist– admitted to writing a news article with a lie; describing it he wrote, “… the world swallowed another fairy tale about the remarkably bloodless revolt and humanitarian ‘reluctance’ of ‘President’ Marcos to use force.”

And now, a short interlude that helps explain why Reagan was one of the most popular presidents in American history.

It’s interesting to note what recent presidents have become known for, through the opposition’s propaganda:

BILL CLINTON: Playing golf; Keeping his brother Roger out of trouble, and having an extramarital affair on company time. Wait. How did he have time to play golf?

GEORGE W. BUSH: Playing golf; Shaking hands with his oil-industry friends, and mispronouncing words. How did he have time to play golf?

BARACK OBAMA: Playing golf; Palling around with terrorists, and taking selfies. How did he have time to play golf?

DONALD TRUMP: Playing golf; Tweeting, and guzzling diet soda. How the hell did he have time to play golf?

RONALD REAGAN: Taking naps while having his enablers rewrite history. He didn’t need to play golf to get popular.

To be fair, Reagan was fortunate to have a world full of dictators to be ousted and Commies to be fought. More recent presidents have had a harder time in trying to behave heroically.

Anyway, here’s a sample of Reagan’s enablers’ handiwork:

The American defense secretary told the press that the Pentagon had helped the Philippine rebels (not true) and the American secretary of state had praise for Marcos’ maturity in peacefully relinquishing his presidency after so long.

In 1965, soon-to-be brutal dictator Ferdinand Marcos came to power in the Philippines. He stopped at nothing to stay in power. That is how he continued his tyrannical rule over the Philippines for twenty years. In September 1972, he declared martial law because he could. In 1983, he maintained his power by having a political rival, Benigno Aquino, assassinated.

Starting in the mid-1980’s when Marcos again sensed he was losing his authority, he launched a propaganda campaign that described an elaborate plot to remove him from office. Two military officers in particular, were secretly hand-picked by Marcos to stage an alleged uprising of his security detail. One of them began stockpiling weaponry for future use by the “rebels.”

In May 1985, Marcos had such a bad case of hubris syndrome, he held a meeting to confidently hear complaints from the rebels, who resented Marcos’ favoritism of his claques, flacks and sycophants. Marcos permitted himself– no one else– to talk for 45 minutes, and ended the meeting. It was then that an officer got Marcos’ attention, but only to ask him to inscribe books Marcos had written on Filipino ideology. Marcos was only too happy to do so.

By November 1985, Marcos was pressured into the public relations stunt of calling for an election to be held in early 1986. He committed every form of election crime imaginable against his opponent, the widow of the aforementioned rival– Corazon Aquino. He still lost the election. It turned out that dissatisfaction of the Marcos regime was truly reaching critical mass in the military, and had already done so among Filipino civilians.

One major factor that led to the minimal bloodshed during Marcos’ ouster (only sixteen deaths) was the religion of the population: 90% Catholic. The dictator controlled the Church by allowing Catholic businesses to make megabucks, awarding them contracts such as those that provided chain retail outlets at airports. But the vast majority of Catholic ministers had become anti-Marcos. They publicized an urgent appeal to remove Marcos in a non-violent manner.

Another factor was that the Philippine economy was in shambles, and the United States was the nation’s sugar daddy. United States President Ronald Reagan wanted Marcos to stay in power because Marcos was the devil he knew, and could count on, not to let the Philippines fall to Communism (not that it would’ve anyway, even absent untold amounts of financial aid that was used to support the Marcos family’s lavish lifestyle).

For, America had two military bases on the Philippine islands. It had wiretapped the phones at the American embassy. If Marcos ever strayed to the Soviets, America’s hegemony would see it through nonetheless.

In the fourth week of February, 1986, Marcos ordered that tanks roll into the heart of Manila to show everyone who was boss. At the peak of the protests– nuns, housewives, schoolkids, true activists and other angry people filled the streets to dare the tanks to run them over.

Reagan appealed to Marcos to tell his marines to refrain from shooting at the protestors with efficient, advanced weaponry, or else he would get no more military support from the Americans.

Along with that reason, there might have been various other reasons why the approximately 960 soldiers dispensed with an actual show of force: “…pity, conscience, tactical considerations, the courage of a million Filipinos, the cool-headedness of General Tadiar, the clever psychological ploys of the Enrile-Ramos camp, the intelligence reports of the Sikorskys up above…” or that the Blessed Virgin Mary halted the tanks.

In September 1986, Corazon Aquino gave a speech to the UN General Assembly criticizing the UN for failing to help Third World nations depose brutal dictators. In the initial months of her presidency, she took steps to make the Philippines a democracy, by restoring freedom of the press and draining the swamp in government agencies.

Read the book to learn the details of the various interactions of the whole cast of characters involved in this suspenseful four-day drama, during which: the Marcos family’s expenses and protection (via aerial means) of Manila’s embattled neighborhoods were paid for by American taxpayers, and curious things happened, such as on inauguration day: “Soon there would be two presidents, two chiefs of staff– but still only one First Lady…” and the joke going around was “At least Cory [Aquino] doesn’t have a First Lady.”

I Shall Not Hate – BONUS POST

The Bonus Book of the Week is “I Shall Not Hate, A Gaza Doctor’s Journey” by Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish, published in 2010.

Born in February 1955 in Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza (territory in dispute between the Palestinians and Israelis), the author was a descendant of a prominent, wealthy family which evacuated their estate in Palestine in 1948, thinking they would return when the Palestinians regained power in the region. The family’s home was taken over by Ariel Sharon’s family.

The author was the oldest of nine siblings. His most burning childhood memories include the stench of the outhouse, hunger pangs, and exhaustion from selling milk before dawn before going to his United Nations school, where fortunately, he had a few inspirational teachers. He grew up dirt poor, but due to his mother’s iron hand, he became an OB-GYN doctor through extensive, international schooling, including that in Saudi Arabia, Israel, Italy, Belgium and the United States.

The author was an extremely busy man, as through the years, he had eight children with his one wife, who died of leukemia when the youngest child was six years old.

In the single-digit 2000’s, the author– a glutton for punishment– invited a million headaches by commuting from Gaza to Israel for work– four days a week– at an Israeli hospital. Weekly, at the border, he and his luggage had to be screened with X-rays, metal detectors, frisking, questions and identification documents.

Hamas guards were on the Gaza side, and control-freak, often sadistic guards were on the Israeli side. Prior to the blockade that began in 2006, the going-home screening took an hour. Afterwards, it took half a day. There were arbitrary closings and bus delays, traffic, plus the guards, etc.

The author explained that Palestinian culture highly values families, and he chose to live where he did to be close to a large number of his extended relatives. Of course, the pay was also higher in Israel, and the medical community had resources and opportunities way superior to those in Gaza.

“In Gaza… every time the government administration changes [at the top], the health system undergoes a metamorphosis that’s dependent on the people in charge rather than the needs of the population.” Sounds somewhat familiar. In the United States, the health insurance companies are largely in charge.

As is well known, roughly half of Americans get their insurance through their employers. The employers who can afford to pay for their employees’ insurance tend to do better financially because they can attract the best employees.

The nation is following an economically dangerous course because health-insurance costs keep soaring. The biggest employers, due to economies of scale (their insurance costs keep falling because their number of employees keeps rising– creating a larger pool of risk, giving them a statistical advantage), are besting the smaller employers. It is wonderful that this nation has such a diverse labor pool. But its insurance pools of risk are fragmented, complex, and extremely inefficient– when the system could be compared to ONE pool of risk of three hundred plus million people if there is a single-payer national healthcare system.

Ironically, the profit motive is responsible for driving privately-funded new life-saving medical technologies and treatments. This saves patient lives, but leaves patients bankrupt, and longing for a bygone era when the doctor was a trusted family friend who didn’t overcharge them.

Read the book to learn what happened to the author’s family that prompted him to write this book (Hint– the author is guided by the peace-encouraging passages of the Quran, and he wrote, “Judging them [all Americans] as arrogant is the same as calling all Israelis occupiers and all Palestinians troublemakers.”). One more thing: Stereotypes should not be applied to all the participants in the American medical system (i.e., all insurance companies, drug companies, hospitals, other medical institutions and doctors are greedy is the same as calling all patients saintly) just as stereotypes should not be applied to nationalities, ethnicities, etc.

City Room – LONG BONUS POST

The Bonus Book of the Week is “City Room” by Arthur Gelb, published in 2003. This large volume presented the highlights of the author’s 45-year New York Times career. There were two short passages that might cause confusion for the reader: when the author discussed health department and city infrastructure programs in 1947 or 1948, and also, “After covering Colombo’s murder during a rally in Columbus Circle on Columbus Day, June 28, 1971…”

In 1933, president Franklin Roosevelt insisted that the White House press corps get his permission to quote him directly. The journalists accepted that condition with nary a protest. Having grown up in East Harlem and the Bronx, New York City, Gelb began his career as a copy boy at the Times in May 1944. At the newspaper, writers and editors were always at odds over editorial control. Subjectively, the copy of each was ruined or improved by his counterpart.

In August 1956, the author described how he solicited enough money to keep Joseph Papp’s non-profit, Shakespearean theater organization alive by reviewing a partially rained-out production of the Taming of the Shrew. The following year, the Shakespeare Workshop won its lawsuit against New York City parks commissioner Robert Moses, obtaining a permit to have free shows in Central Park.

In 1966, the Times reported on the classic problems of education in the city. Mayor John Lindsay controlled the nine-member school board. Minority parents and civil rights groups thought he was indifferent to educating their children, as “… 85% of minority students in the city read far below grade level… The teachers’ union was perceived by some in the community as virtually a Jewish institution and racist as well.”

In spring 1970, a former law-enforcement official hired by the Times took six months to write a three-part series on extensive corruption in the New York City police department. It took that long to collect and verify all the information in the articles. “… we had numerous sources and stacks of documents and tape-recorded conversations corroborated what we had published.”

And the journalist assigned the series, David Burnham, declined to write a book on the whole sordid affair, “… ethical to the bone, [he] did not feel he should profit from having performed a public service.” Mayor Lindsay was furious that the Times exposed his poor record on corruption; he tried to pressure the paper not to print it.

In spring 1971, it took almost three months for numerous Times employees working around the clock, to prepare the Pentagon Papers for publication. Newspaper executive A.M. Rosenthal was pleasantly shocked that they were able to keep the project secret for that long!

There ensued prolonged, torturous and tortuous legal wrangling over how much the public has a right to know about the government’s nefarious activities. The U.S. Supreme Court eventually ruled in favor of free speech.

In a nutshell: old-school journalism used to be comprised of an alcohol-lubricated male-dominated field of workaholics, some of whom were investigative reporters– critical thinkers who asked intelligent, probing questions (like, ‘How’s the building of “the wall” coming along?’).

If this was fifty years ago, the Times would have a reporter personally go to “the wall” and have someone write a human-interest story about what they saw and heard. With their own eyes and ears. Maybe even a detailed, two-part series. And follow up every month or so.

Not now. Can’t afford to send anyone anywhere anymore to get a firsthand account, to write any fact-filled article, rather than an opinion-filled one. Neither can any other media outlet. This, for a host of reasons that have been accumulating for decades. Everywhere Americans try to get honest, factual information– TV (including cable), radio, newspapers, magazines, internet, rallies and political (junk) mail– they can’t. Trust is at an all-time low.

For years, readers, listeners and viewers have read, seen and heard contradictory stories, and video and audio clips. Sometimes fanciful ones. Additionally, quotes have been taken out of context, words have been deleted, and the rest, spliced together. Which ones? Only the editors know. Sure, some websites do fact-checking, but the audience gravitates toward the sites simply to confirm their beliefs, not really to get the truth.

Now it’s all unctuous political hacks with fertile imaginations, whose goal is to get a candidate elected, reelected or to cut down political enemies– not to educate the populace. Such nonsense comes from both sides of the aisle.

As is well known, one slogan of the 1992 presidential campaign was “It’s the economy, stupid.” The 2020 election might well say, “It’s the media, stupid.” Wait. That should be rephrased: “It’s the stupid media.”

Eventually, dissatisfaction with this sorry state of affairs will reach critical mass. There will be sufficient backlash to reverse the trend. Because the audience will stop paying attention until influential parties inspire value in honesty and fact-checking again.

Anyway, read the book to learn about the adventures of Gelb and his colleagues.

The Most Wanted Man in China

The Book of the Week is “The Most Wanted Man in China, My Journey From Scientist to Enemy of the State” by Fang Lizhi, translated by Perry Link, published in 2016. Despite its sensationalist title, this volume aptly described the unusual personal account of a Chinese dissident who was fortunate to receive minimal (but still emotionally wrenching) punishment for his “crimes” in an oppressive regime. Under that regime, there were millions of deaths due to famine and suicides.

Born in Beijing, China in 1936, Fang was the second-oldest of six siblings. As a business owner, Fang’s grandfather exploited his employees, according to the Marxist doctrine forced down the throats of the Chinese people. Therefore, when Fang joined the Communist Party for the first time in June 1955, he was compelled to denounce his late grandfather.

At university, Fang began to rebel against the robotic, rote-learning curriculum. Having developed a passion for tinkering with electronics and studying science at an early age, he asked why there wasn’t independent thinking. The authorities answered that only several sources of ideology (Marx, Lenin, Mao Tse Tung, Engels and the Communist Party) had already discovered the absolute best way to think for the people, so no one need waste any more time on thinking for themselves.

Mao maintained that socialism was the best economic system, but admitted that there were three imperfections with it: “subjectivism, bureaucratism and factionalism.” Mao encountered a big problem when university students started to search for why. By using reason, logic, science and independent thinking, followers of a leader cannot help but question the leader. As an absolute ruler, Mao could not abide that.

Mao thus used four techniques of Communist dictators to maintain his power. The first was to label only 5% of the people as “rightists” and dangerous enemies. This way, the majority of Chinese people would feel threatened, so he could crush everyone like bugs through fear and force. The second was to falsely accuse them of being anti-Party and anti-socialist. [In the United States, a dictatorial president might label people “unpatriotic”].

Thirdly, Mao had his minions behave like tattletales in publicly criticizing the small groups (pairs, even) of closet rightists. Finally, the authorities organized self-criticism groups to foster group-think and herd-mentality to denounce everyone’s every transgression. Because– people feel more comfortable engaging in group-bullying than individually attacking others.

Fang became a teaching assistant at the University of Peking, until December 1957, when he was reassigned to do farm work– hard manual labor– in a rural area. He was forced to live far away from his girlfriend and later, wife and kids, over the course of about twenty years.

In the 1960’s and 1970’s, Fang was alternately exiled to rural areas, and returned to resume his primary career at a university, engaging in both teaching and research in nuclear physics, and later, materials science and laser physics. Ironically, Fang acquired a variety of physical skills and valuable experience in all different kinds of workplaces, such as a railroad, coalmine, pig farm, water-well, steel mill, vinyl and brick factories, tunnels, etc.

Mao ordered dissidents to be geographically separated from their loved ones, so as to: impose psychological trauma on the people, make it difficult for them to form alliances with the like-minded, and band together to fight his oppressive regime. Fang was in a special category because he possessed rare expertise in academia. So for a few months in mid-1969, he was detained with other scientists and was pumped with Mao’s ideology for hours every day.

But prior to that, in his twenties, even Fang had been ideologically brainwashed. In 1965, he thought he wanted to study in the Soviet Union because he liked its brand of socialism. He was impressed that the Soviets were ahead of the Americans in the space race.

Until he started traveling internationally, even Fang, a well-educated physicist, lived in an insular society that limited his knowledge of the rest of the world. He read scientific journals from other countries, but had no real understanding of political ideologies or cultures other than his own.

Fang lost respect for the Chinese authorities beginning in 1967, when he heard rumors that Mao’s closest political associates were just a bunch of mean, petty, vengeful people jockeying for power. Currently, in the United States, such people who are also super-wealthy, might adopt a litigious lifestyle, which is extremely expensive, but effective in intimidating and vanquishing enemies.

Mao launched a new nationwide political campaign every time the old one started to backfire on him. For example, in the mid-1970’s, “Denunciations of the wrong kind of astronomy topped the agendas, but in order to do that, someone had to read the texts of the papers that were going to be denounced. So real astronomy spread.” At least the Chinese backed up their denunciations with evidence.

In 21st century America, attention whoredom has reached new heights. For, few media commentators actually read the book, see the movie or know much about the report or study they denounce. They simply play a game of “telephone” and the tabloid-believing public eats it up. Oftentimes, it’s just a non-story, hysterically reported.

The commentators are so desperate for attention or to put their two cents in with no independent thinking that they even shamelessly admit to their own laziness or ignorance in not doing their homework.

Their audience is seeking confirmation of what it already believes, so no convincing is necessary. Further, when evidence is presented, the data are cherry-picked with weaselly language in oversimplified apples-to-oranges comparisons. So it’s as though the media have already done the thinking for the American masses.

So why are Americans so politically dogmatic on one side or the other? How are the media imposing this thought-control? It’s not through fear or force (!)

By nature people are lazy. Nowadays, they’ll get information from the most accessible sources–TV, radio or their electronic toy (phone). Those sources convey information concocted by attention whores or entertainers or profit-seekers with a political agenda. Not scholars who seek out original sources and comprehensively present both sides of an issue. This has almost always been the case in the most recent century, but the difference today is in the quality of the information presented.

The information is mostly opinions and when it isn’t, the audience can’t tell whether it’s propaganda. For, journalism verification standards have been eliminated. There used to be fact-checking departments and ethics guidelines to avoid conflicts of interest– at reputable publications and broadcasting and cable communications companies. No more.

Further, many media commentators who have no law degrees express their opinions on legal issues. But practicing lawyers are more likely to know what they’re talking about when explaining the issues. Sadly, it appears that this ignorant state of affairs isn’t going to change anytime soon.

Anyway, read the book to learn much more about Fang’s life and work (from the “horse’s mouth”), and whether much changed in China with Mao’s successor.