PROPAGANDA
Who controls the past, controls the future: who controls the present controls the past. — Geo. Orwell, 1984
When future historians write about the 20th Century, it would not surprise me to find it had been nicknamed The Century of Spin. Today more than ever we see that the battle for the minds of the people revolves around the manner in which events get interpreted, not necessarily the events themselves.
Social observers have long noted this trafficking in interpretations. Who decides what is good and what is bad? Who decides who the good guys and bad guys are in this battle for control of the narrative?
We live in a mediated world. Before entering World War One, very few Americans knew much about Germany, its history and its aims. But as the drums of war began to sound, there were plenty of messages being piped into our brains through the news media, striving to form a national will to take up arms against Kaiser Bill and those German brutes. …
NOSTALGIA
“My work is a moving thing.” — Bob Dylan
The Minnesota music scene has produced some sensational talent through the years. Rock, folk, jazz, blues, bluegrass and even gospel music circles have developed exceptional performers and recording artists. One of these was David Curtis Glover, better known as Tony “Little Sun” Glover. A harmonica player with the folk group Koerner, Ray and Glover (inducted into the MN Music Academy Hall of Fame in 1983) he was also a notable rock critic who wrote for many of the best-known music mags including Crawdaddy, Sing Out, Creem and Rolling Stone.
WORK LIFE
“We are not a team because we work together. We are a team because we respect, trust and care for each other.” — Vala Alshar
For years I have referenced data from the Gallup organization for insights on various topics. What I like about Gallup Polls is that they stake a claim on getting the most diverse viewpoints from the broadest field of data. They have the resources to do this because they do it well and have become trusted for it, unlike many news polls that pretend to do so.
When companies measure ROI, they are measuring results after the fact. …
HISTORY
For the present I am not in search of remedies, but am only concerned with diagnosis. — Bertrand Russell
On March 24, 1922 Bertrand Russell delivered a speech at South Place Institute on the subject of Free Thought and Official Propaganda. The speech was then put into book form and by August was in its second printing, which is the copy I have here in my possession.
I’ve now read this little volume at least three times in the past year, somewhat amazed by its clarity of thought and powerful relevance nearly a century later. …
MOVIES
“I’ll be back.” — The Terminator
I just finished watching MIB and MIB II this past week. Afterwards, I tried to figure out why the first was so engaging and entertaining, and why the latter left me flat. Both feature Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith, doing the usual things they do with deadpan wit. Both had innovative aliens and SFX. Both have given our heroes a task to accomplish or else life on earth as we know it will end. In other words, there is something at stake.
HISTORY
Shedding light on the biggest day of mass arrests in U.S. History
Over the past few years I’ve attempted to write about some of the experiences of my youth in an effort to perhaps gain deeper insights into what I saw and felt and thought, and how it may have shaped me. One of these was my experience of hitchhiking to Washington DC to be part of a major antiwar rally. What prompted me to write my story was Ken Burns’ 10-part series on the Vietnam War. I believe it was part seven that covered the events of Mayday 1971. …
TRIVIAL PURSUITS
If I put my phone in airplane mode, will it fly?
I keep running across things I want to share, few of which I’d consider a blog post on its own without my having to do more work to make it seem important. For this reason I’ve decided to batch them here and call it a Medley.
MOVIES
“When you got nothing you got nothing to lose.”
— Leonardo DiCaprio in his opening scene.
“When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose.”
— Bob Dylan, Like a Rolling Stone
Last night I watched James Cameron’s Titanic, the 1997 film spectacle starring Leonardo DiCaprio (Jack) and Kate Winslet (Rose). When it was over, an interesting thought emerged regarding this historic event. Yes, it was a story about wealth and privilege in contrast to the common folk in steerage. Yes, it was a love story. Yes, it was a remarkable achievement in special effects and cinematic story telling.
But at the core of it, it was something still bigger. It was a story about competing narratives. Let me explain. …
NO CRIME IN RHYMIN’
aka: releasing the subtle streams of absurd randomness swimming inside my head
dada tripe denial
the furrowed fow
devoured but notion
flour de brow
connotes commotion
dissecting rhythms
rhymes and rose
defining deafened
combine flows
expose the neuron
flakes of grass
beak the borken
pebbled glass
Each denied the cause is just
revile the wintered snowbound rust
exhiled exhaled surveillant trust
alas the angled agile bust
of seizure swollen breadcrumb crust
if pie we eat, then pie we must
stipend sticks
stolen fore
fielded frenzy
molten moore
cul de sac
cross cut core
a frizzled rack
a fowl fore lore
expelled the proton
pless and plack
defile the foo
bamboozle back
to each his own
the song be true
what matters not
to me is…
DREAMS
Here are the details from a recent dream I had.
I’m taking my final exam in college. The room is a large hall with cubicles around the outer perimeter. These cubicles are more like the spaces at the fair where you throw balls at bottles or pop balloons with darts. In other words, we sat “outside” the cubicle, seated not at desks but with a countertop that served as a table top.
Each of us was facing a wall that is ten or twenty feet away, “room” area being perhaps ten to fifteen feet wide. There is no furniture in the room, but on the wall directly facing me are two minimalist pieces of art. …
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