A New Year for the Great American Deception

S.Paul Forrest

This is a repost of an article I wrote for the New Year, 2011...I ask you: Was I wrong? 
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As we enter the New Year, there is much to look forward to and even more to work toward.  The Obama Administration has tried to bring some change but has been blocked at all sides by an over zealous Right and its Tea Party constituents. More recently though, it is not the Republicans causing this Administration’s pains but rather its own base trying to hold on to voting polls by flipping on the issues. A once solid and devoted party is coming undone in order to follow the purposeful deception of a Right Wing agenda and his own disillusionment of how much change America will tolerate. 

The blame game seems to be the soup de jour in the present Congress and the next is sure to include more of the same as both sides scramble to secure a future for their party.  While the Republicans vie for new ways to derail Obama rather than using their energy to come up with real economic solutions, many Americans sit in wait for its President to come through on his campaign promises.  I used to have hope that the campaign rhetoric was genuine but so many of his trail vows have gone either blocked by Republicans or forgotten by an Administration floundering to survive the Right wing maelstrom.

Topping the list of items of change that seems to have been forgotten by the Obama Administration is his desire to lessen and eventually, phase out the War initiative.  Instead of coming through on this promise though, this year’s budget includes the largest amount spent on our military since WWII.  The National Defense Authorization Act, H.R. 2647, a Bill that feeds directly into the plans of the Bin Laden terrorist ambition, is set to spend an astounding $725 billion.  The measure was accepted by a Congressional majority with little contention.  How could an Administration, so vehemently opposed to such action in 2008 so easily allow the continuation of this immoral and economically draining action to continue?

See the Voting results at GovTrack.us for who voted and then read the Bill.

What truly confuses me is how a bill such as this could so easily cruise through a Congress that is Democrat controlled and so vehemently favored by a Republican contingency who has consistently complained about Obama’s big government spending. These people have attempted to deny 911 Responder care, cut education spending and tried to block the continuation of unemployment compensation by arguing these expenditures cannot be paid for.  How do they plan then, to pay for this Military Budget? 

Republicans have been consistent in their statements of fiscal responsibility but not so much when it comes time to vote on measures of military invasiveness and National Security Intrusions on our Bill of Rights.  As an example, Representative JOHN BOEHNER (R. Ohio) has stated, “If we're going to deal with deficits, and we're going to be honest with the American people, we have to cut spending, and we need real economic growth in America that puts more Americans back to work caring for themselves and caring for their families.”   

This is a grand statement and he may even have cried while saying it for dramatic effect but the only people who are benefiting from the recent budget are the Defense Contractors and corporations like Halliburton and Lockheed Martin unless of course, the Government chooses the low bidder and we export the War profits to Chinese contractors.  Déjà vu, anyone? 

It would seem the same political philosophy that got us into the current economic situation has not left us, it has more appropriately, Righted us.  The only families these people care about are their own and those of their rich friends.  Boehner’s voting record stands as a testament of his true colors on any issue and his drama for believing in the American Dream is just that; a dream.

The reality is that republicans on the Hill have not only been responsible for the current economic turmoil by allowing Bush initiated, corporate oversight lessening and the big money bail outs of their banking friends on Wall Street but have continued to endorse a War on Terror that targets Americans and any Nation who would offer dissention of American rules.  HR 2647 sets up a system that targets the Congo, Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, Pakistan and empowers our financial God Fathers from China (Section 1246). (Read the remaining sections through out the 1200 series of the Act for other Foreign issues.)

One of the main reasons I didn’t vote for McCain in 2008 (other than the fear that his death would leave Palin in charge) was the fact that he fully supported the War initiative and his Vietnam POW experience held the fear that he would one day have a major flashback while poised above the button.  If ever there was a question in my mind it was answered when during a debate he wandered in front of the camera like a dementia patient not remembering where he was. (This is not to mention Palin’s calling Africa a country represented her infinite wisdom.)

Obama was the reasonable choice because Democrats have, in the past, been more selective in foreign military invasiveness.  Recently though, Obama has become our worst nightmare on the War front.  He has been pressured to increase troops in Afghanistan and now is being pressured to arm for potential confrontations with Iran and North Korea.  He has folded under the pressure and helped to pass this enormous War budget.  It would seem that Obama has sold the farm to afford a tractor. 

The Wrong Wing Media

Compounding the negatives to our present Congress, American popular media has taken the lead in the deception movement by “reporting” on the issues with a skewed view.  The demonization of Islam through right wing media has all but convinced Americans that the war is just.  Their deception, fed by such Legislation as the National Security Act and Patriot Act, has initiated such an incredible amount of paranoia that citizens have actually come to believe we should accept the growing police state and consequent oppression for our own safety. 

Misleading American voters seems to be the overwhelming premise and a political weapon that is consistently used to propagate the agenda of Congressional deception by this media.  Everywhere, citizens of this nation are purposely told a distorted version of the truth by right wing media and left wing opinion makers. These people represent a system that is so evidently rife with corruption, corporatism and social depravity that the immaculate concept of a free nation which our forefathers first envisioned has become blurred beyond recognition. 

Every so often I wander into Right Wing sites and read articles but when I want to offer an opinion, the comment section is closed.  Most recently, I posted an article from my blog about Palin being the “Misinformer of the Year” on her own Face Book page but was immediately blocked as “Abusive”.  The Right Wing sites do not allow voices or links of dissention.  Even after several attempts, the filters either discard my opinion or the ones that do get through are immediately attacked by blind followers as Left-Wing Radicalism instead of a point of view to be considered and then intelligently argued.  Is this the return to our forefathers’ ideals they continually profess as part of their American “good old days” reclamation? 

When I write, I look for citations to support my thoughts but even a hyperlink to the Times or Post can no longer be trusted to tell the real facts.  All I can do as a citizen is put onto laptop reasoned deduction through dutiful research of multiple sources and try to distinguish the facts from the deception.  All I can do is quote the live feeds from YouTube and even they have in the past, been altered to promote a skewed view.  The real news now lies outside the U.S.  Like our industry, products are now looked to outside our borders for the best value.

For those of you who have been convinced by our corporate media that America is righteous and the Middle East filled with the demons of Muhammad, I offer to you the following excerpt from an Al-Jazeerah website for consideration:

From the article “How Wrong Thinking Has Misled Humanity”

By Mahboob A. Khawaja

“Peace is sought against war:  Knowledge against ignorance, truth against falsehood, day against night, right from wrong and so on.  After the end of the horrifying human sufferings during the two world wars, the humanity hoped for sustainable peace and human enrichment of co-existence and friendly relations across the globe. Not so, it was just a hollow dream, an illusion of the left-over humanity tarnished by the draconian warlords of the Western world with complacency of the authoritarian Muslim rulers- the bootlickers of the Western game of political power. There are too many pretensions for peace and services to the humanity. For more than sixty years, Arabs have done it, Israelis have longed it, West European and the US have professed it and the former Community bloc led by now the dead USSR tried to copycat the scenario of peace and friendship often marked with timetable - Twenty Year Friendship Treaty, as if the doomsday was suppose to follow after the time expiry of the treaty. Could anyone be held accountable for cruelty and deception to the well being goals for the humanity?” 

“The Western policy makers claim power (knowledge and material possessions) and have used it to pave the ways for influence and hegemonic control over the rest of the world. The Two World Wars and now the US-British led “war on terrorism” are the outcome of that absurd thinking. The others less fortunate in knowledge and material possessions (power) – the generally described Third World (not sure, who are the club members of the First World and where is the 2nd World), a connotation full of sarcastic formula and inhuman thought serves the interest of the policy planning agenda in the superpowers chess board game.”

Yes, this author is truly evil to want peace and to see the reality of how easily the Western World can skew the perspective of its sheeple.  (Note the sarcasm.)

The sad ending

There are many reasons that our people believe the lies and feed the War Machine with passivity but first and foremost, it is the simple fact that Americans are increasingly clinging to ignorance as a safety measure to escape acknowledgement of the changing governmental tides toward fascism.  For too long most have gotten by on full speed stupid without a clue to the real experiences of the rest of the world and have based their limited views upon popular media explanations without question of whether they were being told the truth. As long as the bills were paid and the materialistic desires of their Neanderthal level pleasures were met, questioning the governmental initiatives was not necessary. 

The reality of our present situation is so disheartening that I dare not spend too much time thinking about it else go mad.  When America seriously considers a gun toting, fish clubbing, poor English speaking, half term Governor as an intelligent choice for President of the United States and leader of the “Free World” is the day I reconsider my allegiance to this once great Nation.

Where will it end?  Are we next to consider Big Bird as Vice President or listen to the rantings of Rush Limbaugh as the Gospel of a people?  There is a great problem in our modern American landscape and whether it is attributed to the ignorance of its people or the purposeful misdirection of its news sources, there needs to occur a mass rebellion to create the real change our Nation desperately needs.  It has become painfully obvious that even our greatest hopefuls in the political realm cannot deliver. 

I often ask myself where the heroes have gone but then I think of the words of Mike Bellah, “Our best heroes are still ordinary people, people who--because of their courage, integrity, faith and compassion--do extraordinary things every day.” Whatever we have to do, we must do it soon and each of us must become heroes in order to combat the exponentially growing, Great American Deception else lose all that this Great Nation once was and can potentially be again.  This coming New Year is sure to bring either great change or great oppression.  Which would you prefer?

Read also: Where Our Heroes Have Gone