Political Abuse

Wed Jan 25 20:16:29 CST 2017

Surkov. Now that is truly intriguing.  Sounds reasonably Machiavellian, so right in line with current republican political favorite inspirational figures. In the interest of fair play it was  under Truman the democrat that ex Nazis were recruited into the CIA . US PR industry drew heavily on Nazi propaganda, too. Effective ideas for gaining and keeping power are  still a growth industry.  

This entire discussion on gas lighting, propaganda and cynicism could almost persuade a confirmed quaker moralist and naive artist like myself that his own tactics for keeping head above water  have not been so foolish after all. ( qi gong daily, try to be nice and apologize when I turn into an asshole, talk to birds( they are very cheerful and spirit up-lifting), include love crazy mystics in my reading habits, play music, make art, enjoy and love lover,  talk to children and friends, try to be morally consistent,  remember and cherish and if possible revisit those times of immersion in universal consciousness and peaceful bliss.)( occasionally a joint is good to stimulate and  enjoy my admittedly weird  sense of humor) 

I’m not at all sure the confusion produced by many different sources, MSM, military messages, commercial messages, entertainment fantasies, Trump, Surkov, Clinton etc.  is intentional, but it is very effective at allowing forceful lies to dominate. It seems as likely that they are all fields where expert mixes of sex, truth and lies is the coin of the realm and the competition is fierce. The net effect is an unpleasant confusion that serves the predators among us through the human desire for retreat into personal security and comfort and the variations on what that means from person to person. The fact that personal security and comfort and the money addiction it serves doesn’t really satisfy  and the fact that escape is an impossible delusion on an interconnected planet is where we find ouselves. Stuck with the other monkeys on a planet without a plan and a bizarre belief that only something we call banks are real. Maybe we are just gtting to where there is no more road to kick the can down, just a minefield left over from the good old days.

Signing off for now from my personal free press. 
. 

> On Jan 25, 2017, at 5:34 PM, John Bailey <sundayjb at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> My introduction to Surkov was via this really memorable podcast
> (Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything) which puts forward some
> possible direct links between Surkov and Trump (story begins around
> 16:50, juicy Trump bit begins at 23:15)
> https://soundcloud.com/bwalker/useful-idiots
>> From wikipedia:
> "Some outside Russia, such as Ned Reskinoff of ThinkProgress, and Adam
> Curtis in the BBC documentary HyperNormalisation, have claimed that
> Surkov's unique blend of politics and reality have begun to affect
> countries outside of Russia, most notably the United States with the
> choosing of Donald Trump for the 2016 US Republican nomination and
> Trump's subsequent campaign and election victory.
> 
> In an editorial for the London Review of Books quoted by Curtis, Peter
> Pomerantsev describes Putin's Russia thus:
> In contemporary Russia, unlike the old USSR or present-day North
> Korea, the stage is constantly changing: the country is a dictatorship
> in the morning, a democracy at lunch, an oligarchy by suppertime,
> while, backstage, oil companies are expropriated, journalists killed,
> billions siphoned away. Surkov is at the centre of the show,
> sponsoring nationalist skinheads one moment, backing human rights
> groups the next. It's a strategy of power based on keeping any
> opposition there may be constantly confused, a ceaseless
> shape-shifting that is unstoppable because it's indefinable.
> — Peter Pomerantsev, in "Putin's Rasputin", London Review of Books
> issue of 20 October 2011 [8]
> 
> Curtis claims that Trump used a similar strategy to become president
> of the United States, and hints that Trump's Surkovian origins caused
> Putin to express his admiration for Trump in Russian media."
> 
> On Thu, Jan 26, 2017 at 1:38 AM, Gary Webb <gwebb8686 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/11/hidden-author-putinism-russia-vladislav-surkov/382489/?utm_source=twb
>> 
>> Old article from 2014. Eerily prescient today...
>> 
>> Sent from my iPhone
>> 
>> On Jan 25, 2017, at 9:08 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> http://www.nbcnews.com/health/mental-health/some-experts-say-trump-team-s-falsehoods-are-classic-gaslighting-n711021
>> 
>> MENTAL HEALTH
>> JAN 25 2017, 8:55 AM ET
>> 
>> Some Experts Say Trump Team’s Falsehoods Are Classic ‘Gaslighting’
>> 
>> 
>> The behavior has all the signs of "gaslighting", says clinical psychologist
>> Bryant Welch, who wrote a 2008 book entitled "State of Confusion: Political
>> Manipulation and the Assault on the American Mind".
>> 
>> Gaslighting refers to a 1944 film in which a murdering husband manipulates
>> and confuses his wife by dimming the gas lights in their home and then
>> denying it's happening.
>> 
>> "The very state of confusion they are creating is a political weapon in and
>> of itself," Welch told NBC News.
>> 
>> "If you make people confused, they are vulnerable. By definition they don't
>> know what to do," added Welch, who has not personally examined any of the
>> Trump team.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Wed, Jan 25, 2017 at 6:22 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Oh, but you do?  Again, that misses the point at the heart of
>>> 'gaslighting," AKA political abuse.  It is NOT the same as a con.
>>> 
>>> David Morris
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Wednesday, January 25, 2017, ish mailian <ishmailian at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> A lot of the discussion about how the people who voted for Trump see
>>>> themselves, how they view their position in the nation, in the nation's
>>>> history and so on and how capitalism has, saturated their views, their
>>>> hearts and minds, this is a kind of collective subjectivity sure. Trump
>>>> understands this and most of his critics don't understand that he
>>>> understands this and thus they don't understand him.
>>>> 
>>>> On Tue, Jan 24, 2017 at 4:51 PM, Mike Weaver <mike.weaver at zen.co.uk>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'd have said this applies as much to ways of Western capitalism as it
>>>>> does to authoritarian regimes. The hoo ha about alt facts/false news seems
>>>>> to me to be a sign that the longstanding consensus (Gramsci's collective
>>>>> subjective) is breaking down, and the general populace is becoming open to
>>>>> different narratives as they look for fresh certainties to underpin their
>>>>> day to day lives. How much these narratives cleave to longer term realities
>>>>> are not as important as their appeal to shorter term emotional needs.
>>>>> 
>>>>> On 24-Jan-17 4:10 PM, David Morris wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> http://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/01/22/is-shawn-spicer-gaslighting-the-press/
>>>>> 
>>>>> The truly horrible thing about propaganda in authoritarian regimes is
>>>>> not that it convinces the true believers, but that it demoralizes opponents
>>>>> by saying in effect: “Yes, we know that you know we are lying, but we don’t
>>>>> care! We do it because we can and you can’t stop us!” As for the majority of
>>>>> apolitical citizens, it infects them with a corrosive cynicism and dissuades
>>>>> them from all forms of public engagement. Apathy may be a more powerful
>>>>> silencer of dissent than overt physical coercion.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> ________________________________
>>>>> 
>>>>> This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
>>>>> www.avast.com
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>> 
>> 
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