Karen: Julian Assange seems to operate on some antiquated idea — probably picked up in his high-school classes — that our political system is akin to a “democracy,” with a truthfully informed public being essential to its functioning. This is why the First Amendment was the first enumerated of “rights” in the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson expressed the point in these words: “I am…for freedom of the press, and against all violations of the Constitution to silence by force and not by reason the complaints or criticisms, just or unjust, of our citizens against the conduct of their agents.”
But such thinking has been outdated by our modern corporate-state plutocracy. What members of the public know and think is, at best, irrelevant; at worst, it can be downright dangerous to the security (read “national security”) of the ruling classes. The modern role of the mainstream media is not to keep people fully informed, but entertained, so as to distract their attentions from what is being done to them by “their agents.” The state’s monopoly on the use of violence can only be maintained by its monopoly on the thinking of men and women, a purpose served by government schools, the media, and other establishment voices. Such ends are served by Mark Twain’s observation that “Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.” They are also reflected in the modern epistemological standard that a lie is as good as the truth, if you can get people to believe it!
9:55 am on July 26, 2010
