Where to Begin (a "Truth Project" worthy of the name)? (#5)

Over the years, my thinking on why I should bother have developed and gotten clearer.

Theoretically,  with the Internet, we have immediate access to almost infinitely more "information" than was at our fingertips even 30 years ago.  But most people will probably agree that "most people" (but a different "most people" from themselves) are systematically mislead by information sources they trust.

Where to Begin (a "Truth Project" worthy of the name)? (#4)

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties. Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning (1605), Book I, v, 8. [Link on the right is to a free Kindle version - help yourself]

Over the years, my thinking on why I should bother have developed and gotten clearer.  Like most pithy sayings, Francis Bacon's overstates the case.  Still, I like it.

Where to Begin? #3

"I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power."

--Thomas Jefferson to W. Jarvis, 1820.

Where to Begin? #2

The vast majority of people would prefer a simple comfortable life.  Why are so many diverted into some radically different, destructive and self-destructive path?

Where to begin?

It is December 3, 11 years after "9/11".  What is the world like today?  There are so many contradictory opinions.

My Right Wing Dad - Great Resource, but ...

I took a look at the latest on MyRightWingDad.com, namely http://myrightwingdad.blogspot.com/2012/11/fw-america-pronounces-judgment-on-itself.html (it may not be the "latest" by the time you read this).

This blog does a great service simply by bringing to light a lot of the misinformation that gets circulated in anonymous emails, which urge the reader, if a "true American" to forward it to as many other upstanding Americans as possible.  The fact that citizen X receives this email from Aunt Sally, clearly seems to weaken the skepticism you'd normally have about anonymous claims coming out of nowhere.

Sic Semper Tyrannis

I've been mulling over how these words are floating around on the web.  It is Latin for "Thus always to tyrants" or something to that affect.  Since it is most famous for having been shouted by John Wilkes Booth as he killed Abraham Lincoln, and supposed (by some) to have been said by one or more of Caesar's assassins, the implication is that tyrants always are, or should be, killed.

Why this phrase?  A huge segment of the American public has convinced themselves that Obama is the worst tyrant ever to "reign" in America.  Google the phrase and you will get 100s of thousands of links which at a first look seem to be to right wing blogs, etc.