Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold stoutly to a worldview despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality.
Lyndon Johnson was thirteen of the most interesting and difficult men I ever met. He could be as couth as he was uncouth, as magnanimous as malicious, at times proud and sensitive, at times paranoid and darkly uneasy with himself. Freud would have had a field day with him.
Having lost faith in all else, zealots have nothing left but a holy cause to please a warrior God. They win if we become holy warriors, too; if we kill the innocent as they do; strike first at those who had not struck us.
The most encouraging sign is that 71 percent of the public believe the system is profoundly corrupted by the power of money. Ninety-six percent of the people believe it’s “important” that we reduce the influence of money.
America’s corporate and political elites now form a regime of their own and they’re privatizing democracy. All the benefits – the tax cuts, policies and rewards flow in one direction: up.
Yet 91 percent think it’s “not likely” that its influence will be lessened. Think about that: People know what’s right to do yet don’t think it can or will be done.
We have got to nurture the spirit of independent journalism in this country, or we’ll not save capitalism from its own excesses, and we’ll not save democracy from its own inertia.
We have to face the unpleasant as well as the affirmative side of the human story, including our own story as a nation, our own stories of our peoples.
Jon Stewart is a remarkable satirist and parodist in the vein of Mark Twain, because Jon Stewart understands what Mark Twain knew, which is that the truth goes down more easily in a democracy when it’s marinated in humor.
