Aristotle, Curiosity, and the Mainstream Media
In 1850, Palmerston sent British warships to the Aegean to recompense and protect a Gibraltar-born British citizen whose house had been burnt by the Greeks. In 2012, Barack Obama stands by while four Americans are murdered by terrorists in Libya and then blames the event on an internet video. Who? When? What? Where are the contemporary Woodwards and Bernsteins hot on the trail on this pullulating story? Why aren’t scores of journalists running this one to earth, badgering their sources, burrowing into the interstices of this story? Watergate was a pathetic little burglary. No one suffered a scratch. Benghazi is, or should be, an international incident. Four Americans were murdered by terrorists on the anniversary of the biggest terrorist attack on the United States in history. The president and his minions, ever mindful of protecting their pacific narrative about the Arab Spring (to say nothing of their vigilant protection of their prospects for reelection), stand by in supine inactivity while a few hundred RPG-equipped hordes batter our consulate, finally, after seven and a half hours, overcoming their valiant resistance. Our drones were in the air, capturing the event in real time. We had an AC130 airship in the vicinity that was not called on. A squadron of F18s, less than an hour away in Italy, were not scrambled. Why? Why were those Americans left to die? Who told the president? When did he learn about the attack? What were his orders? Why don’t we have the answers to those questions? Why aren’t those questions printed daily on the front pages of The New York Times?
Even to ask those questions is to answer them, sort of. We know the answer. It is “politics,” political expedience. It would not serve the Leftist agenda, therefore Ambassador Chris Stevens and his colleagues had to die and we had to pretend it was no big deal, or if it was a big deal it was all the fault of an obscure internet video about a medieval warlord who may or may not have existed.
“All men by nature desire to know”—except if they work for The New York Times, The Washington Post, etc., and the subject of inquiry is politically inconvenient. “All the news that fits our agenda,” that’s the real, if unstated, motto of The New York Times and its kindred “news” organizations.
Which brings me to my second point. Richard Miniter, in that morning panel, outlined how it was that big stories became big stories, how thinly sourced they often were, and how they required the active involvement of a handful of editors and organs like the Times and and The Washington Post. Over the course of this past election, one heard—and I was among those proclaiming—that alternatives to the (formerly) mainstream media were much more prominent now than in 2008 and that therefore organs like the Times, the Post, etc., now had real competition. They no longer set the agenda, but, powerful though those teetering enterprises were, they were merely one voice among many.
The first proposition is true. Internet entities, prominently including PJ Media, do offer real and increasing competition to those legacy outlets. But the second proposition, alas, is not true: a tiny handful of organs, conspicuously including the Times, still sets the agenda for what is news. The idea that “new media” has emerged as a serious rival is, as Miniter said, “a myth.”
I do not say this gladly. I wish Miniter were wrong. But my observation of what just happened in this election, and what has not happened in the (non) coverage of Benghazi, convinces me that he is correct. So I can take scant consolation from John Nolte’s insistence that “new media” made a big difference in the election. True, he acknowledged, we didn’t win—but our loss would have been larger had there not been internet sites from Breitbart and Drudge to PJ Media and Red State purveying “the rest of the story.” Maybe so. Nolte admitted that “new media” could not—not yet—set the agenda, but it was, he argued, a potent weapon in shooting down false narratives. Again, maybe so. But the biggest false narrative of this past election was that Mitt Romney was an insensitive plutocrat out of touch with the common man. The whole “Bain-Capital-is-Evil” meme was tirelessly and successful pursued by the Obama campaign. It was less than ridiculous. It was a patent, malevolent lie. Romney never managed to counter it, and neither did we. So much the worse for us, and for the country.
It was all aptly explained by Machiavelli, who advised those who would destroy a nation to put a young, charismatic man in power – the public, fawning, would forgive his mistakes. “Oh, but he’s so niiiiiice!”
Cute. Benghazi. As if nothing before. As if not SOP among people in exclusive gentlemens clubs immune from teaching moments/penalty for their whatever it’s called these days.
Gotta watch those people who name themselve feel your pain compassionates. Or is it liberals, aka progressives, aka socialists whose primary interest is the good of the people? Those champions of the poor and disadvantaged the oppressed just wanting to live free. Those expert in the madness of crowds that can be manipulated for advantage
The Dark Charisma of Adolf Hitler: Leading Millions into the Abyss by Laurence Rees.
Odd that the swastika is black and red.
Plus ca change…
Hey Chicago Tribune, what kinda Journalism is that?
http://illinoispaytoplay.com/2012/12/12/hey-chicago-tribune-what-kinda-journalism-is-that/
The truth is he’s not a nice guy. He’s a petty little spoiled bitch
And I’ll tell you from where Machiavelli got it: from Prophet Isaiah: (3:4,5,6,…)
“And I will give you children to be their princes, and tricks shall rule over them.
And the people shall be oppressed, everyone by another, and everyone by his neighbor: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient etc)
Machiavelli was a great connoisseur of the Old Testament and the Scriptures.
And that old imperialist? Rudyard Kipling in his The Gods of The Copybook Headings.
All there, concrete, easy enough for even the leftist intellectuals and putative constitutional scholars and worshippers to understand.
Thanks, Roger, for a fine article and I wish this conference were recorded.
Maybe it is, I will try to find it.
Your comments about The Times and the Washpo are accurate but one can count on one hand the intrepid journalists on network
tv other than the journalists at Fox.
Maybe, Jake Tapper.
Where are the rest?
One has to target NBC as the main culprit.
Remember how it was argued sometime ago that a centralization of media power under new FCC rules would lead to better journalism.
We have Jack Welch, that cuddly little leprechaun, for that.
Now the power behind the peacock is Comcast and Roberts Family who not only put up with this leftist network but work to enhance it.
Know the enemies !
Name the enemies !
Hypothesis: They aren’t curious because the already know the truth in broad outlines.
As against this there’s H.L. Mencken’s conviction that for most people “the truth is indistinguishable from a migraine headache.”
Take your pick.
I love this topic, and the squelching of curiosity is the main theme of my website. For instance, see http://clarespark.com/2012/05/24/curiosity-and-the-femme-fatalejew/.
Popular culture barrages us with images of eccentric puzzle solvers, who lack compassion. That is a dreadful distortion of seekers after truth.
Yes, mankind IS still curious and wants to know, but there is a brutal force out there that doesn’t want us to know, and the price for pressing the issue can be disaster. That force is given support by an army of witless voters, and until a large part of them feel that price, they will remain oblivious. Can we be that far from an armed insurrection?
Aristotle was right, Roger, but your obsession with Obama is blinding you to that fact.
What you are missing is that for most of us Benghazi was a tragedy, and what we wanted (and still want) is to better understand how we can prevent further such tragedies.
But for yourself and much of the right Benghazi was not a tragedy – it was an opportunity. Nowhere was that more true than at PJM which monetized Benghazi like nobodies business, bringing in multiple mil-fiction writers to weave new theories about that day. But beyond the opportunity for personal/corporate gain, Benghazi was also seen by many as an opportunity to take revenge on that person for which all is now to be blamed, the President.
Nowhere is that more clear than in your three questions, none of which had anything to do with Benghazi the attack, but concerned only Obama the individual.
This is the kind of personalized celebrity-driven worldview that I expect to find in People magazine, not a political news outlet.
And that lack of self-awareness, the inability to see that you’ve lost sight of 4 dead Americans behind that dart-board of the President’s face, ultimjately led you down the primrose path to the land of conspiracy.
“Scandal”. “Coverup”! “Juicy”!!
I can see the People cover layout coming to life before my eyes…
Aha! So because we’re baffled and horrified that the Commander-In-Chief of America’s armed forces appears to have done nothing whatsoever to defend Americans — Foreign Service employees! — from a ravening mob that would eventually kill them, our inquiries into that are merely political shafts aimed at an adversary! Because we care about those lost lives — and because we utterly reject the notion that being nice to savages will magically transform them into civilized men — we are suddenly demoted to mere seekers after Obama’s scalp!
This is the oldest of all the tropes employed by American Leftists: to recharacterize an inquiry into causation with a personal vendetta. The usual form it takes is, of course, a cry of “Racism!!!!” But whatever the form, the content is utterly contemptible — as are you, “General.”
Tso, if you are not a MSM “journalist”, you should be. You have the grandiloquent skills of a budding Walter Duranty.
Perhaps if Benghazi had been a one time thing, a mistake, an aborition…perhaps you would be right. But after four years of incidents with the same lack of concern; “oopsie” is not a suficiant response.
The doctor in Pakistan that helped us find and kill Bin Ladin.
The Marine in Mexico.
The border gaurds.
to name just three.
At some point the learning curve has to be over and responsibility must be taken.
So apparently your argument is that any media outlet such as PJM that holds the view that those in a position of ultimate responsibility should be held accountable are basically just evil money grubbers since they have found a market among those who seek the truth. Is that it? Well then, what about folks like the multi-million dollar compensated Brian Williams who gives us misleading drivel dressed up as news? He doesn’t seem to wish to have our attention directed to the one of ultimate responsibility (Obama) when things go wrong. Is he the one to whom we should turn our attention? But then he’s making big money at it. You say that’s bad. I’m confused. And, so too, is the General it seems.
“what we wanted (and still want) is to better understand how we can prevent further such tragedies.”
Really? Gee wiz then, let’s talk to all the Americans who did survive the attack so we can learn the details and prevent them in the future. Have you seen any of them interviewed on the news or speaking to Congress? Nope.
In fact, Congress can’t talk to these people because the State Department is hiding them. Your tragedy stinks of lies.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/12/12/Chaffetz-Benghazi-State-Dept
TSO–
You are correct on both counts. Yes, Aristotle is right. Man’s and each individual man’s daily survival depends upon knowledge. Our survival depends upon correctly observing and interpreting reality. Also, you are correct when you say the right wanted to use the Benghazi tragedy to discredit Obama to hurt his chances in the election.
The point still remains: is it a legitimate discretization. You did not address that point. It is not enough to discredit the President’s critiques in this affair by saying they simply has an ax to grind. We all have our motivations that may or may not relate to finding the truth. So why did you not address the question: Could the administration have reasonably prevented this tragedy by offering proper support both before and after the events commenced? Your bias is found in that you go out of your way to come to a right leaning blog for the sole purpose to discount the legitimacy of a reasonable question.
Thankfully, we all know that General Tso is nothing but chicken and a cloying sauce. There’s no beef there, no substance. Certainly no mind.
I like the way you apply the verbal lash, Rob Crawford.
Sadly, your target probably will lack the sense to know when he’s been whipped.
Why devote any words at all to needling this “General Tso” troll?
“what we wanted (and still want) is to better understand how we can prevent further such tragedies”
If you’re curious, you might study criminology. Basically, it boils down to: be vigilant, be prepared, and effectively defend yourself. The ones you kill won’t be around to attack you again, the others thinking about attacking you will be less inclined to do so knowing the price they are likely to pay, and the friendlies will also respect you as a kindred spirit and current or potential ally.
But to know the best particular defensive preparations and measures to take, one must examine how you were attacked, and how your defenses, if any, failed.
The trouble is that you (and the Obummer regime) are refusing to carry out or co-operate in the examination.
Then again, one must consider whether it was a success or a failure. That depends on your goals. Perhaps, we’re making a mistake in believing that the goal is for US diplomatic and military personnel over-seas to be secure from such attacks. Perhaps Obummer and his regime had other goals. If so, we need to seek out and examine those goals. Perhaps those goals were reasonable and ethical and constitutional, and perhaps they were/are not.
Roger, it is not their lack of curiosity but it is their fealty to leftist/Islamist dogma.
And to the left their dogma is uber alles – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/12/11/benghazigates-truths-ensnaring-some-leftist-media-admitting-that-qadaffis-main-beneficiary-is-al-qaeda-addendum-to-benghazigates-stink-bombs-commentary-by-adina-kutnicki/…but that doesn’t mean that some snippets of truth telling aren’t seeping through. Not at all.
Re your:
“….but that doesn’t mean that some snippets of truth telling aren’t seeping through. Not at all.”
Why don’t we hear more about them? These seeped snippets need a lot of amplification and broadcasting before they dry up. Are we really so short of conservative investigative reporters and sponsored platforms for these good folks?
That quip of H.L.Menken’s is not really true. Our “migraine” seems to be a lack of stentorian, clarion, crashing [anybody think of more good adjectives?] voices and their commercial sponsors.
Where is, for example, a new Ross Perot? He had the testicles to mount his own rescue mission for his employees in Iran, if my memory is intact.
Where is the vocal conservative cash?
My rabbi said: Only 1% of people actually think. another 4% think that they are thinking. They try but don’t succeed. And the rest of the 95% would rather die than think.
The alternative media is used by those inquisitive enough to search out for the truth. Our problem lies with the dumbing down of the culture. They get their information by saturation osmosis from the MSM. They do not have to think.
So, maybe Glenn Reynold’s idea is the way to go — from “Where big GOP bucks could matter” in the NY Post (http://tinyurl.com/amlgngh):
“Mitt Romney and the GOP lost, but it wasn’t for lack of money. They spent a lot; they just didn’t get enough bang for the buck.
Billionaire Sheldon Adelson alone donated $150 million. But Romney lost anyway, especially among unmarried women.
Which is why I think that rich people wanting to support the Republican Party might want to direct their money somewhere besides TV ads that copy, poorly, what Lee Atwater did decades ago.
My suggestion: Buy some women’s magazines. No, really. Or at least some women’s Web sites.
One of the groups with whom Romney did worst was female ‘low-information voters.’ Those are women who don’t really follow politics, and vote based on a vague sense of who’s mean and who’s nice, who’s cool and who’s uncool.”
The anti-Journalism “Journalists”.
It does seem that reporters are less and less able or inclined to ask even the most obvious questions. Or maybe it’s that fewer and fewer reporters are able or willing. What happened to the fast-talking, aggressive reporters focused on getting a scoop, that we see in the old movies?
A friend of mine was a newspaper editor in the 1980s and 1990s, and I used to get after him on occasion. He liked to share one or two of his favorite stories, the ones he was most proud of writing or co-writing, and at least a quarter of the time there were, to me, obvious holes, missing pieces of information. Sometimes, they just hadn’t thought of asking; they’d come at the subject from a totally different direction. A couple times, they didn’t want to risk intimidating a valuable source. Sometimes it was merely dead-lines.
More recently, with on-line content and e-mail addresses and comment forms like this one, lots of people wonder why the reporter hadn’t asked certain questions, or why he hadn’t gotten a more detailed clarification of something. Usually, they answer that they just hadn’t thought of it. Rarely, if you spoon-feed them the data, cite government sources (occasionally a scientific journal article will do), they’ll make a correction or addition. Sometimes.
But isn’t that why the -who what when where how why- guideline was developed and taught in “journalism” classes at colleges and universities? (Speaking of which, why does anyone think it requires a college degree to be a good reporter? Garrumph. Hyper-credentialism everywhere.)
I’m sure this Benghazi thing will be an actual scandal any time now…
Boris-
Would you care to offer your snide remark to anyone of the family members who were killed?
regardless of the context, Boris is right. Neither the media nor anyone in DC cares about Benghazi, and that would be the case even if Romney had won. For the Repubs to bang the drum brings forth the predictable sour grapes argument; had the GOP won the White House, the call would have been for a fresh start and an end to partisan rancor. Either way, the families of the dead have been told to go to hell, much like the Border Patrol agent and any number of Mexicans killed as a result of F&F.
Boris–
Would you care to offer your remark to any of the family members killed?
It’s not just the dumbing down of the culture. It’s the deliberate assault on secondary symbol systems like phonetic reading and math in favor of the spoken and the visual. Especially the seizingly graphic visual. Did you know video gaming is about to be regular classroom activity because it is engaging to the students and involves personal interaction? Imagine they are 15 and will have 3 years of that and then be able to vote in 2016. Where will their knowledge come from in an education system trying to minimize knowledge, the rational, abstract mind, and habituate responding from emotion?
I think it was about reelection but it is more than that. During the Cold War the Communists aspired to reframe the consciousness of the West to convince enough of us to eliminate nuclear weapons and believe in the basic goodness of humanity. The Berlin Wall may be down but the noetic assault never ceased. You think UNESCO or the NEA are giving up such aspirations of control? http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/oh-good-grief-now-i-need-to-know-what-a-noetic-system-is-because-it-is-under-attack/
So that mental and full personality assault is still going on in K-12, especially now with the poorly understood Common Core and other Obama ed initiatives, and in higher ed. But on a parallel track is Islam as the largest voting bloc in the UN with, as Andy McCarthy describes so well, real aspirations for hegemony over the West. It wants to take down the rational mind of the Enlightenment and any aspirations of individuality as well. So the UN noetic assault works well for their ultimate intentions too.
How nice. That’s already what UNESCO is quietly pursuing via education globally. Using the accreditation agencies and their monopoly stamp of approval as its proxy for enforcing compliance. These things may be news to us but many people in the UN or serving in the Obama Administration or on the Board of large foundations or heading up colleges have all been in meetings where such “transformations” are openly described.
So natural curiousity is being smothered by the visual, emotional, make the curriculum about the world’s problems and the need for radical Transformation. The mindset that was cultivated for malleability to Transformative political, social, and economic change in the West is basically defenseless against assaults from any direction.
At some point we are going to have a showdown between the Radical Left’s aspirations and those who would seek a 21st century Caliphate in the West. Right now they seem to be united in a Common Goal of first strangling the Western Axemaker Mind and creating an emotional belief in the primacy of the Common Good. Plus the environmentalists are pushing the same goal to prevent additional technology to “exploit” nature.
The media is the third leg of this coordinated communication assault on the psyche. Advertising & Entertainment and education being the other two legs. MSM knows their assigned role in this new Corporatist coordination with Government Planners economy. It’s why Immelt and others are so openly comfortable with the China model.
This was a long response but it’s not just about breaking through the MSM blockade. The noetic assault that goes after future and current voters starts early and from many directions. It’s not just that they have been cultivated to be dumb. It’s cultivated to be emotional with x five things as the ideas that should set that emotion and a need to take action off.
How politically useful. So it’s time for us to understand it better.
Thanks, well said.
BRAVO!
I will just point out that having military assets doesn’t mean they can be used at short notice. This is true of ground and aviation assets. If the assets are not on an alert status, and it appears that there were no alert assets in the area, they would not be ready for deployment for at least 6 hours (how long would it take you to arm airplanes, go home and pack your deployment bags and get back to base, gather specific intelligence and plan a mission, etc)
This simply begs the root question of why, with all the trouble in the area, there were no hot seat assets available?
There were plenty of assets nearby. Assets in Sicily, an entire Airborne Brigade in Italy, a Marine FAST in Spain, Spec Ops in Africa, Navy in the Med. They DIDN’T WANT a rescue because… AQ captives, weapons deals, general incompetence? An actual reporter would be trying to find out the answers.
The question nobody asks – why were 2 General Officers in the area relieved of command that day (or very shortly thereafter)? AFRICOM commander General Carter Ham was relieved (and allegedly arrested for activating his Special Ops Group for a rescue) on 9-11. Rear Adm. Charles Gaouette commander of the Stennis Carrier Group was relieved the a couple of days later.
Why 2 of the highest ranking officers in the area relieved of command that week? What the hell happened? Why isn’t anyone in the press curious?
Good question, Old Soldier, true investigative reporters would have a field day unravelling this mess, this tragedy.
They could also look into the other Generals and Commanders who have recently been exposed for compromising behavior and either fired, Gen Sinclair and Navy Commander Darlak, or disgraced, Petreous and Allen. They could find out whether the excesses of both, former Africa Command, Gen Kip Ward and, the head of U.S. European Command, Adm. James Stavridis do indeed deserve to have the Pentagon investigation.
Perhaps all these commanders and high officers are bad apples.
Although, I just read that Stavridis was cleared, but his career has been harmed.
( “Last year, he was a top contender for the job of chief of naval operations — the Navy’s most senior military leader. And many considered him an eventual candidate for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
But as rumors about the inspector general’s investigation swirled last year, top Pentagon and U.S. leaders, including then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates, decided not to recommend Stavridis for the Navy post.”
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2012/11/ap-admiral-james-stavridis-cleared-misconduct-110812/)
Perhaps, too, the timing with which they are found to be bad apples is a coincidence.
Maybe it is. Maybe commanders are falling down on their honor all the time and it flies under the radar usually.
But there also could be a story there.
Hey, this was September 11, in a country where there had just been a violent revolution – and we didn’t have forces already on alert? That’s the problem right there.
Obamunists are trying to lie their way out of Benghazi, just like they try to lie their way out of everything that puts them in a negative light.
I say keep on demanding the truth. Keep taunting the lying Democrats for not coming clean with the threat you won’t let this go away just because the main stream media left us years ago and won’t report on critical issues like Behghazigate.
In other words, beat up a Democrat for Christmas. Use logic, common sense and everything else at your disposal that puts the pressure on the Democrats to come clean.
Beat up a Democrat for Christmas.
Did that for Thanksgiving. House will be loaded with Dem’s for Christmas as well so ready to roll.
And why was the ambassador in Benghazi in the first place? I’ve seen some obscure reports that he was making arrangements with Turkish representatives to move US supplied arms to the rebels in Syria- rebels who are, perhaps Islamist, or even Al Qaeda. Clearly not advocates for democracy.
And who wrote the final version of the so-called talking points that were so deceptive? In retrospect, they sound so political that David Axelrod should warrant a few pointed question. His name has never been connected in any way to this story.
Yes, it would have been a great story if it were dealt with honestly and aggressively, but alas, the mainstream media reserves such enthusiasm for the political right.
I spent last week vacationing in Charlottesville, VA and visited Jefferson’s Monticello. In the front reception hall are a number of maps. Another visitor asked the guide why there were so many, including one of Africa. The guide gave a generic response I couldn’t stand it and I spoke up. I told the whole group they shouldn’t be surprised at the Africa map since Jefferson was the first president to stand up to Muslim terrorism in the form of the Barbary pirates who demanded tribute from the U.S. to stop attacking and kidnapping Americans. The others all gave me a blank look and I asked if anyone had heard of Triopli–in Libya! Blank and/or surprised looks and a quick pivot by the tour guide. Ignorance runs rampant, but those tourists can all put a check next to “Visited Monticello” on their to-do vacation list.
Good for you. Should a similar occasion arise in the future, you might want to try and explain to the ignorant and befuddled that the expedition against the Barbary pirates is the reason “the shores of Tripoli” are referenced in the Marine Corps hymn.
Jefferson wasn’t waging a war against militant Islam, he was waging a war against pirates. FFS, leave everybody alone.
Tripoli–sorry for the typo.
The MSM treats Obama as the ancients treated God. Their position is that He will reveal what we need to know in due time.
They do indeed, Michael.
Good point that in addition to simply worshipping him ( Can ANYONE tell me why? Anyone? Bueler? )and behaving with the uniformity of a single cell organism, the MSM trusts in his revelations.
So sad that rumors of the mainstream, monolithic, media’s demise were exaggerated and very premature … and, as a consequence, America falters.
And Romney just played their game along with them.
The Republicans could have torn Obama’s pretenses apart, but they refused to do their job.
The so-called mainstream media are left-wing propagandists pretending to be journalists. By now, this should be beyond dispute. They are not reputable or credible. They are merely cogs in the left-wing machinery whose job is to spew forth propaganda to further the leftist agenda or conversely to ignore or cover up developments that would hurt the agenda. The sooner everyone wraps their mind around this fact, the better off we will be, and it will make articles such as this one superfluous.
Mr. Kimball:
Where was the AC-130 Spectre based or loitering, and if you can establish a source of this info? This is crucial. Good article, thanks.
> “All men by nature desire to know”—except if they work for
> The New York Times, The Washington Post, etc. …
because they are not men in Aristotle’s sense.
For the alternative media to set the agenda two things need to happen. a)Ala cart cable/dish channel subscription. b) alternative TV media from news to entertainment. Once people have the chance to pick and choose the news and entertainment sources all those lefty propaganda outlets will have much smaller audience to spew their hateful misinformation. According to NCTA ‘http://www.ncta.com/Statistics.aspx’ there are 100 million cable customers only 30 million of them are HBO subscribers. If People have an option, how many of them will choose CNN, MSMBC, ABC, MTVT or any other gutter channel? If the center right wants to win it must win the media war first.
Exactly. With a la carte cable, the conservative majority’s preferences would acquire much greater importance. The multitude of biased left wing programs would be fighting over the 20% of the population that is far left, resulting in many media bankruptcy sales and growth of new outlests to serve the 40% of the public that leans right. Ending the forcEd purchasing of far left swill broadcast by the dying legacy media would quickly restore balance to our media.
With 30 governerships and a record number of state legislatures under Republican control, you’d think they’d be diligently working on this. But Nooo, not the stupid party. They’re too afraid of being mean to the democrats, who our out to enslave the public and sell us out to penury just as long as they get to be in charge…
Look in the mirror, oh Aristotelians, for the answer to your curiosity question. Why have you and your fellow comrades not explored why all of the media would not be covering and analyzing not just the Benghazi sordid event, but a whole host of other issues vital to the nation. What great cat has your tongue that you cannot mutter a guess. Perhaps you are afraid of the answer to your curious question. I know I am afraid, but at least I admit it.
I, for one, am extremely curious. Two question taunt me:
1 – How can the media behave so much like a single, solid organism? Okay, so there exists a party line, an overall party affiliation. How can there be but one, single, monolithic, if you will voice. Surely, normally, the reporters, as individuals would have differing points of view and there would be a rich mix of views and reports. But, no. MSM = uniformity.
2 – How can the individuals, qua individuals, within the MSM have treated GWB so terribly? And then turn around and, wiping the grimace off their faces, smarmily give BHO no difficulty at all for doing many of the exact same things? Are there really no individual thinkers among them? How far will they go in their support? The image of the media trying to describe a justifiable reason for BHO’s being discovered over a dead body, with the bloody weapon in his clutches, takes shape in one’s imagination.
Okay, I lied, three things:
3 – How scary is that?
“Aristotle went wrong in a few areas—biology is a conspicuous example”
Quite wrong. Aristotle was perhaps the greatest biologist who ever lived, so said Darwin, and so say biologists I have sent to read Aristotle.
I offer a polite demurral. I think there are more biologists who would disagree with Darwin, and name Darwin himself. Or perhaps Mendel, or Crick.
I would myself offer Aristotle as possibly, I say possibly, the greatest mind of the West. Not having taken polls this is certainly only one man’s opinion.
Outside of your little world, there’s is very little interest in Benghazi for the excellent reason that it was a minor event, a skirmish in a long war. I guess you could find some wider policy implications in what occurred—the cuts in State department spending probably made things like this marginally more likely—but even that’s a bit of a stretch.
You’re just looking for some sort of club to swing at the Democrats, and that is not exactly news. This piece is written in bad faith, and that’s not exactly news either.
There is a good point there. Obama (like Bush before him) simply sits around while Americans are being slaughtered by Islamist butchers every day.
Jim:
State Department funding (or lack thereof) was not an issue here per the testimony of administration officials.
The issue here is as detailed: a)why was additional security not provided, (b)if repeated incidents (Red Cross, IEDs, British envoy etc) why did the US Mission remain and c) What were our Muslim Dictator’s orders to rescue the diplomats, CIA and security personnel once attacked?
It that Simple Jim! Wake up!
I have decided to approach people like you in a new and more measured way.
Oh, it’s not that you are not a fool, and that I suffer fools gladly. You are a fool, and I do not suffer fools gladly, especially arrogant fools.
But you are a Child, with a Child’s understanding of the world. A child who is obstinate and does not wish to sit and be quiet and learn when the Adults are having a conversation, but a Child nonetheless.
This must make you a grave disappointment to your parents and anyone who has ever tried to teach you anything right down to Toilet Training.
But I will say this with all the patience I can muster: The President of the United States allowed 4 American Citizen to do, to allow one of them to be raped and torn to pieces by Assassins disguising themselves as an Angry Mob. He knew this would happen and did nothing to stop it.
Now, I know that a Petulant Child like yourself cannot understand such things. But this is what happened.
Now if you are not willing to sit down and listen and learn while Adults have an Adult Conversation, I suggest you go to the other room and eat some Playdough.
Actually, Jim, Kimball’s comments are spot on, and yours miss the point. Citizens who are first citizens, and only secondly on the left or on the right, depend on our journalists to get at the truth of any event, no matter who occupies the Oval Office. This the MSM have not done for four years. So here’s the test question: if, during the Bush Presidency, a U.S. Ambassador and three Americans had been slaughtered on the anniversary of 9/11 and about two months before a Presidential election, do you think our beloved MSM might have been curious as to why? Or would they, as you suggest, have simply regarded the event as “. . . a minor event, a skirmish in a long war. . .”? What say you, Jim?
You frustrated little people lash out blindly, but the rest of the country is tired of your manufactured scandals. Many of you are so besotted with ideology that that you actually believe that an American president is in cahoots with the Muslims. You also seem to think that any problem can be solved by the instant application of deadly force. In the Benghazi case, for example, you imagine that if you were in charge, you would have leveled the place as soon as you heard there was some sort of trouble as if going off half cocked when nobody knew what was going on would have been likely to help.
Well, as Cicero wrote long ago, “Against stupidity, the Gods themselves struggle in vain.” What chance do I have?
In “cahoots”? No Jim, Obama is Muslim, he is president and acts likes a dictator end of story…
Aristotle (and other western philosophers) hope that homo sapiens would evolve into more enlightened beings through the exercise of rational thought – and in doing so, achieve happiness.
Unfortunately, despite all the technological advancements, we have instead de-evolved into “monkeys wearing tennis shoes”.
Romney and his party certainly were out of touch with the needs of America.
For instance, Romney did not need the NYT when he could have hammered Obama with Benghazi on national TV. Romney continually let Obama off the hook for everything all through the campaign. It’s like it was an article of faith for Romney that nobody would believe anything not from the mainstream media, so he just needed to keep his mouth shut!
Exactly. One of the most aggravating idiocies of the 2012 GOP campaign was Romney’s enablers pretending that Romney’s foolish denial in the debate that Obama had called the Benghazi attack terrorism was anything other than totally dropping the ball, when the actual issues were the failures to prepare, or act, and the baseless invention of the assertion that the attack wasn’t pre-planned. Instead Romney muddied the water by accusing Obama of not doing the one thing he clearly -had- done, albeit with less emphasis than he should have. Obama said it in the Rose Garden speech, repeated it in shorter form in a later speech at an air force base, and made a -finding- that the attack was terrorism for the purpose of the relevant law. But Romney was too indifferent to the issue to get the facts straight, and so screwed up that issue too.
The MSM is at the top of my list!!
Oh, that’s not a nice place to be.
The LSM is not even pretending to do real journalism anymore. I fear you Mr. Kimball and others like are tilting at windmills.
The MSM must be confronted and engaged directly and with extreme prejudice – forced into a public and high profile defense of their behavior.
I don’t know how this will be done, but until then it seems that we are pointing and saying “Look at that!” to ourselves.
Well said Roger, I wonder what America would be like if everyone was in full integrity…
Samo, samo. Is there anything new under the sun? What I see that has not been realized in this article (not unlike many amid the various such sites), is that Benghazi was not, is not a US consolate. If you were to check before this event what were US consolates around the world and in particular in Libya, Benghazi would not have been listed as such. So, the question remains what was it? And furthermore, what was being done at this location? Who was involved in the activities at this place? Answer these more pertinent questions and then perhaps you might understand the white house reaction, the media’s complicity, the coverup. When you look at any given situation or event with the prescribed talking points and from what you perceive as the right perspective without considering that you may not have all the relevent details, you will get to a conclusion, just not the reality of the facts. Questions do need to be answered for certain, but maybe not the ones you are asking. Or more precisely, answered in the way you are asking…something to think about?
“… But the biggest false narrative of this past election was that Mitt Romney was an insensitive plutocrat out of touch with the common man.”
Um, no. Romney IS an insensitive plutocrat out of touch with the common man, as amply demonstrated by his 47% remark. It would have been a bit better had he been elected rather than Obama, but the fact that he was IN FACT a hereditary pol firmly entrenched in the out-of-touch politically connected plutocracy was a major reason Obama’s attacks sunk his misbegotten candidacy. Not to mention Romneycare. And his ham-handed fumble of the ball on Benghazi. And his evident managerial incompetence demonstrated by his pathetic campaign operation. Kimball is still in denial about this. But Kimball is the kind of guy who stuck us with the 2012 debacle.
A basic difference between right & left is separation of church and state. Deductive reasoning is ideal for spiritual matters. Inductive (scientific) reasoning is ideal for the world of work and most of daily life. Deductive reasoning can prove pigs fly, so one needs to use it with care, especially if working in the aviation industry.
The right is packed with people who have a separation of church & state in their own persons. Proof is the MSM (60 Minutes?) story about the foolish TV evangelists and Global Warming. Three were asked and all said they did not see anything really solid proviing GW yet. (This is the view also held by 15-20-thousand individuals with advanced degrees in science who have signed a petiton saying that.) The left wing person is holistic. Deductive resoning is smeared all over in what they do. Economics and social issues are handled with the New Testament and the secular religions which spewed out of France when the Church went splat in 1790. Their doctrines are so speckled with Deductive reasoning elements that they look like crazy lace. Exploring each element may establish something entirely different, which happens with after-which-therefore-becuase-of and other reasoning errors.
A Liberal newspersn coming across Benghazi does not have the questions appear because they have already been answered by the Progressive narrative, and all they have to do is exercise deductive reasoning to get the answer. It is like a tuning fork coming near one of its vibrating fellows. Benghazi questions would not be needed as the template already has a UN measure all nations should sign a treaty on promising not to attack and belittle any religion (e.g. Islam) and this is something on the way for the Senate to consider. The Progressive tapestry already has a picture on it of frantic insulted people spontanously (after months of coordination and agitprop by bigwig Imams) rising up and wrecking stuff because of seriously damaging cartoons. And if the answer comes down from rectitude on high, what’s not to like? And recall that Mussolini made the trains run on time, Mao was a simple agrarian reformer, Fidel was a sort of a Caribbean New-Dealer, and Andropov was a moderate who drank whisky and listened to cool jazz.
I am sorry to say that in my opinion, Aristotle is not wrong here. The MSM are refusing to tell, to acknowledge, to investigate openly, but I don’t imagine the journalists or anyone else not curious about what really happened. Even if the whole story is too disgusting not be a TMI alert in a certain light, and unbearable for a leftist.
A French journalist has been raped place Tharir, in Cairo, Egypt, just as US journalist had been raped, and the whole story was downplayed by her own leftists+Arab spring fanboys+macho colleagues. But they all know perfectly.