[PenultimateManStanding]

I'm watching the third season of 24 on DVD. A British former-MI5 agent is threatening to kill most of America with a bioengineered virus for reasons that many of our PO.com members would perhaps find laudable: America is evil. There are preposterous holes in the plot, but the production is high class otherwise. This is what Americans are watching with relish. Groundbreaking in many ways, for instance: usually the virus is contained by the hero, but not in this one. People are getting horribly sick in LA because one of the vials was released in a hotel. The aspect that I find most interesting is the Dirty Harry thing: the federal agent breaks all the laws, citizens have no rights, they can be tortured if need be, but all by high-minded brave public servants. Reality isn't like that. Reality is much more sordid. The public is ready to forget about constitutional rights in my estimation. High minded notions from the 18th century live on only in small inconsequential portions of the public. A shame really, because our future is obviously very grim.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'I') wish i owned a tv. only a DVD monitor.

my name is peter I am a tv addict.

[gg3]

This is how Naziism and Fascism got going in Germany, Italy, and Spain. Yes, I'm as serious as a heart attack about that.

Go read your history.

At first people like it and want it, and they cheer for it and revel in it. Then they realize what they got themselves into, but at that point it is too late.

The media, right now, are serving it up by the steaming plateful, and people are eating it up, shingle and all.

Fortunately 60-something percent of America right now has also gotten fed up with the Regime. Alberto Torquemada is about to get the boot, Rove may be dragged into swearing an oath before Congress, and 2008 looks like it's going to be a repeat performance of '06 where no amount of election cheating will be sufficient to save the Regime.

As for the 30-something percent who approve of torture or actively drool over it, in time they will find themselves as marginalized as racists.

BTW, Godwin suspended his "law" with regard to comparisons between the Bush Admin and the aforementioned regimes.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'T')his is how Naziism and Fascism got going in Germany, Italy, and Spain. Yes, I'm as serious as a heart attack about that.

Go read your history.

At first people like it and want it, and they cheer for it and revel in it. Then they realize what they got themselves into, but at that point it is too late.

The media, right now, are serving it up by the steaming plateful, and people are eating it up, shingle and all.

Fortunately 60-something percent of America right now has also gotten fed up with the Regime. Alberto Torquemada is about to get the boot, Rove may be dragged into swearing an oath before Congress, and 2008 looks like it's going to be a repeat performance of '06 where no amount of election cheating will be sufficient to save the Regime.

As for the 30-something percent who approve of torture or actively drool over it, in time they will find themselves as marginalized as racists.

BTW, Godwin suspended his "law" with regard to comparisons between the Bush Admin and the aforementioned regimes.

[username]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'A')t first people like it and want it, and they cheer for it and revel in it. Then they realize what they got themselves into, but at that point it is too late.

[AlCzervik]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'T')his is how Naziism and Fascism got going in Germany, Italy, and Spain. Yes, I'm as serious as a heart attack about that.

Go read your history.

At first people like it and want it, and they cheer for it and revel in it. Then they realize what they got themselves into, but at that point it is too late.

The media, right now, are serving it up by the steaming plateful, and people are eating it up, shingle and all.

Fortunately 60-something percent of America right now has also gotten fed up with the Regime. Alberto Torquemada is about to get the boot, Rove may be dragged into swearing an oath before Congress, and 2008 looks like it's going to be a repeat performance of '06 where no amount of election cheating will be sufficient to save the Regime.

As for the 30-something percent who approve of torture or actively drool over it, in time they will find themselves as marginalized as racists.

BTW, Godwin suspended his "law" with regard to comparisons between the Bush Admin and the aforementioned regimes.

[Baldwin]

24 makes me wonder if the sheeple are being conditioned to believe that some gung-ho borderline renegade who grossly oversteps his power is a good thing.

However, in this world, you might speculate on if then terrorists are real, US backed, or a hoax.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Baldwin', '2')4 makes me wonder if the sheeple are being conditioned to believe that some gung-ho borderline renegade who grossly oversteps his power is a good thing.

[undertaker]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Baldwin', '2')4 makes me wonder if the sheeple are being conditioned to believe that some gung-ho borderline renegade who grossly oversteps his power is a good thing.

[NEOPO]

Yes and one could speculate that the universe was created the nanosecond I say "now" and no one could theoretically prove that person wrong.

AL may have been goose stepping but I was like "wow check out all the people goose stepping"

4x4's with a 6 foot wide american flag mounted on the rear with "proud to be an amerian" blaring from the stereo.

Hmmm from Invasion of the body snatchers to 24!
Someone check all the geneology lists of global elite back maybe 400 years and tell me if you find the name Sutherland please

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('undertaker', '
')Bauer was also the real name of Meyer Amschel Rothschild, founder of the House of Rothschild. That was what I glommed onto with this "Jack Bauer" stuff.

[PenultimateManStanding]

I have to wonder about Marxist/Leninist analysis and how that applies to modern ecological thinking such as William Catton's. My guess is that the ecological thinking is right. England couldn't have survived the Nazi onslaught if they didn't have control of shipping and the money to pay for their food. I would guess that their own capacity to produce food was entirely dependent on imports: 'ghost acreage'. Sure they were smart and clever with radar and code decryption, not to mention bravery and dedication. But how can any nation survive a lack of food?

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('NEOPO', '
')AL may have been goose stepping but I was like "wow check out all the people goose stepping"

[Roy]

I agree on the issue of new memes.

I'll go one further. I watch older movies and TV shows from the 70's and 8-'s from time to time. In those, police and governement agents are often depicted as bumbling idiots. Incompetents, worthy of contempt, easily duped, that sort of thing. An echo of the Nixon/Vietnam war era scandals perhaps?

Now, most of the fare on TV seems to depict police and government as all knowing, all powerful, always right, always "solving the crime", and protecting the great, unwashed masses.

That's the shift I see.

[Chaparral]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', ' ')The experiences in your personal background make this an issue for you. I can respect that but I came from a mild and civil background. My question for you is can we rise above our own conditioning?

[Madpaddy]

PMS wrote,

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'E')ngland couldn't have survived the Nazi onslaught if they didn't have control of shipping and the money to pay for their food. I would guess that their own capacity to produce food was entirely dependent on imports: 'ghost acreage'. Sure they were smart and clever with radar and code decryption, not to mention bravery and dedication. But how can any nation survive a lack of food?