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posted by martyb on Tuesday October 09 2018, @04:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the usa-usa-usa dept.

In March, the United States Special Operations Command, the section of the Defense Department supervising the US Special Forces, held a conference on the theme of "Sovereignty in the Information Age." The conference brought together Special Forces officers with domestic police forces, including officials from the New York Police Department, and representatives from technology companies such as Microsoft.

This meeting of top military, police and corporate representatives went unreported and unpublicized at the time. However, the Atlantic Council recently published a 21-page document summarizing the orientation of the proceedings. It is authored by John T. Watts, a former Australian Army officer and consultant to the US Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security.

[...] The private sector, therefore, must do the dirty work of the government, because government propaganda is viewed with suspicion by the population. "Business and the private sector may not naturally understand the role they play in combating disinformation, but theirs is one of the most important.... In the West at least, they have been thrust into a central role due to the general public's increased trust in them as institutions."

But this is only the beginning. Online newspapers should "consider disabling commentary systems—the function of allowing the general public to leave comments beneath a particular media item," while social media companies should "use a grading system akin to that used to rate the cleanliness of restaurants" to rate their users' political statements.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/10/05/pers-o05.html


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:03PM (19 children)

    by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:03PM (#746503) Journal

    There it is folks. The merger of state and corporate power. Staring you in the face. Ain't no one got any excuse now for saying it's not happening here.

    --
    I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:12PM (4 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:12PM (#746506)

      There it is folks. The merger of state and corporate power. Staring you in the face. Ain't no one got any excuse now for saying it's not happening here.

      LOL [twitter.com] Which side are the fascists again?

      • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:33PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:33PM (#746515)

        The powerful side which has totally engulfed the DNC and GOP.

        Got any more partisan hackery you'd like to spread this today?

      • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:35PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:35PM (#746516)

        Which side are the fascists again?

        Any side that wishes to oppress our constitutionally guaranteed freedoms. And that includes the left, right and center.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:36PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:36PM (#746579)

          Power.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:30PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:30PM (#747096)

            Reading Comprehension.

    • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:14PM (1 child)

      by bob_super (1357) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:14PM (#746507)

      The US military spends a lot of time drafting plans top invade Russia, Zimbabwe, Singapore, or London... Few of the things they say or plan are designed to be actually put in place.

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:19PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:19PM (#746509)

        The Military plans for a lot of things that never happen but the plans are in place if they are needed.

    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:23PM (11 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:23PM (#746510)

      It's definition applies to basically every single government that has ever existed.

      My guess is that Dinesh D'Souza is correct [amazon.com]: The Academic left, having fled (literally) the horrors of its doctrine in Europe, has spent a great deal of time obfuscating what "fascism" means, moving it carefully into the "right" wing of politics.

      In short, this isn't textbook fascism; rather, this is textbook authoritarianism.

      • (Score: 4, Interesting) by fritsd on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:42PM

        by fritsd (4586) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:42PM (#746520) Journal

        here's yet another collection of partial definitions for you, then.

        Eco explains that it is a vague term, that can be applied to a broad selection of different organizations. It is not meant to be a clear or self-consistent definition.

        Ur-Fascism, by Umberto Eco [nybooks.com]

      • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:44PM (9 children)

        by acid andy (1683) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:44PM (#746522) Homepage Journal

        In short, this isn't textbook fascism; rather, this is textbook authoritarianism.

        In that particular context, does it matter what we call it? In as much as it's a very bad thing either way. Or do you disagree with that?

        --
        If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
        • (Score: 2, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:55PM (8 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:55PM (#746527)

          You have to recognize that what's bad either way is the idea of a government itself—the idea that society should be built atop this one, peculiar organization that takes resources at gunpoint against an individual's will.

          Put another way: This article only exists, because you're being forced to pay for research into how you yourself can be censored. That's the bad thing either way. There is no greater democracy than being able to say "What? I'm not paying for that!"

          Let me be clear: I'm not saying you have to agree that government should be thrown out overnight or that I have a suitable replacement for organizing society. However, I am saying that you must admit, audibly, to yourself and to others, that a member of Civilized society should be interested in looking at ways to get closer to a Stateless society.

          • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:55PM (6 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:55PM (#746556)

            The final say: Idiots should not comment on topics they do not understand

            Addendum: Anarchy is stoopid mmkay?

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:05PM (2 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:05PM (#746561)

              They don't have these kinds of problems (or discussions) in dictatorial regimes. I'm just sayin'

              • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:55PM (1 child)

                by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:55PM (#746589)

                There is always a balance that must be made between individual and group control. Dictstors are the worst of both, individuals wielding total group control. Stateless society is stupid because then one group can go rogue and take over the planet with a butter knife.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @11:16PM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @11:16PM (#746696)

                  You seem to think the concept of a "stateless society" implies no weapons (or butter-proof vests, for that matter) exist. Even if that were somehow true, I don't think I'm unique in having a number of agricultural tools in the shed that easily trump your butter-knife.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:40AM (2 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:40AM (#746756)

              Addendum: Anarchy is stoopid mmkay?

              No! You've shown me the light! Anarchy is the future of womankind! Men aren't angels, and since women are angelic, as we've established, the obvious final solution is to kill all men! Let's get this revolution started! Infinite turns anarchy (for Civ fans)!

              (Either that or we can go the boring route and just implement a permanent, international revolution of the working class according to a socialist program as the Trotskyists suggest. 1 turn anarchy. Booooooooring!)

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @04:08AM (1 child)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @04:08AM (#746805)

                I agree, join us:

                There should be one university that is the best in all ways, everyone will be accepted, and it will be tought by angels.

                https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=20695&page=1&cid=542949#commentwrap [soylentnews.org]

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:13PM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:13PM (#746932)

                  Yes! Soon will implement the Exterminate Men Angelic Contract System!

          • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:51AM

            by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:51AM (#746863) Homepage Journal

            Whenever that actually happens, someone moves right on in, takes control then quite likely starts murdering their enemies.

            A Stateless society is at best a theoretical ideal.

            Consider also that the totally screwed-up notions of morality that many Americans possess are the direct result of the new world's early colonists commonly being Utopians.

            --
            Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
  • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:19PM (1 child)

    by Freeman (732) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:19PM (#746508) Journal

    Netflix recently cut the comments section for each movie. Now, you can only give a movie a thumbs up or a thumbs down. I'm sure that helps cut down on the cost of moderating the comments, but I can help feeling like that's not the right way to go.

    Nowadays, the news is so biased, it's hardly worth listening to. It's best to just note major events, form your own opinion, and move on. Generally, they aren't giving you a lot of real information. Instead, they're mixing 90% opinion with 10% fact and as little of the latter as possible. Sure, doing real research is hard, but isn't that what a real journalist is supposed to do? Perhaps, they're trying to patch a leaky ship that's being bombarded by social media platforms like Facebook, but turning into Facebook won't save a news organization. It will just lose them the people who actually cared about getting real news.

    --
    Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
    • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:26PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:26PM (#746511)

      Thumbs up or Thumbs un-up.

      It's double-plus ungood, comrade.

  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:28PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:28PM (#746512)

    The private sector, therefore, must do the dirty work of the government, because government propaganda is viewed with suspicion by the population. “Business and the private sector may not naturally understand the role they play in combating disinformation, but theirs is one of the most important…. In the West at least, they have been thrust into a central role due to the general public’s increased trust in them as institutions.”

    If government propaganda is coming from "business and the private sector", then they will be "viewed with suspicion by the population" as well. In fact, it is pretty obvious that this has been going on for quite some time and many people do not trust the media at all.

    Look at this poll, which discovered the majority of people now don't trust the news because it is inaccurate, biased, opaque, and filled with hype/clickbait. Who would have thought?

    https://www.knightfoundation.org/reports/indicators-of-news-media-trust [knightfoundation.org]

    Online newspapers should “consider disabling commentary systems—the function of allowing the general public to leave comments beneath a particular media item,”

    Whatever, then people will just move to news aggregation sites like this one. I also don't trust disqus, so this would probably be a net benefit. But usually the most interesting part of any story is actually the comments at this point.

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:09PM (1 child)

      by Phoenix666 (552) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:09PM (#746565) Journal

      I agree with you there--the comments at the end are the most interesting part of a story, now. A decent moderation system like SN has helps boost the signal to noise ratio.

      It has been glaring, too, how many "news" sites have eliminated comments sections entirely. They don't want to be challenged by readers. They don't want their glaring omissions or mistakes called out. They don't want to engage with the world because it's harder to have a conversation than to deliver a soliloquy.

      --
      Washington DC delenda est.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:58PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:58PM (#746592)

        They don't want their glaring omissions or mistakes called out. They don't want to engage with the world because it's harder to have a conversation than to deliver a soliloquy.

        Nah, that's not it. They just don't want a Runaway666! He did managed to get banned from the comment section of Fox News, for being too cray-cray.

  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by EvilSS on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:46PM (11 children)

    by EvilSS (1456) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:46PM (#746525)
    First off, nice source. And interesting interpretation of a paper on combating disinformation (you know, the stuff every one was mad about with Russia and the election?) You can't have it both ways. Either you want governments and social media companies to combat this type of interference or you don't (and if you don't then don't complain when you get Trumps).

    And for anyone interested (since the outstanding source article left it out) here is the paper:

    In an era of increasing technological, cultural and geo-political change, the rise of disinformation undermines the institutions that nations rely on to function and creates risks across society. At the heart of the challenge is the battle of truth and trust. In this report, “Whose Truth: Sovereignty, Disinformation and Winning the Battle of Trust, John Watts draws upon a rich discussion on the threat that disinformation poses to state’s sovereignty by a diverse group of experts as part of a US Special Operations Command program. The paper explores the themes and key takeaways of a discourse that explored the causes and impacts of the current complex information environment, its implications for state sovereignty, the range of threats it poses and how a natural maturation of the changed environment can be accelerated by groups at every layer of society.

    http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/publications/reports/whose-truth-sovereignty-disinformation-and-winning-the-battle-of-trust [atlanticcouncil.org]

    • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:55PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:55PM (#746529)

      WSWS actually runs some pretty good original research. I've never seen anything like this from the news: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/03/07/dems-m07.html [wsws.org]

    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:13PM (6 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:13PM (#746568)

      Can we having an educated populace that can find the truth themselves, instead of needing it spoon fed to them by anyone?

      • (Score: 4, Insightful) by EvilSS on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:21PM (1 child)

        by EvilSS (1456) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:21PM (#746571)
        Not really. As a whole we tend to suck at it due to our internal biases. Just look at the anti-vax movement (which is a textbook example of what the paper is in this article is actually talking about). Hell look at the reactions to this post from a bunch of people who didn't read the paper but accepted without any question the narrative from the article. That's a powerful weapon and easy to wield.
        • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:12AM

          by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:12AM (#746900) Journal

          As a whole we tend to suck at it due to our internal biases.

          Because what has been delivered to you wasn't education, it was conditioning.
          And the conditioning is continuing, yet you are still accepting it. Why would be that?

          --
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
      • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Virindi on Tuesday October 09 2018, @09:35PM (2 children)

        by Virindi (3484) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @09:35PM (#746644)

        Not in a society where every child spends their entire childhood being conditioned to sit still and memorize facts from authority, and questioning of the presented facts is punished. This is modern education.

        And by now, almost the entire population has been raised that way.

        Since they have been trained to merely accept 'facts' from one authority, they react poorly when it is obvious the authority is trying to manipulate them. Rather than examine the situation themselves logically, the only way they can react is to try to find a new authority to get facts from. We are seeing this play out all over right now: cable news networks, conspiracy theorists, politicians, etc.

        Of course those in power don't see this as a problem at all; they want a population who can only choose an authority and follow them rather than thinking for themselves. They are just upset that people are choosing someone other than them.

        Given the amount of the population which thinks like this at this point, we are pretty screwed. Education is not getting better in this regard, it is getting worse. The only way to "solve fake news" would be to reverse this trend in schools, and I don't think that's happening anytime soon. Until then it will just be a battle of potential overlords fighting over the minds of their subjects.

        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:12AM (1 child)

          by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:12AM (#746866) Homepage Journal

          Many Republican elected officials have long opposed the teaching of Critical Thinking in schools for such reasons as that they claim it leads children to disobey their parents.

          My own education had quite a lot of Critical Thinking study.

          This was always taught in English or Literature classes. Math and Science admit no or little ambiguity, but natural language is chock full of it.

          --
          Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
          • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:22PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:22PM (#746936)

            (Sorry, this one's a bit off topic. Not terribly I hope.)

            Don't worry. The witch hunt started by the #metoo movement will soon eliminate the last vestiges of critical thinking. #MeToo-style allegations used to oust popular University of Michigan professor [wsws.org]:

            Rubadeau is one of the most distinguished professors at the university, and is widely admired and even beloved by his students. In 2005, he received the Golden Apple Award, which is awarded to the most engaging and inspiring teachers at the university, based on student nominations.

            Rubadeau’s page on RateMyProfessor.com shows he has a perfect overall quality score of five. One student review there says, “If you like writing, cursing, blasphemy, having fun, and working your tail off, take this class. If you want to inspired to be your best self, take this class. If you value trust, friendship, and universal truths, take this class. English 425 with John was the best three hours of my week every week. I would follow John to the end of the earth.”

            ...According to the [anonymous] claimant..., Rubadeau has not even committed an offense which falls under the “mandatory reporting” provision of Title IX civil rights law. This means that Rubadeau has not engaged in discrimination, nor has he engaged in unfair treatment on the basis of sex or sexual harassment.

            This sordid episode validates the World Socialist Web Site’s analysis of the #MeToo movement—that it has become, among other things, a foul arena for the settling of various political, financial or professional scores and the source as well for an unknown number of personal tragedies.

      • (Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:14AM

        by Dr Spin (5239) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:14AM (#746880)

        Can we having an educated populace that can find the truth themselves, instead of needing it spoon fed to them by anyone?
        Not while you have the right to remain stupid, and a large part of the population that considers this their biggest priority.
        Note that the allies would not have won WW2* without massive amounts of lies and propaganda that would have been destroyed without censorship.

        * Well it might have been won two years later - opinions differ. (The UK might have staved to death before this).

        --
        Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!
    • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:00AM

      by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:00AM (#746899) Journal

      Either you want governments and social media companies to combat this type of interference or you don't (and if you don't then don't complain when you get Trumps).

      Why exactly should I not complain?
      If I can tell a false dichotomy and call it out, why shouldn't I expect everyone to be able to do it?

      --
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:59PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:59PM (#746926)

      Very seriously. Look at what they [wsws.org] say about this and then compare it with the official material referenced in the summary.

      Pretty 1:1 if you ask me.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:33PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:33PM (#746942)

      I'm a daily reader of World Socialist Web Site. What pulled me in is that they share my disdain for both of the major parties in the USA. They will slam Trump, and then they will slam Hillary. They slammed Kavanaugh, and then they promptly slammed Senator Hirono (D-HI) for her comments [wsws.org]¹.

      I'd say they tend to slam the Democratic Party more often than the Republican Party, but I think that is because the Democratic Party pretends to be advancing left-wing values when they are actually a pro-war pro-bankster pro-austerity right-wing abomination. The Republican Party doesn't tend to make such pretensions about what it is.

      ¹ "'Guess who’s perpetuating all of these kinds of actions? It’s the men in this country,' [Hirono] told a news conference. 'And I just want to say to the men in this country: Just shut up and step up.' There is nothing remotely progressive or democratic about smearing half the adult population of the United States over what may or may not have happened to a teenage girl 36 years ago."

  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Barenflimski on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:25PM

    by Barenflimski (6836) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:25PM (#746539)

    When I read this I don't see some evil plan to combine corporations and military. They already work in tandem, and have forever.

    I see the Military doing what it does. I then see it being bifurcated, and use as talking points for someone else's agenda to further polarize the electorate.

    As long as the Democratic party and the Republican party both continue to fund the Military Industrial Complex, this is a bi-partisan result from a well funded military.

    Isn't the bottom line about our information sovereignty? I have not been able to reconcile the folks that don't like immigrants, 'cuz they talk funny, but want to shoot the shit with propagandists from around the world.

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Thexalon on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:36PM (8 children)

    by Thexalon (636) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:36PM (#746543)

    The US military brass firmly believes that the reason they lost the Vietnam War was that they were "stabbed in the back" by the lefties at home. (Sound familiar? That's exactly what the Nazis claimed was the reason that Germany lost WWI.) They of course determined that they had to correct that problem with the US war machine, and thus have made a great deal of effort to ensure that never happens again.

    Some things that are definitely not an accident:
    - There's absolutely no TV footage ever of any KIA soldiers after Vietnam ended. Heck, there's barely any footage of any wounded soldiers either. They'll claim this is out of respect for the families, but typically the US soldiers that are killed are not even named in news reports, much less pictured or filmed coming home in a coffin. In short, the losses are invisible.
    - There's all the shiny and ridiculous recruitment ads that regularly lie about what will happen after your service if you enlist. In short, those promises of a college education are often bogus.
    - There's the propaganda at public events like football games and NASCAR races. Why do you think they pay those leagues big bucks for the right to fly military jets overhead or use uniformed military personnel as props in lavish displays?
    - The Pentagon cultivates journalists who will print what they want them to print by giving them scoops and possibly cash. They punish journalists who print anything else by denying them access to events that journalists normally have access to. This process means that it's not uncommon for the front page of, say, the New York Times, to look an awful lot like a Pentagon press release. An example of this sort is Judith Miller.
    - Journalists who want to report on events in war zones are strongly encouraged to take advantage of the Pentagon's program to manage reporting. Which of course means that the military controls where those journalists go, what they see, and who they talk to. Which sure helps ensure that any in-country reporting is whatever the military wants it to be.
    - What can happen to journalists who don't follow the rules set forth by the Pentagon is that they're killed by the US military [youtube.com].
    - Those that spread the information the Pentagon doesn't want spread around get tortured [theguardian.com] or imprisoned without legal justification [theguardian.com].

    I wish I could be shocked by the push for government censorship of Americans. I'm not.

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:05PM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:05PM (#746562)

      Thanks for the rundown.

      As much as I dislike Violently Imposed Monopoly guy and the ideological naivete there is something to be said for reducing the hierarchical command structure that humanity has grown so comfortable with. It is pretty basic human nature, people look for leaders. However, as with the rest of society we need to use our intelligence to patch up the flaws in the system. We need a better feedback loop for citizens to interact with government. The general populace should be able to put the breaks on war, we should never have gone into Vietnam.

      It is a tough problem, sometimes what is needed is one person to make the tough choice, but then again that is so rarely needed that we shouldn't base our entire society around the concept.

      • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday October 09 2018, @10:17PM

        by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @10:17PM (#746663) Journal

        The problem with guys like Mr. Vim is they have a small kernel of truth, but they surround it by a giant, rancid overripe avocado of bullshit, much of which is contradictory to the truth they insist they are working to preserve and promote. This is something I've noticed with the right-wingers I've interacted with who aren't actually sociopaths: there is much to be said for controlling immigration, making sure a social safety net isn't abused, and cultivating personal responsibility.

        What I see in people like this is something like an ideological autoimmune disorder. They've got the metaphorical immune response, which is good (and yes, I would characterize many people on the social and economic left as being metaphorically immunodeficient...), but it's attacking things it shouldn't, much too powerfully, and damaging the very basis of itself.

        --
        I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
      • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:30AM

        by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:30AM (#746870) Homepage Journal

        The great thing about artificial intelligence as well as progress in control systems is that when a future American President decides to ensure their place in history by murdering a hundred million foreigners, the American public won't object because none of our children will have their lives put at risk.

        --
        Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
    • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday October 09 2018, @09:37PM

      by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @09:37PM (#746646)

      Thank you for putting the effort into this post.

      It is already modded +5 but in my view ought to be modded +6.

      As you noted, the US military learned an awful lot of lessons from Vietnam, one of which may have been that there's no need to win a war, the population just needs to accept the need to keep fighting.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:58AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:58AM (#746742)

      Interesting idea, but as counterexamples, I've often seen stories on combat wounded veterans, arrays of coffins arriving in Dover, and stories about casualties and their families, not just famous ones like Pat Tillmann.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:59AM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:59AM (#746743)

      The US military brass firmly believes that the reason they lost the Vietnam War was that they were "stabbed in the back" by the lefties at home.

      They were. The lefties in the State Department forbid the air force from bombing strategic assets in North Korea, forcing them to waste massive amounts of money bombing roads in the forest. A lefty at Reuters wrote a fake news article that led the lefties at the CIA to assassinate President Diem who had been holding the south together. The lefties in the media claimed that the North had won the Tet Offensive,which wiped out most of the irregular Viet Cong. A lefty in the Pentagon named Morton Halperin wrote a fake history of the war and gave it to the lefties at the New York Times who claimed it was the Pentagon's official history and used it to condemn the Pentagon. (Halperin is now a major figure in George Soros' operation.) Then in the 1970s the Democrats elected a lefty majority to Congress who imposed an arms embargo on the South as punishment for being invaded by the North after signing a peace treaty. Then the lefties, being the victors, wrote the histories so that no one could have the hindsight to stop the same thing from happening in Afghanistan and Iraq.

      • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:33AM (1 child)

        by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:33AM (#746871) Homepage Journal

        In my actual experience, the people who gripe about George Soros bear a great deal in common with that rogue USAF General in "Dr. Strangelove" who said "I only drink distilled water and clear grain alcohol because water fluoridation is a Communist plot to corrupt our precious bodily fluids".

        --
        Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
        • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:49PM

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:49PM (#747058) Journal

          So, uhhhhhhh - WTF you think rich people do with their money? You have the Carnegies, the Rockefellers, the Melons, and more who have returned some of the riches they've exploited from the commoners, in the form of museums and such. Soros? He wants to build a different kind of "legacy". He's an ideologue. He hopes to be remembered up there with Karl Marx. Then, there are the Kock brothers. I think they want to be remembered up there with Adolph Hitler. Neither Soros nor the Cock brothers are returning anything to the common working man. Instead, the manipulate the common - mostly non-working - men and women to push their ideologies.

  • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:14PM (9 children)

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Tuesday October 09 2018, @07:14PM (#746569) Journal

    This proposal is un-American. It's a clone of what the Chinese are implementing.

    Dissent is at the heart of discourse in a democracy. Dialogue instead of monologue is the hallmark of the Information Age. Shutting down conversation because the powers-that-be don't like what the rabble are saying exemplifies tyranny.

    People in government who champion this sort of thing should get voted off the island. Champion torture? Bye-bye. Champion police state surveillance? Buh-bye. Champion censorship? So long.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Fluffeh on Tuesday October 09 2018, @10:35PM (1 child)

      by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 09 2018, @10:35PM (#746675) Journal

      It's a clone of what the Chinese are implementing.

      We can't let the Chinese get better than us at something! We need to play catch-up and quick-smart!

      Seriously, do you not think most governments don't look at the state control in places like China and just dream of having even a small fraction of that power? Do you not think they wouldn't do just about anything to have that ability to "do good for the entire country" (as long as that view aligns perfectly with their personal view of what is good and not a sliver more or less).

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:17PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:17PM (#746913)

        It's "terrorism gap"! The word originally meant government violence against its citizens. ref [wikipedia.org]

    • (Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday October 10 2018, @03:36AM (6 children)

      by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @03:36AM (#746798)

      Dialogue and discussion between your fellow country peeps is easy. Dialogue and discussion between citizens and several embedded foreign shills/propagandists... that's tough. A moderation system helps eliminate the garbage but it's a kind of censorship.

      --
      SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
      • (Score: 4, Interesting) by RamiK on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:35AM (5 children)

        by RamiK (1813) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @05:35AM (#746833)

        Dialogue and discussion between your fellow country peeps is easy. Dialogue and discussion between citizens and several embedded foreign shills/propagandists... that's tough. A moderation system helps eliminate the garbage but it's a kind of censorship.

        When the US constitution was drafted, it was necessary for the American forefathers to specifically circumvent British political science since it was tainted by the feudal-monarchical values of the British nobility. They referred to French and other European works instead and draw inspiration from the Romans and Greeks. They made many mistakes while they were at it. But they had no other way to get rid of the monarchy.

        During the days of civil war, most the industrialized north required college students to learn either French or German since much of science and engineering was conducted in those. The moral opposition to slavery was much to do from being influenced by those foreign thoughts. Especially when you had black artists and journalists in France living in a free society and portraying the US for the barbaric nation it was at the time. Things got twisted around WW1:

        When the Great War erupted in summer 1914 between the Central Powers (principally, Germany and Austria-Hungary) and the Triple Entente (Britain, France, Russia), among the first casualties were the ideals of beneficent internationalism. German scientists joined other intellectuals in extolling Germany’s war aims. French and British scientists took note.

        After the war, the International Research Council, formed under the aegis of the victorious Entente – now including the US but excluding Russia, which had descended into the maelstrom of the Bolshevik Revolution – initiated a boycott of scientists from the Central Powers. New international institutions for science were erected in the early 1920s locking out the defeated Germanophone scientists. This exclusion lit a long-delay fuse that, in the coming decades, would contribute to the death of German as a leading scientific language. Three languages had, for part of Europe, diminished to two. Germans responded to their predicament by reinvigorating their commitment to their native language. The multilingual system was beginning to crack, but it was the Americans who would shatter it.

        In the Germanophobic frenzy that followed the entry of the US into the war in April 1917, German became criminalised. Iowa, Ohio, Nebraska and others rolled back what was by far the most commonly spoken language besides English in the US (a consequence of massive immigration from central Europe). The proscription of German only grew after Armistice Day. By 1923, more than half of the states in the Union had restricted the use of German in public spaces, over the telegraph and telephone lines, and in children’s education.

        That year, the Supreme Court overturned these laws in the landmark case of Meyer v Nebraska, but the damage was done. Foreign-language education was devastated, even for French and Spanish, and a whole generation of Americans, including future scientists, grew up without much exposure to foreign languages. In the mid-1920s, when German and Austrian physicists published about the new quantum mechanics, American physicists were only able to read the German papers because Yankees still traversed the Atlantic for graduate study in Weimar Germany, and had necessarily learned the language.

        The gradient of travel soon went the other way. In 1933, Adolf Hitler summarily fired ‘non-Aryan’ and Left-leaning professors, devastating German science. Those Jewish scientists who were lucky enough to emigrate in the 1930s faced a number of challenges. Cornelius Lanczos, one of Albert Einstein’s former assistants, had difficulty publishing in English both because of his topic and because of ‘the well‑known excuse of “bad language”’, even though he had ‘subject[ed] the text to a thorough revision with good friends’. Even Einstein relied on translators and collaborators.

        ( https://aeon.co/essays/how-did-science-come-to-speak-only-english [aeon.co] )

        From then on, it only got worse and worse. Now you have idiots 1984-thumping when opposing nationalized health care since they have no idea they're a century behind the rest of the world. It's why the US and Britain still have executions and torture and how Brexit was possible. It's also why the Chinese can get away with so much: If Anglo-Saxons could communicate better with Europeans, the Middle East would have been a done deal 50 years ago and the Chinese wouldn't have been able to divide and conquer us by narrow economic interests.

        So no. Less international influences on political discourse is certainly not the way to go about democracy. It is, however, a great way to become the next great authoritarian empire. Which some people would very much like the US to become.

        --
        compiling...
        • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:28AM

          by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:28AM (#746869) Homepage Journal

          It is very common that citizens of nations other than the US are multilingual, enough so that they do just fine living and working in foreign lands.

          While foreign languages are commonly taught in US Junior High and High Schools, it is exceedingly uncommon for American-born people to know a foreign language well enough to have so much as a casual conversation in it, let alone use it in their daily work.

          I studied German for four years, yet the longest conversation I have ever had in that language was roughly ten minutes, with the German immigrant who interviewed me for MIT. I cannot recall so much as once having a real conversation in any of my German classes, or in my Russian class at Caltech.

          --
          Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
        • (Score: 3, Informative) by Dr Spin on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:21AM (1 child)

          by Dr Spin (5239) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:21AM (#746883)

          It's why the US and Britain still have executions

          The UK has not had executions since the late 1960's after it was discovered that the convictions of the last 13 hanged were all unconvincing, and in about 5 cases, someone else had admitted the offence later.

          --
          Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @02:53PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @02:53PM (#746969)

            With or without court sanctions, regardless of it being public, closed doors or secretive, its own citizens or foreigners, at wartime or during peace, on its own soil or abroad, Britain been executing terrorists and the like for decades. Sometimes its using intelligence agents. Sometimes its by ordering shoot-to-kill. Sometimes its by opening fire on civilian infrastructure during wartime under suspicion of collaboration... The term "execution" simply means someone in government gave the order to kill and it was carried out through the chain of command by this or that branch. The reason it's muddled is because there laws and treaties meant to limit these that the US and Britain been trying to avoid since Agincourt.

            It's a long, infamous tradition.

        • (Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:42PM (1 child)

          by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:42PM (#747122)

          Science papers have evidence, citations, and are peer reviewed (moderated). A news site comments section is the wild west and filled with bullshit. Trying to solve nationalized healthcare in the comments section of CNN is a terrible idea. You also completely ignored the point i was trying to make about bad actors who are trying to sabotage or steer discussion.

          --
          SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
          • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Thursday October 11 2018, @08:22AM

            by RamiK (1813) on Thursday October 11 2018, @08:22AM (#747329)

            Science papers have evidence...

            Not political science and the law. Look up Machiavelli's works. Discourses on Livy and The Prince were especially referenced by the American forefathers and those are still in-effect despite being provingly wrong by modern works. And the whole US legal frameworks is based on philosophical ass-pulls from 16th century thinkers that just didn't have the sources and were brought up on the kind of "scientific disciplines" Monty Python made fun of in the witch/duck sketch.

            You also completely ignored the point i was trying to make about bad actors who are trying to sabotage or steer discussion.

            No I didn't. That whole post-WW1 censorship of foreign languages came about following the WW1 propaganda which had bad actors all over. And it made more harm than good. The correct way to combat false rumors is with education and regular exposure to multiple opinions. People shouldn't trust their news sources or officials to begin with. They should double check what their religious leaders tell them. They should triple check what their elected officials tell them. They should read their own and the opposition's news sources and compare. It's not recommended. It's mandatory.

            Go talk to 16 somethings who grow up on social networks. They don't believe anything without sources. And half the time they'll tell you those are probably photoshoped. It's our generation that having trouble keeping up with the times. Give it another decade and it won't be a problem anymore.

            --
            compiling...
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @06:34AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @06:34AM (#746841)

    "In the West at least, they have been thrust into a central role due to the general public's increased trust in them as institutions."

    ahahahahahaha. Oh wait you were serious. Allow me to laugh harder. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n5E7feJHw0 [youtube.com]

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:20PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @12:20PM (#746915)

      Sadly the general public is not laughing but busily using these platforms.

      I wouldn't click your link because I ironically enough don't trust google.

  • (Score: 2, Informative) by nrudaz on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:07AM

    by nrudaz (6417) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @09:07AM (#746878)

    France has recently published a similar study:
    https://www.defense.gouv.fr/irsem/page-d-accueil/nos-evenements/lancement-du-rapport-conjoint-caps-irsem.-les-manipulations-de-l-information [defense.gouv.fr]
    (Scroll down for the English version of the PDF report)

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