Tony Blankley makes some fascinating observations about our current state of the information flow and control(s).
I felt compelled to post his thought provoking piece!

Losing our grip on reality

By Tony Blankley
December 20, 2006

Before the invention of movable type in the 15th century, the media of mass communication was limited to architecture, paintings, sculpture, images on coins and songs sung by balladeers. Christians learned about the dangers of Hell from the stained-glass stories in the cathedrals. The people might have had an idea of what their king looked like by his minted (usually heroic) image on coins. But they might not have known much about their king or what he was doing that might change or even end their lives suddenly.
After the printing press, the sliver of humanity that was literate (mostly clerics, some of the more motivated aristocracy and a few merchants) engaged in continental communication of key new ideas. Slowly over centuries, literacy spread downward and politics and news began to be informed by books, newspapers and pamphlets. Prior to the invention of the telegraph in the 1840s, whatever news there was could move no faster than the trot of a horse — although semaphore, yodeling, smoke-signals and carrier pigeons could move some vital information slightly faster over short distances.
In fast succession mass and long-distance communication was advanced by the general availability of telephones (1870s), linotype-fast newspapers (1880s), radios (1920s), televisions (1950s), computers (1970s), the Internet (1990s) and cellular text, audio and now video devices (2000s).
Over those centuries we have gone from ignorance of the events of the world due to the absence of information to today's condition of confusion and ignorance due to an unending glut of information. We are living out the truth of Sherlock Holmes' insight that to hide something, surround it in plain sight with many similar items. In his fictional case, a criminal hid an incriminating broken piece of porcelain in a room filled with broken porcelain. Which was the piece that mattered? Today, as snippets of news flash past our consciousness at a rate and volume greater than our capacity to absorb, we don't know what to know and what to ignore. And of the information we decide to notice and absorb, there are so many versions of it that we don't know what is true and what is false or distorted.
For example, on Monday The Washington Post reported that war was likely to break out between Ethiopia and Somalia Tuesday morning. On Tuesday the BBC reported that the threat of war between Somalia and Ethiopia was receding as both sides indicated a desire to negotiate.
In September Pakistan entered into an agreement with North Waziristan (part of Pakistan) which a few commentators such as I characterized as our ally Pakistan negotiating a separate peace with (and effectively a surrender to) our joint enemies, the Taliban and al Qaeda. Other news organizations reported the event, but did not characterize it as I did. Was this event a central and dangerous development in our war in Afghanistan (the evidence grows to support my analysis), or was it merely an internal administrative Pakistani matter of little consequence?
Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi has announced that on the evening of Jan. 4 it will cost you $15,000 to celebrate her ascension to the Speaker's chair with her. She has also announced that on the morning of Jan. 5, you can meet her in "The People's House" for free. Depending on which of those items passes into the consciousness of people next month, they might think she is either a Democrat or a plutocrat. Or they may be so confused by the conflicting images of the same person that comes at them from one nanosecond to the other that they give up on trying to understand the world and mentally retreat into their own private lives. Of course, it is not just Mrs. Pelosi's conflicting images, but the images of every political fact and event that are coming at people.
How different, functionally, is the man or woman of 2006 who mentally checks out from the chaos of the world's events and news, to that European villager of 1400 who isn't sure who his king is, what he looks like or what he is doing? Well one difference is that today, the people — whether ignorant or informed, whether wise or foolish — can strongly influence the state actions of their country. In the 14th century, kings and princes were free to act unhindered by a public opinion that didn't exist — although the contingency of riots, rebellions and revolutions usually hovered at the back of kingly minds.
Of course the sovereignty of the people has — and I hope will continue to be — the benefactor of their happiness and dignity. But in the technologically driven growing chaos of public information overload and distortion, the leader must by force of mind, word, image and personality define for the public some semblance of objective reality. As never before, the leader who fails in that mission will fail in his office.
And rule by the people itself is threatened if the people are unable to gain a plausible grip on reality. The threat to democracy in the future will be less from above than from our mind-numbed selves.
Losing our grip on reality*-*Editorials/Op-Ed*-*The Washington Times, America's Newspaper

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If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.
~ Frank Zappa ~

Liberty means responsibility, that is why most men dread it.
~George Bernard Shaw~

SSSSOooooooooooooooooooooo...........What's a po boy to do? toooo much information to sort out? I guess you pick what fits your agenda and go with it, and leave the rest to travel into the ether.......................

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Life is good, the water is sweet. The ground keeps moving beneath my feet.

Yea, that’s basically correct.....it has become sort of like a Chinese buffet of information, you can load up on whatever you want of some stuff and leave lots of other dishes alone.

Reality is largely a subjective interpretation of selected snippets of the information continuum.
Nowadays, humans can, and do inhabit varied realities! This makes political consensus far more difficult to achieve.

__________________
If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.
~ Frank Zappa ~

Liberty means responsibility, that is why most men dread it.
~George Bernard Shaw~

Reality is largely a subjective interpretation of selected snippets of the information continuum.
Nowadays, humans can, and do inhabit varied realities! This makes political consensus far more difficult to achieve. MY friend, I think you have seen the light!

__________________
Life is good, the water is sweet. The ground keeps moving beneath my feet.

What did he say???? lol

I think he said the world is made up of 99.9999999% crazies, and then there are us, the chosen few, the ones that really know!

__________________
Life is good, the water is sweet. The ground keeps moving beneath my feet.

^^^^

*LOL*

Not really med, but interesting spin.....

There are many competing versions of the reality theme on the electronic shelf.
We all tend to pick the one we like the best.

Does anyone ever truly "know"........???

__________________
If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.
~ Frank Zappa ~

Liberty means responsibility, that is why most men dread it.
~George Bernard Shaw~

Some do, and some don't, I'll put you in the don't category!

__________________
Life is good, the water is sweet. The ground keeps moving beneath my feet.

And there we have it ladies and gentelmen! The arrogance of the Far Left. Of COURSE they think they are in the top .000001% ... the "chosen few," if you will. This is why they continually think they can reinvent human nature in order to establish the perfect world. It never occures to them that no matter what, they always fail in that endeavor.

Vi

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Liberals are people that will believe anything twice.

Vi the failures have a lot to do with guys like you that want it all for themselves! And yes there are failures, you can't give up now can you? I'll fight the good fight as long as I have breath!

__________________
Life is good, the water is sweet. The ground keeps moving beneath my feet.