Product of the 60's

I know I'm a product of the 60's and why I'm still what some might call a "flaming liberal", but I've been ruminating on why there seems to be such a preponderance of hatred and anger out in the political world nowadays.  Maybe it's not any worse than it has been in the past but it sure seems that way to me.


So, I've been doing some searching and reading and learning on "The Internets" lately.  I've joined Twitter (I know!) and read a few of the more progressive blogs and websites with regularity.  Occasionally I hold my nose and turn the channel to....wait for it.....FOX.  I know without any doubt that FOX is a right-wing propaganda tool and a very successful right-wing propaganda tool no doubt.  But I have to wonder why?  How?  Study after study shows that FOX "news" (sorry, it just has to be in quotation marks) viewers are the least informed.  So why do people watch it?  What is the reason behind the FOX success story.


I ran across an amazing article in Rolling Stone Magazine by Tim Dickinson that is an in-depth look at Roger Ailes.  It documents his biography, his thought processes and his (what can only be called) mental illnesses.  It's disturbing to me that these mad-men so often rise to such an influential position of power.  It's happened all over the world, all through history.  Please, I beg of you, read the article here:  http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-roger-ailes-built-the-fox-news-fear-factory-20110525?page=1


After my reading I was reminded of the famous statement attributed to Pasto Martin Niemoller.  It's about the inactivity of German intellectuals following the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group after group.  If it sounds to you as if I'm overstating the facts, you haven't read the Rolling Stones article.


Thin about these words and speak out.  Get active.  Spend some time doing your OWN research.  Don't just rely on one news source (or pretend news source) or one network or just one point of view.  Examine them all and use your God-given critical thinking skills.  We must always be on guard against another atrocity like the Holocaust.  It's our duty to our children and our grandchildren.  

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.