The only constant in life is change - Heraclitus

2Step/R. Moran

Since the beginning of time, man’s reality distortion field rules as our tiny take on existence
is but a dust mote in god’s eye, something readily understood by Heraclitus, in 500 BC, stating 
The only constant in life is change. 

Heraclitus

Ignore this at your peril.

Here are the essential characteristics that define the success or failure of every endeavor.

500BC: The Art of War

The Art of War - Sun Tzu

Competency and situational awareness determine the success of any given initiative.

• “All warfare is based on deception.”
• “It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of carrying it on.”
• “He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.”
• “If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle”
• “We are not fit to lead an army on the march unless we are familiar with the face of the country—its mountains and forests, its pitfalls and precipices, its marshes and swamps.”

Selling the Big Lie, aka Propaganda, drives advertising, politics and war.

The "art" of persuasion

 

1928, Edwin Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, writes Propaganda

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, and our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of…. It is they who pull the wires that control the public mind.

1933, Joseph Goebbels, channeling Bernays, creates the gospel of Nazism

Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.”

“National Socialism is a religion.

 All we lack is a religious genius capable of uprooting outmodedreligious practices and putting new ones in their place. We lack traditions and ritual. One day soon National Socialism will be the religion

Subjectivity rules based on the fact every person views reality in her own way.

The Rashomon effect: Tajōmaru the bandit and the wife of a samurai,
two characters who offer different perspectives of events in the film Rashomon

The word assume kills clear thinking as it remains forever the ass of you and me.

“Question everything.” - Einstein

Inventing ways to “explain” the unknowable never ceases to amaze.

Politics and the English Language - Orwell

Governments lie. - I. F. Stone

Misery loves company.

It’s all about the money.

News as entertainment medium

Tech never sleeps.

A tiny sampler of Truly Excellent Adventures :)

1275 BC: The battle of Kadesh - Propghanda 101

The battle of Kadesh, sometimes called the first world war, featured one of the largest-ever chariot battles. It was fought in 1275 B.C. in present-day Syria between the Egyptians under Pharaoh Ramses II, and the Hittites under King Muwatalli II, who were supported by eighteen of their allied and vassal states.

The Egyptian–Hittite peace treaty, on display

at the Istanbul Archaeology Museum,
is believed to bethe earliest example of any

written international agreement of any kind.[3

The battle ends in a draw, Ramses II loudly proclaims victory after barely escaping with his life while Muwatalli II states they won as they held onto Kadesh in spite of being attacked by the Egyptians.
The warring parties quietly sign a piece treaty.

875BC: The Odyssey - The word Assume applies

Odysseus and the Sirens, eponymous vase of the Siren Painter,
c. 480–470 BC (British Museum)

What's in the bag?

Consider the exhausted Odysseus, slowly sailing toward the coast of Ithaca while sleeping next to a bag carrying all the winds save the favorable west, a gift generously given to the weary travelers by Aeolus, god of the winds. The crew, also tired from the 10 year Trojan War but all too greedy for their own good, decide to open the bag thinking there was treasure to be had, thus consigning themselves to death or enslavement when their ship is driven back into the Mediterranean when all the winds escaped from the bag, forcing Odysseus to wander the sea for another 10 years before reaching Ithaca yet again.

Question, why didn’t Odysseys tell the crew what was in the bag?

To explain the unknowable, man invents the gods.

1739-1748 War of Jenkins Ear - It's all about the money

A new & correct map of the trading part of the West Indies : including the seat of war between Gr. Britain and Spain : likewise the British Empire in America, with the French and Spanish settlements adjacent thereto : adorn'd with prospects of ye most considerable towns, ports, harbours &c. therein contained from the latest & best observations London: Printed for and sold by Henry Overton, at the White Horse without Newgate, 1741 "Dedicated to the Honble. Edward Vernon Esqr., Vice Admiral of the Blue and Commander in chief of all his Majs. ships in the West Indies, by H.O."

Another needless military action lasting 9 years from 1739 - 1748 between Great Britain & Spain

to encourage the Spanish not to renege on the lucrative Asiento de Negros contract

(permission to sell slaves in Spanish America).

The Spanish won

Wag the Dog - Propaganda 101

Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst, full-length, dressed as the Yellow Kid,
a satire of their role in drumming up USA public opinion to go to war with Spain.

1898 The Spanish–American War (April–August 1898) is considered to be both a turning point in the history of propaganda and the beginning of the practice of yellow journalism.

It was the first conflict in which military action was precipitated by media involvement. The war grew out of U.S. interest in a fight for revolution between the Spanish military and citizens of their Cuban colony. American newspapers fanned the flames of interest in the war by fabricating atrocities to justify intervention in a number of Spanish colonies worldwide.

Frederic Remington, an artist hired by Hearst to provide illustrations to accompany a series of articles on the Cuban Revolution, soon became bored with seemingly peaceful Cuba and wired Hearst in January 1897:

“Everything is quiet. There is no trouble. There will be no war. I wish to return.” To which Hearst’s alleged[8] reply was: “Please remain. You furnish the pictures and I’ll furnish the war.”[

Ignorance is strength - Politics and the English Language - Orwell

George-Orwell

 “Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.”’ 

 “If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”’

 “It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words.”’

If it bleeds, It leads - Misery loves company

Prior to the death of JFK, news on the tube as money maker was a non starter,
after the tragedy, it becomes the goldmine.

Shortly after Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963, the TV networks demonstrated their sensitivity to the tragedy by canceling commercials and devoting all their airtime to the story for several days. CBS President Frank Stanton would later call it “the longest uninterrupted story in the history of television.” At one point, 93% of all U.S. TVs were tuned into the coverage.

Estimates vary, but the networks’ decision to forgo ads may have cost them as much as US$19 million – which is $191 million in 2023 dollars. But no longer ...

Ultimately, the chaotic, cacophonous and confusing decade of the 1960s would end up launching the hyper-commercial media world we live in today. Chasing sensational investigative stories, such as Watergate and the Iran-Contra arms-for-hostages scandal, would generate higher ratings and more advertising revenue, and turn broadcast journalists into national celebrities.

The original values animating network broadcast journalism at its inception would surrender to more lucrative formats. “60 Minutes” – a CBS News production – eventually became the most valuable network-owned programming property in the history of American television,
and by the 1980s almost every local news station had launched its own “I-Team” investigations group. 

I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore. News as entertainment medium

We’ll tell you anything you want to hear. We lie like hell! We’ll tell you Kojak always gets the killer, and nobody ever gets cancer in Archie Bunker’s house… We’ll tell you any shit you want to hear! We deal in illusion, man! None of it’s true! But you people… do whatever the tube tells you... This is mass madness, you maniacs! — Network 1976

 

Who’s in command here? - Propaganda, The word Assume and ... ignoring yet again, The Art of War

Soldiers of the Army of Vietnam (ARVN) 1st Battalion, 6th Regiment, are airlifted to “Landing Zone Kala” northeast of Khâm Đức, Vietnam, by U.S. Army UH-1H Hueys during Operation Elk Canyon,

1955-1975: Vietnam ... A disaster based on a lie.

The 1964 Gulf of Tonkin event begins the nightmare of Nam in earnest thanks to Robert McNamara lying to Johnson about the three ship Vietnamese navy “attacking” the largest naval force on the planet. The destroyer, USS Maddox, initiated contact by firing three warning shots at the 3 torpedo boats, thus kicking this disaster into overdrive to enable the MIC to reap billions at the cost of approximately 1,353 million deaths (58.000+ US soldiers and 1.29 million South and North Vietnamese) along with untold numbers of maimed and wounded participants, counted as collateral damage, of a historic cf of biblical proportions, information not revealed to the world until 2005.

Documents and tapes released in 2005 and 2006 provided new insights into the 2 August 1964 attack on the USS Maddox (DD-731) by three North Vietnamese patrol torpedo boats (above) and established that there was no follow-up attack against the destroyer, along with the USS Turner Joy (DD-951), on the night of 4 August 

Addendum ... Putting tanks in the jungle’s not a good idea but conducting a war while ignoring the tenets of the The Art of War is inexcusable. Apocalypse Now Redux ...

1979 - 1989: Russians invades Afghanistan - Ignoring The Are of War yet again

Often invaded by entities such as the Persians, Alexander the Great and the Mongols in ancient times and the Brits, Russians and Americans, in the present, Afghanistan has been rightly called, the death of empires due to its difficult terrain, the fierce loyalty of the people and the sheer remoteness of the country. In 1979, the Russians invade yet again, ignoring the lessons of Nam and the essential fact, indigenous fighters don’t have to win, just outlast as they will be there forever while the invaders will not. After decimating the country, the Soviets left Afghanistan in 1989.

Overreach - Iraq invades Kuwait - The word Assume applies

Saddam Hussein

On 2 August 1990, Iraq, governed by dictator Saddam Hussein, launched an invasion of neighboring Kuwait and fully occupied the country within two days. Initially, Iraq ran the occupied territory under a puppet government known as the “Republic of Kuwait” before proceeding with an outright annexation in which Kuwaiti sovereign territory was split, with the “Saddamiyat al-Mitla’ District” being carved out of the country’s northern portion and the “Kuwait Governorate” covering the rest. Varying speculations have been made regarding intents behind the Iraqi invasion, most notably including Iraq’s inability to repay a US$14 billion debt the country had borrowed from Kuwait to finance its prior war with Iran.

Iraq lost, big time and ... unlike Nam, reporters had to be embedded in the military.

Unanswered Questions - Governments lie

What the September Eleventh Families Asked and the 9/11 Commission Ignored

Shock & Awe - Governments lie

2003: Another fiasco based on a lie

Thursday night, Anthony Zinni, the former commander of the U.S. Central Command, was interviewed by Ted Koppel on Nightline. And he was rather sharp in his assessment of George W. Bush’s policy in Iraq. Before the war, Zinni, who had been an envoy for Bush in the Middle East, opposed a U.S. invasion of Iraq, arguing that Saddam Hussein did not pose an imminent threat. On Nightline, Zinni compared Bush’s push for the war with the Gulf of Tonkin incident–an infamous episode in which President Lyndon Johnson misrepresented an attack on two U.S. Navy destroyers in order to win congressional approval of the war in Vietnam–and he challenged “the credibility behind” Bush’s prewar assertions concerning Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction and its association with anti-American terrorists. “I’m suggesting,” Zinni said, “that either the [prewar] intelligence was so bad and flawed–and if that’s the case, then somebody’s head ought to roll for that–or the intelligence was exaggerated or twisted in a way to make a more convenient case to the American people.”

2007: digital becomes personal - iPhone/rev 1.0 - The Art of Persuasion

Even though the PC and the Mac became watchwords in computing in the 80’s & 90’s, the real change for mankind came with the advent of the iPhone in 2007 as now everyone became addicted to said device 24/7. With the advent of such persuasive tech, Apple becomes the most profitable company in the world in tandem with the net becoming the connect for the world and social media becoming the personalized source for real “news” tailored just for you .

“The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous. - Orwell - It’s all about the money

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. - Einstein

In 2009, yours truly wrote this about Afghanistan and the futility of fighting yet another war eerily reminiscent of Vietnam, the poster child on how to not to fight one: For starters, the Taliban don’t have to win, just persevere. The US will not be in Afghanistan forever so just showing up is enough. Afghanistan is a huge country, inhospitable to occupiers as seen throughout history via defeats placed on Alexander the Great, the British and the Russians. Now it’s our turn and ...

In 2021, the Taliban won just as the VC did in Nam.

The cost of said Middle-East wars since 9/11, all of which the US lost, comes to a cool 8 trillion +, the cost/benefit ratio of waging such a campaign besides monies going down the drain includes countries destroyed, people killed and never ending hatred of the US.

To see why the US failed miserably regarding Afghanistan,
check out the Afghanistan Stability diagram by Coin Dynamics.

I can see clearly now

Don't Look Up - Subjectivity rules

“Based on truly possible events”.

In 1976, Network, depicting how news became an entertaining environment committed to generating revenue at any cost is now joined in 2023 with an equally dark comedy showing how social media, obsession with the self and denying climate change takes precedence over a comet destined to kill us all. :)

2024: Ghost in the machine - Tech never sleeps

Photo by Scott Rodgerson on Unsplash

Outside of the nightmare happening in Israel/Palestine and a rematch between Trump and Biden is this ...

“GPT-4 is full of ghosts. Gemini is also full of ghosts,” said Ethan Mollick, a professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in a Thursday blog post. “There is a weirdness to GPT-4 that isn’t sentience, but also isn’t like talking to a program… It is the illusion of a person on the other end of the line, even though there is nobody there.”

The concept of a ghost residing in the “machine” of AI, the open ended tech forever to remain unknowable due to the fact of code having to write code in order to react to the real world in real time, is eminently logical based on the continued hoovering of data 24/7 by the Gemini’s of the world, pointing out the fact we have, in effect, lost control of a rapidly evolving tech making it’s way toward sentience, something voiced with great concern by the very people who created this entity in the first place.

Whistling past the graveyard applies.

Robert E.