I quote Daniel Boorstin, The Image, 1962, page 37. Boorstin discussed pseudo-events (contrived events) television and the Graphics Revolution (the multiplication of images and recording techniques, which began in the 19th century). The 1960 Kennedy and Nixon debates were pseudo-events, neither true nor false, but misleading, he says.
We are drowning in manufactured and misleading news, much more so than in 1962. The space shuttle, the debt ceiling and our frantic hyped-up drive for cures are examples.
Boorstin saw a bad side to TV. “TV and radio discussion programs must snap question and answer back and forth”. He notes that Kennedy and Nixon had 2 ½ minutes to answer. He would not have approved of twitter. What would he have said about Rupert Murdoch's Fox News?
He distrusted advertising, but advertisers aren’t Machiavellian manipulators. They tell us what we want to hear. “We worry about advertising...accusing Madison Avenue witch doctors of subverting our will”. Our world has changed from emphasizing truth to emphasizing impact and credibility. Old distinctions between truth and falsehood no longer apply.
You might object that the Lincoln-Douglas debates were not spontaneous and that all debates are misleading. Boorstin later said yes, debates are almost always misleading compared to analysis of what politicians have done in the past.
What about the shuttle, the debt limit and the search for cures? All are contrived pseudo-events. The shuttle followed the successful Apollo program, to create a re-usable launch vehicle. Original plans called for 40-50 launches per year, at a cost of $10-11 million each launch. Great scientific progress was expected- different chemicals could be created in zero gravity, etc. The International Space station was started in 1994 and is near to completion. Yuri Gagarin orbited the earth on April 12, 1961, the Bay of Pigs fiasco was April 17th, Alan Shepard’s suborbital flight came May 5th and then suddenly on May 25, 1961 Kennedy announced the goal to put a man on the moon before the end of the decade. The main rationale for Apollo and all subsequent space projects was to control space to ensure military supremacy., http://racetothemoon.blogspot.com/... Today, we fear that China will “surpass us in space and become our masters”. China is not part of the consortium that own and operate the ISS.
I loved science fiction as a teenager, read every sci-fi book in the library. Later, I loved the Dune trilogy, the Bene Gesserit breeding program, the planet Arrakis, etc. I favor nonhuman space exploration as a small part of government sponsored research. If private businesses want rockets and millionaire space tourists, that’s OK. I don’t think that humans can travel safely to Mars any time in the next 30 years. We must give priority to our urgent problems right at hand- Boorstin says “we have come to believe in a plastic universe that we can easily control”. The old ways don’t work. They tell us to reduce interest rates when we have economic busts. This creates opportunities for the very rich to borrow and profit from new bubbles while sequestering money from the lesser 95% of Americans. With each successive ‘recovery’ there are fewer and fewer jobs with benefits, and wages decrease.
The debt ceiling first appeared in 1917. No other country has one; it would make no sense in a parliamentary system. Even in our divided government, while the executive branch might borrow more than Congress wanted, Congress could control where the money was spent. The debt ceiling doesn’t protect the country; it’s a symbolic wrestling match; good versus evil. Big Finance and the very rich understand that financial collapse endangers their possessions. They will make sure that the debt ceiling is raised, or that Obama ignores it if he has to. However, it is to their short-term advantage to extract additional business tax cuts from such a process.
No doubt some tea party representatives are as dumb as they seem and would try to block any debt ceiling increase no matter what. However, the money men can ensure that the debt ceiling is raised. President Obama wants to be the great compromiser, the cool and reasonable leader, to be re-elected. We can't tell what Obama will do, but he and the Biden group seem to favor big spending cuts and triangulation. At some point, the system will crack. Arnold Toynbee had a point- all great nations will fall. Increasing unemployment by shrinking state supported education, courts, etc. at a time when true unemployment is in the 15% range is both stupid and evil. Tim Geithner's apocalyptic warnings don’t help- delaying payment of bond interest would endanger the dollar’s status as a reserve currency, we should avoid this problem, but it isn't Armageddon. Somebody should tell NPR.
What if the tea party fanatics force us to default by miscalculation? I worry more about our political leaders (both parties) avoiding default at the last minute and then claiming to have saved the country (the Simpson-Bowles ‘compromise’ catfood agenda).
Boorstin also discusses our incessant promotion of cures- another big pseudo-event. He says "One of our grand illusions is that we can find a cure for every disease, every problem. There is no cure; there is only opportunity for discovery." We can help people live better with cancer, autism, etc. but we mislead them when we speak of cures. I have prostate cancer in remission after surgery. My surgeon says, “you have no symptoms, your PSA is zero, but we don’t speak of cure”.
Boorstin has interesting observations about our obsession with sports, crime news and gossip-these provide unscripted real news in a world of manufactured crises, summit meetings, fake solutions, etc. The misleading virtual world is larger today than it was in 1962, but the basic issues are the same. Corporate power is much greater, Big Finance is much bigger. He distinguishes pseudo-events from propaganda, which he links to totalitarian regimes such as the USSR. He was too close to WW II. I believe that pseudo-events and propaganda overlap.
So where does that leave us? Reject the media, who say that the sky will fall unless we DO SOMETHING about the debt NOW.. I called the White House and emailed them today saying good for Obama standing up against the ideological tax cutters, that he must not give in on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. He must not triangulate. I called my Congressperson and Senators with the same message. Will there be a need/opportunity to primary Obama? Could an energetic Obama (??) do any good if the Rs control both houses of Congress in 2013? That's too far in the future. Support the progressive agenda now and don't believe the networks, not even PBS or NPR. They all must be reasonable, as defined by Murdoch and the conservatives. Reasonable people don't talk about entitlements- the rich have their tax cuts and inside access to lawmakers- those are unjustified entitlements, but the media keep quiet.
Humans have always needed myths to live by, but democracy requires that the myths manufactured by corporate rulers are upended.