Slow, Sloppy and Brilliant

Obviously part of the reason we have a dysfunctional foreign policy is we’re dependant on oil. And we feel extremely guilty about our role in that. Not lobbyist guilty, but sometimes it’s close. The problem however, is more complicated than merely oil imports - it’s about intellectual decay. Sometime in the past few decades politicians and advertisers discovered that you could win an election or sell a product just by making people feel really, really good about our country. Voters and consumers rewarded them for it, and they responded by making people feel good about feeling good. It created a powerful cycle of consent and control. And the only problem is that we lost sight of the fact that feeling good about the country isn’t the same thing as being a good citizen. Sometimes they’re the exact opposite. Do you get that? Do you people understand this? When we kill off thousands of our soldiers in wars we don’t understand, and the government tells us we’re not any safer so they can keep rifling through our bags or hunting foreigners with flying robots you shouldn’t in any way feel good about that. It’s your duty - not your right, although it’s that too - but it’s your duty to get mad and perplexed and ask questions and read as much as you can to find some answers and change things. A picnic on a pickup’s bed with Mellencamp blasting from the radio has nothing at all to do with this. Getting a gentle high about this place isn’t helping. Try some confusion and anxiety. You need it.