‘Self-interest’ was virtually absent from the agenda, it was probably more of ‘enlightened self-interest’.

(At that time there were so few ‘embedded’ journalists/writers that you could count them on your fingers).

These days there’s all too much coverage of pseudo-events about extraordinarily inauthentic people doing inauthentic things.
–David Halberstam
Vanity Fair, March 1998

Cybermedia will make every man his own editor, which in turn makes every writer a fool. The Internet will transmit misinformation very efficiently. We will miss the gatekeepers.
–Neal B. Freeman
National Review, Dec. 11, 1995

I strongly recommend that you go through the comments in Shaun Mullen’s post please click here.

Excerpt:

Sam Says: “but why does this have to become ‘George Bush obviously is mentally ill and/or deficient in some manner”?”

Austin, no one is saying he’s crazy. But we do think he is sinfully incompetent. The kind of incompetence that keeps driving with the parking brake on even after he knows about it. He lies, covers for his boys, obviously thinks the world is black and white and simple, the kind of way a child would look at it. Except he has the largest military in the world at his disposal and thinks that’s the answer to all the problems.

He doesn’t understand American principles and thinks torture and imprisonment without trial is freedom as long as the Stars and Stripes are waving in the background. He defends the unthinkable on emotional grounds all the time, and never uses his damn head because its not him thats going to pay the real costs.

DLS Says: Is your hatred of Bush truly pathological (diseased), as it is of so many people here in the USA and in Europe.

Even you agree that “so many” (obviously more than a majority) people here in the USA and Europe hate him. Why? Just think about it.

I do not hate Bush, or for that matter anyone in my life because hatred – like lust, anger and greed – are debilitating/negative emotions that sap the energy (mental and physical) of those who get into the clutches of these emotions (at least this is what we are taught in Hinduism).

I have no personal enmity with President George W. Bush. I raise an alarm regarding those people, especially in power, who appear to suffer from some debilitating traits, and whose actions appear highly suspect and have negative/deadly consequences that affect a large number of people and the world.

DLS, there has to be some major/mysterious reason why you are among a small minority, according to your own statement, who are blindly supporting someone in power whose actions are resulting in untold misery in different parts of the world.

Ultimately, these very actions (based on short-sighted vision) are going to take a tragic toll, not only of the very values which make the USA a vital and a democratic nation, but also harm economically.

I hope I am proved wrong.

Is your hatred of Bush truly pathological (diseased), as it is of so many people here in the USA and in Europe?

As for that little get-together photographed, here’s another article with another photograph for you to savor.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6607757.stm