On 6/7/2011 3:29 AM, Warp wrote:
> Darren New<dne### [at] sanrrcom>  wrote:
>> On 5/28/2011 5:21, Warp wrote:
>>>     You know that a news channel is really bad when even foreigners are aware
>>> of how bad and biased it is.
>
>> Also when your president actually starts saying stuff like "Come on, guys,
>> your lies are really hurting people."  Or when they're not allowed to
>> broadcast in neighboring countries because said countries have laws against
>> intentionally incorrect news broadcasts.
>
>     From the little I have seen, though, most people at Fox News seem to be
> pretty smart and good at arguing. If you were to watch only their side of
> any argument or how they defend themselves against bias accusations, their
> arguments can be pretty convincing. (Of course this is the same as with
> conspiracy theorists: If you only listen to them, you are getting very
> carefully selected, highly polished arguments, and you are not getting the
> whole picture. Trying to form an informed opinion based solely on this would
> be a bad mistake.)
>
>    Why are such smart people so stupid at the same time?
>
Don't remember who said it, but they explained it like this (their 
version being a lot shorter than this), "More knowledge/intelligence, 
when applied badly, leads to more plausible sounding explanations for 
the ridiculous, since they have more to work from, when constructing 
their gibberish. This makes them better able to defend their position, 
unless you are nearly as knowledgeable, and not heavily invested in the 
same errors." The original was directed at the question of why a 
scientist may hold, simultaneously, idiotic ideas, not directly related 
to their own field, while managing to do a good, or even exceptional, 
job at things that *are* in that field. The answer being, "Because they 
can construct better stupidities."

Now, when you have a refusal to recognize certain problems, a political 
agenda that requires either supporting the absurd, or ignoring the 
existence of said problems, and your goal is to minimize inconveniences, 
caused by actually acknowledging such problems, or recognizing 
absurdity, the situation is even worse. In such cases, the convoluted 
idiocies constructed are often directed at a) delaying action, b) 
presenting the problem as non-existent, and designed to inconvenience 
you, or your supporters, and/or c) claiming that, even if the problem 
exists, its not as bad as its made out, so all the steps suggested, 
which cause you, or your supporters, inconvenience, are detrimental. And 
that is without even adding in religious components, which bring with it 
a whole level of, "Even though we constitute 90% of the people in the 
country, we are ***supposed*** to be persecuted, otherwise our nonsense 
might not be true, therefor *everyone* is persecuting us."

Who "everyone" is changes from day to day, ironically, sometimes being 
90% of the country (including all the "not true Christians, because they 
are not as insane as we are"), to 10% of the population that supposedly 
functions like the Legion of Doom, super powers and all, and will, any 
day, take over the world, if they don't whine about us conspiring to do 
it, and scream about being persecuted, or something... Don't ask me how 
the hell that works exactly though. lol In any case, the "who" involved, 
in both sorts of nonsensical cases, politics and religion, is fluid, and 
could constitute nearly everyone on the planet, or two idiots in their 
basement, claiming to be the "New Black Panthers", depending on need. It 
doesn't have to be consistent, sane, rational, etc. Only the overall 
"conspiracy" needs to appear to be, and that constitutes basically, 
"Environmentalists and liberals are trying to destroy the world by 
bankrupting businesses, destroying religion, and overthrowing good 
Christian (only they usually are not) laws!"

Frankly, I personally think it makes about as much sense of the moron 
who took in millions from end of the worlders, but seemed to think, 
assuming he wasn't scamming them, that world wide earthquakes, famine, 
deaths, falling buildings, fires, etc., wouldn't have any effect at all 
on the banking industry, so all that cash would be "helpful" to those 
"left behind". It makes perfect sense, as long as you only get your 
information from people payed to make all the numbers come out in favor 
of the nonsense you already believe.

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