Stan Goff ex-US Special Forces: Americans are not critical thinkers

[JohnyCanuck]

This quote is from an interview with ex US Army Special Forces Sergeant Stan Goff posted at www.truthout.org


(JVB) What did you think about the invasion of Iraq?

(SG) I think it has turned into a tremendous tar baby. And the more he fights this tar baby, the deeper he will become stuck in it prior to 2004. People know it had something to do with oil, but they don't understand the complexities of oil.

by and large. We suffer from a collective sociogenic learning disability based on the complete commodification of our consciousness by consumerism and electronic media. So we are not only bitterly unhappy and alienated, we are intensely stupid and attached to denial.

So understanding what invading Iraq had to do with oil takes a little study. They didn't just go there to steal. There was a confluence of factors that were economic, strategic, and political. People like Andrew McKillop and Michael Hudson have written at length on these points. The main point is that the US economy has been converted into a credit and debt scam aimed against the rest of the world, and backed up by military force. But the scheme is falling apart as the rest of the world is losing the ability and willingness to pay. The US economy is dreadfully weak, with the real material economy now gutted by parasitic speculation, and the only source of strength left is the military, which they are now trying to use to gain control over the world's energy supply.


http://truthout.org/docs_03/073103A.shtml

[rock]

1. Americans are not critical thinkers

No sh*t Watson.

[gratuitous]

2. Several points to blame for that

Americans aren't critical thinkers? I beg to differ. You should go visit the chat board for the Big Brother or Survivor television programs. The critical analysis, depth of thinking, and overall high tone would put old Kremlinologists to shame. The same goes for major league baseball chat rooms, and other sports venues.

Why don't Americans bring that kind of intellect and analysis to international affairs? Partly there's a lack of public interest. Partly there's a lack of information. Partly there's a lack of coverage. What if the Iraq invasion got the same sort of air time, commercial promotion, multiplicity of voices that CBS gives to the NCAA basketball tournament? Hell, people that you wouldn't think could string two coherent sentences together can go on forever about the advantages Kansas might have in its matchup with Duke.

What would happen if instead of talking heads railing at each other for hours on end, there was actual reportage of what was going on, full of detail and human interest? Ten minutes on the nightly news devoted every day to Iraq's history, the ethnic groups that make up its population, who has ruled it in the past, how Saddam came to power, how he stayed in power through the 1980s and 1990s, its war with Iran, and so on, could greatly enhance public awareness of what the situation there is like, how the U.S.'s intervention affects it, and what the likely outcomes might be.

But of course, it wouldn't sell nearly as much Zoloft as "Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire" does, so that's right off the table.

[Garage Queen]

4. Speaking of Big Brother...

...can you give me an update? :D

[gratuitous]

5. Don't I know you from somewhere?

I never forget a face.

[JackSwift]

6. I respectfully disagree

Americans do not have the ability to take another side of an issue or to critically examine their own points of view. Being able to spin a thousand reasons why they are right on some trivial issue, well yeah, but that isn't critical thinking. The ability of Americans to construct a logical argument is utterly appalling.

[tom_paine]

3. Goff knows his stuff

:thumbsup:

[Postman]

7. AWESOME INTERVIEW....

eom.