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You Say You Want a Revolution?
By David Glenn Cox
We all want to save the world. Revolutions are relatively easy things to start; what is difficult is to successfully complete them. Most revolutions arise from societal instability, poverty or political upheaval.
The first American Revolution was a tax revolt, rich white men complaining about taxes levied from London. Lost in the American debate was that the taxes were raised to cover the Crown's cost of the French & Indian war. In London the Parliament was dismayed that the American colonists resented paying for the military services of the King’s Army which had protected the colonists' interests. The Crown learned something now well known, Americans want everything but rich Americans resent paying for anything.
The British lost the war, not by troops or cannons, but by the printing press. The taxes imposed on the press and printed goods created a media openly hostile to the interests of the Crown. No revolution can be successful without control of the media.
The second American Revolution was about several interests that, when combined, created a hot intensity that burst into flame. Conflicting mercantile laws compounded the question of states' rights. The Northern states were industrial and heavily populated, as well as the financial center of the country. The Southern states were rural and sparsely populated with an agrarian society. The question of slavery in the South was seen purely as an issue of property rights.
By adding more Senators backed by Northern interests, the Northern states could pass, through the House, legislation detrimental to agrarian interests. If the Northern states could limit the expansion of slavery, the South saw this as an attempt to marginalize and control them, both politically and economically. Most Southerners owned no slaves; they knew only what local politicians told them or what they the read in the local paper. To the average Southerner it appeared the Northern industrial states were trying to rob them of their freedom.
The Bolshevik Revolution, in a country as vast as Russia, involved small groups of intellectuals and masses of followers in a few cities. For the masses there was hunger and widespread unemployment; alternative plans always sound good to the hungry masses.
The Wiemar Republic was a living example of a democracy that could never work. With half a dozen political parties spread across class, religious, ethnic and commercial interests, all parties had to govern together as a coalition which guaranteed that most were unhappy with the outcome and little was accomplished. In 1925 a small nationalist party acquired the failing newspaper “Volkischer Beobacher.” The party filled the paper with nationalist sentiments and how Germany had been mistreated and that the weak Wiemar government would never deliver anything but misery. Despite the party's intimidation of newsstand owners and street corner paperboys, the paper sold poorly, until the economy went into the tank.
The party bought the "Der Angriff" in 1926 and then "Das Reich" and then the official newspaper of the SS, "Das Schwarze Korps" and then something for the intellectuals called "Der Sturmer." The party had effectively blitzed the newspaper marketplace. Now, add the strong-arm sales tactics towards newsstands that didn’t give the publications prominent locations, and the rest, as they say, is history.
By 1933 when the party took control of the government, all these efforts became unnecessary as the press officially came under control of the government. William Shirer, the author of the "Rise and Fall of the Third Reich," wrote another book titled “Berlin Diary” about his two years, from 1937 to 1939, when he was a CBS correspondent in Berlin.
Shirer witnessed, first hand, the antics and machinations of the third Reich. He was one of the first to recognize that Adolph Hitler was a master theatrical showman. Shirer wrote of Hitler reportedly throwing himself on the floor in a fit of rage, threatening the Czechoslovakian Prime Minister with total annihilation and earning the nickname "carpet chewer," and then seeing him in a hallway a few minutes later laughing and joking about it with confederates.
Shirer’s job required him to meet with his boss, Edward R. Murrow, in London every six weeks. Shirer wrote of these meetings, that he knew that the German press was controlled by the Nazis, and that he was fully aware of the propaganda lies. What shocked him when he reached London was how much his worldview of the issues had been altered by the constant bombardment of Nazi propaganda.
Propaganda is like the rain; if you go out in the rain you will get wet. You can wear a hat and a raincoat and goulashes, but some of the water will still get through to you. You will see the world through the rain and it will inevitably affect you.
In Hitler’s memoir, “Mein Kampf,” Hitler explained in great detail that Germany’s future greatness depended on the taking of lands in the east. He lambasted the treaty of Versailles and the states that it created by executive fiat. It was clear to anyone who read Hitler’s book that Poland, Czechoslovakia and Russia were in his cross hairs.
After he unleashed blitzkrieg warfare on the Poles and after bombing Warsaw unmercifully, Hitler unleashed his next campaign. The Nazi-controlled media took an apologetic stance; the German people had never wanted a war with the Poles at all. The Germans and the Polish people had a long history of friendship, and the war was brought about because of the Jews. It was a ludicrous argument and totally false on every level in both word and deed. But the media campaign continued, explaining that the calamities and suffering of the Polish people wasn’t the fault of their friends, the Germans; it was the fault of the Jews.
So successful was this campaign that six months later in Warsaw it was a majority opinion. When their German masters began to inflict their racial laws, there was little resistance by the Poles. After all, the Jews had brought this on themselves. Of course it wasn’t true, but there was no other opinion offered to counter it.
Most people don’t pay attention to issues every day. Many never realize the connection between politics and their daily lives. They say, “My boss is an asshole and we’re not getting raises again this year!” Then they turn on the TV and watch "American Idol" or "Fox News." They aren’t bad people or dumb people, they just believe what they are told by the media without questioning. Recently in the article that I wrote advocating that Dennis Kucinich run a primary challenge to the President, I got the following response, “Dennis Kucinich voted against health care reform so I think he’s a piece of shit!”
It is pretty obvious that this individual had never heard of Eugene Debs' “It is better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.” Kucinich based his no vote on the fact the bill does nothing to control costs and gives $70 billion to the private insurance industry. He called it a foundation built on sand. I wonder where my commentator got his opinion?
You say you want a revolution? Call your cable or satellite providers and say, “This is me and this is you; this is fuck and this is off.” This would be a step in the right direction. Outside of the time and money you'll save to pursue more meaningful activities, you will find your own ideas emerging from what you read. You might have to buy gasoline from huge corporations but you don’t have to buy their opinions.
You will never overthrow a government such as this with guns and violence as long as they control the media. They can shoot you down like dogs in the streets while vilifying you in the press until before long the public will condemn you for stopping their bullets.
The media and the government spend billions of dollars each year trying to sell you things, wars, torture, Toyotas, bath beads, tax cuts, hemorrhoid creams and political ideas. The oil companies all have bloated TV budgets explaining how green they’ve become, and the sheep say, “Baa, baa.”
You say you want a revolution? Step one: Stop listening to them! Stop buying from them and stop giving them access to your most important possession, your mind.
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