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| Militant blog by a UK political dissident. |
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 There are known knowns. These
are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to
say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also
unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know.
Donald Rumsfeld Rumsfeld's known unknowns or unknown knowns - or something. This could get really messy. Let's start again. What I'm trying to explain to you is that I know the unknown - to you, probably - source of inspiration for Rumsfeld's known unknown remarks. If you read the rest of this posting you will also then know that known unknown which will then of course, be known. A few days ago - on 26 October 2009 - the Geocites website was closed down by its current owners Yahoo. Geocites was a site that offered free webhosting for many years and I had a site there called 'Deep dt's reality cracking pages' from 1999. My site only had a handful of pages and although long ago abandoned, it was still there until last Monday. It's address was http://www.geocites.com/athens/olympus/1833/. The link is broken - of course - because Geocites has shut down. At that site was one page called the new diary which dating from 1999 was a very early blog. I did claim that it changed often and it did for a while and then it didn't. The point is the newdiary.htm page is now extremely difficult to locate using search engines although the other pages are much easier. I found that only the bing.com search engine delivered a cached page with the search "deep dt" newdiary.htm. I recognised my work when Rumsfeld said his unknown knowns remark back in 2003 although I think that I stated it much more clearly as "you cannot learn what you already believe to know and you cannot know what you have not learned." (but then you have to make allowances because he is a mass-murdering Neo-Con). Hmm, I've just realised that it's worth contrasting this with Tony Blair's "I only know what I believe". [Is that insanity? I think so] Rumsfeld may actually have been trying to prove me wrong since it comes from a longer piece having a go at politicians. Anyway, since the page is so hard to find, here it is. The links are broken because it's so old. DEEP DT's PAGESThe new diary (early '99)
"Say: I am real, this is real, the world is real, and nobody laughs. But say: this is a simulacrum, you are only a simulacrum, this war is a simulacrum, and everybody bursts out laughing. With a condescending and yellow laughter, or perhaps a convulsive one, as if it was a childish joke or an obscene invitation. Anything which belongs to the order of simulacrum is obscene or forbidden, similar to that which belongs to sex or death. However, our belief in reality and evidence is far more obscene. Truth is what should be laughed at. One may dream of a culture where everyone bursts into laughter when someone says: this is true, this is real."(from Baudrillard's 'Radical Thought').
I am not a politician. I am a Socialist. Call the pot black. He reads. He is a witch, a politician, a devil in disguise. Burn the witch. Burn the witch. Burn the witch. You may disagree at any stage. The world is mostly organised under the economic system known as Capitalism. Capitalism is concerned, above all else, with the accumulation of private and corporate wealth. Capitalism is counter-democratic - individuals have never been asked nor given their consent to this system of economic and social organisation AND economically powerful organisations are powerful politically. Cap is above such matters. You cannot be credible or real in opposition to such a situation. It is above question the natural and god-given state. You cannot discuss cap. You cannot criticise cap. It is Natural. It is Real. It is Good. I've been doing some web-based research for a friend's essay on post war British politics. These stats are for the U.K. and are shamelessly cut and pasted from www.jrf.org.uk. There are hundreds of sources available on the net. You don't have to be a politician to read these stats and they already know, it is their business.
Well I knew that PCPlus writers frequented these pages and they employ the 'black pot' analogy in the current issue BUT Gordon Brown the British Chancellor of the Exchequor has announced a budget that reduces the rate of income tax from 25% to 10% for the poorest paid since I made the comments above. I'm not sure that it will have much impact because 15% of very little is er, very little. A dual form of taxation operates in Britain with Value Added Tax on almost all purchases at 17.5% hitting the poor hardest. I intend to search the web to see what impact it will have.
Prejudgice and arrogance stop learning. The politician is not concerned with truth, justice, reality or any such notions - he is concerned with maintaining his social standing, his ego, (uh-oh Freudian term) maintaining the adoration that feeds his megalomania. He does not realise that you cannot learn what you already believe to know and you cannot know what you have not learned. He does not even attempt to know or understand. To do so would recognise a failing, a flaw, that compromises the arrogance that is demanded. His social standing is important above all else. He will sell his grandmother and rationalise it and sleep well and rubbish his opponents in the process. He is not concerned with learning or knowing because he has an unshakable conviction in his own omnipotence and perfection. Should we accept and adore and debase ourselves to this model - that there are Gods amoung us? LINX | ||
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