Category: Book Recommendations

Propaganda … A College Course

Main Texts

1.) Propaganda: The Formation of Men’s Attitudes — Jacques Ellul

http://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-The-Formation-Mens-Attitudes/dp/0394718747/ref=pd_sim_14_32?ie=UTF8&dpID=417YlDRfqUL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR93%2C160_&refRID=14ZH0NAB2ZC7KY68Y96C

2.)  The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America — Daniel Boorstin

http://www.amazon.com/Image-Guide-Pseudo-Events-America/dp/0679741801/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1458140754&sr=8-1&keywords=Daniel+Boorstin+image

Required Texts

1.)  The Father of Spin – Larry Tye

Intent — Biography of one of the most influential Propagandist in the 20th century

http://www.amazon.com/Father-Spin-Edward-Bernays-Relations/dp/0805067892/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458143784&sr=1-1&keywords=Father+of+spin

2.) Propaganda — Edward Bernays

Intent — The technique and “how to” of how Bernays did Propaganda

http://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Edward-Bernays/dp/0970312598/ref=pd_sim_14_13?ie=UTF8&dpID=51P65kY5kAL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR102%2C160_&refRID=01DZMMG01QW2S39NM69T

3.) The Crowd — Gustav LaBon

Intent — How the public mind works in the context of large gatherings. How propaganda can manipulate the public mind in the context of large gatherings.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Crowd-Study-Popular-Mind/dp/0486419568/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=1Z80KH2S9C3GBRACXJDX

4.) Rules For Radical — Saul Alinsky

Intent — Alinsky’s propaganda methodology in order to manipulate Organizations and Public Opinion of Organizations. Community Organization 101.

http://www.amazon.com/Rules-Radicals-Practical-Primer-Realistic/dp/0679721134/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458141021&sr=1-1&keywords=rules+for+radicals

5.) Confrontational Politics — H. L. Richardson

Intent — “How to” book on how to use propaganda in confrontational settings. Gives tips on how to organize with propaganda.

http://www.amazon.com/Confrontational-Politics-Senator-H-L-Richardson/dp/0915463768

6.) The News Twisters — Edith Efron

Intent — Demonstrates the subtle presence and success of Propaganda by the Mainstream media upon the American voting public. Dated book. Still highly relevant.

http://www.amazon.com/news-twisters-Edith-Efron/dp/0840212062/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458141353&sr=1-4&keywords=edith+efron

7.) Why Johnny Can’t Think — Robert Whitaker

Intent — Demonstrates the bias and propaganda in the University system. Insists that every message received must be received by examining the presuppositions of the person or vehicle sending the message. Begins to give a outline on how to be immune to Propaganda.

http://www.amazon.com/Johnny-Cant-Think-Robert-Whitaker/dp/0972929207/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458141805&sr=1-1&keywords=Why+Johnny+Can%27t+think

8.) Amusing Ourselves To Death

Intent — Reveals that Americans are a Propagandized people and explains how Television is a propaganda machine. Television makes people immune to Truth and creates a society that requires a constant diet of propaganda.

http://www.amazon.com/Amusing-Ourselves-Death-Discourse-Business/dp/014303653X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458144103&sr=1-1&keywords=amusing+ourselves+to+death

9.) The Medium is the Massage — Marshal McLuhan

Intent — How the vehicle of the Message affects the Message sent. Propaganda, to be effective, has to be married to the right vehicle.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Medium-Massage-Marshall-McLuhan/dp/1584230703/ref=pd_sim_14_3?ie=UTF8&dpID=51y9DtmSKWL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR92%2C160_&refRID=048PEYTMZ68F9KGW16J1

Note — See the course curriculum offered on Worldview Thinking and Presuppositionalism to provide the answer how one immunizes themselves to propaganda. This course will make you aware of Propaganda but it will not by itself make you immune to Propaganda.

Required Video

1.) The Century of the Self

Intent — 4 hour video that demonstrates the vast and deep role of propaganda in the 20th century. Should be viewed at least twice.

 

Basic Weekly Assignments:

Unlike previous courses this course insists on the importance of each and every book and the video for a complete understanding of Propaganda. As such each and every book requires Chapter summaries.

A final 30 page paper is required that explains what Propaganda is, how it works, the relation it bears to truth, if any. The paper will also require a demonstration and brief explanation of the techniques of successful Propaganda.

 

Thumbnail Sketch of Jones’ “Monsters from the Id”

Finished “Monsters from the Id,” by E. Michael Jones.

Jones works too hard to make connections between various Horror film genres and the Revolutions that inspired them with the result that his connections come across as unnatural and contrived. Jones want’s to link Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” to the French Revolution, Dracula to the Weimar Republic, “The Forbidden Planet” to the rise of the 60’s sexual revolution in America and “Alien” to the rise in America of sex withoutprogeny. Though the exactitude of the connections are a bit forced there remains a good deal of fantastic connections which Jones makes as he explores the horror genre when understood in connection with social and sexual revolution.

For Jones, the Monster of the Horror genre is the return of the repressed. Jones’s theory is that what is repressed is sexual morality as social revolution brings about sexual perversity. What the horror genre does is that it provides a release mechanism whereby what has been repressed can find expression again. The Monster in the Horror genre is a killer of those who have sublimated the inescapable knowledge that sex outside of matrimony is verboten. The Monster thus is the suppressed conscience as God’s executioner against those who have tried unsuccessfully to sear their conscience.

The greater the perversion, the uglier and more vile the returning Monster. Jones argues that the Monster is both known and unknown by those who create them. Known because their creators can’t escape what they have done (Here Jones’ concentrates heavily on Mary Godwin Shelley’ Frankenstein) and yet unknown because their creators can’t admit to themselves the genesis of their Monsters.

Along the way Jones richly quotes from the Marquis de Sade, from Jacques Barruel’s “History of Jacobinism,” from Mary Wollenstonecraft,. from Stroker’s “Dracula,” from Quetel’s “History of Syphilis,” from Magnus Hirschfield and Christopher Isherwood, from Edward Bernay’s “Propaganda,” from Ren’e Wormser’s “Foundations; their Power and Influence,” from Linda Lovelace’s autobiography, and others. Jones weaves all of this into a wonderful tapestry that exposes Modernity and the forces that have sustained it.

There are wonderful sections that set forth the control mechanism of Modernity and how sexual perversion is linked to that. Likewise fantastic insights into mega Foundations and how they have supported the social revolution of sexual perversion. And finally, glimpses into how the Illuminati, via Jacobinism has been a partner in all this work to overthrow Christ.

It is a splendid read. It does start slow but it really picks up steam as it goes.

Reading List in Preparation for Memorial Day 2016

A reading list to get you ready to celebrate Memorial Day, 2016.

Read these 11 books by Memorial Day 2016 and you’ll never celebrate Memorial day again in quite the same way.

In a loosely chronological order.

11.) Lincoln’s Little War: How His Carefully Crafted Plans Went Astray — Webb Garrison

10.) Lincoln the Man — Edgar Masters

9.) Wilson’s War — Jim Powell

8.) War is a Racket — Smedley Butler

7.) The Unnecessary War — Pat Buchanan

6.) Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution — Anthony C. Sutton

5.) Naked Capitalist — W. Cleon Skousen

4.) Freedom Betrayed — Herbert Hoover

3.)  FDR goes to War — Burton Folsom

2.) Stalin’s Secret Agents: The Subversion of Roosevelt’s Government — M. Stanton Evans

1.) Blacklisted by History — M. Stanton Evans

 

From the Mailbag — Pastor I’m For Open Borders … Why Aren’t You?

Dear Pastor,

I ran across this quote from R. J. Rushdoony and I’m pretty sure you would support it,

We must render honor and justice to all men wherever due, but we have a particular responsibility to care for our own. This means first of all our families. . . . Biblical conduct is regulated by relationship, and to subvert this is to lead directly into welfare economics and socialism. If a man must exercise towards all men the same care, oversight, and charity he does towards his own family, then an impossible burden is placed on him. . . . Every system of ‘universal’ ethics is at one and the same time a system of universal slavery.”

R. J. Rushdoony
On illegal immigration and Amnesty
“Politics of Guilt and Pity”, p. 248

Pastor, I see this quote not as an argument for regulation of immigration, walls, and border patrols but rather as an argument against welfare. I do not see how the need to take care of my own family necessitates that I have a government that prohibits an individual from crossing an imaginary line in say Arizona. This is not logical. Furthermore, to construe this to mean that Rushdoony supported immigration laws is not honest. Could you help me see what I’m not seeing?

Lovey Jardine

Dear Lovey,

Thank you for writing. First let’s consider the RJR quote itself to see if it speaks to immigration. RJR says,

“If a man must exercise towards all men the same care, oversight, and charity he does towards his own family, then an impossible burden is placed on him…”

I would say that this indeed is an argument for regulation of immigration, walls, and border patrols as well as an argument against welfare. So, I do believe you misinterpreting the quote when you say it is not about immigration at all. To hopefully help you see where the relation is between “imaginary lines” and taking care of your family, allow me to offer,

1.) The need to take care of our own families includes the idea of having a stable culture and economy. The flooding of our nation with people of a different religion and culture means your family will not be taken care of because the consequence of such policy means the balkanization of this Nation into hostile religion, ethnic, and economic enclaves which demands a Centralized tyrannical Government can keep in order. One reason the FEDS are following this policy Lovey is that it creates a need for their presence since only a strong handed Government can mediate the hostilities that will arise from the policies of purposeful balkanization that they are pursuing.

2.) The depression of wages resulting in the destruction of the middle class is assured by the current immigration policy. This likewise will eventuate in the voiding of care for our current families. Harvard Professor and Immigration expert George Borjas has analyzed the effects of immigration on the middle class and the conclusion is that this immigrations redistributes capital upwards with the consequence that the mega-Rich get richer and the middle class are increasingly impoverished so that what is created by this policy is a have vs. have not social order. I’m sure you’ll agree with me Lovey that impoverishing your children in order to enrich the Mega-Rich Corporatism class, via this immigration policy, is not taking care of your family.

3.) This quote clearly advances the idea that RJR supported immigration laws when the consequence of them meant the voiding of the care, oversight and charity towards one’s own family. The current status quo does just that. Here is another quote from Rushdoony that communicates much the same idea that Scriptures do call for the extension of hospitality and justice, but not an open-borders re-ordering of social life.

“To call for the modern, humanistic society with an open relationship to all men would have appeared to the Israelites as the ultimate tyranny. The law did not require any such a re-ordering of any man’s private life: It simply required justice in dealing with all men.”

Highest Regards Lovey,

Pastor

______________________________
Lovey wrote back,

Dear Pastor,

Part of your answer was that “immigration “brings down wages”? So we should keep wages artificially high by regulating the number of people that can live or move through a particular area? I guess we not thinking in terms of a free market economy.

When Rushdoony said we need to “take care of our own families” I am sure you are right an he meant extending more power to the government to interfere with the natural right of individuals to move about freely. Yep, that sounds like something Rushdoony would say.

Lovey Jardine

Dear Lovey,

Thank you for writing back. Let’s see if we can tease this out for you.

First, I am not the kind of Libertarian that you seem to be. I do not support this free market economy that you are championing because it is most certainly not a Free Market economy. What you are supporting is the Corporatism wherein the Mega-Corporations are in bed with the Mega-Government to the end of turning the rest of the citizenry into slaves for their pleasure and use. This current immigration “policy” enriches the Mega-rich class and destroys the middle class. Statistics (See George Borjas’ work)

National Data | Economic Impact of Mass Immigration Worse than We Thought

clearly show that current policy means a transfer of wealth from the Middle class to the Mega Rich who are in bed with the Government class. I’m all for free markets when they are fair Markets but the game is rigged right now and I do not support a policy which destroys the infrastructure of the middle class in order to worship at the feet of Austrian Economics while at the same time serving the ends of creating a Globalist New World Order.

Second, per RJR, he was not the Libertarian that North is. North has been destroyed by his worshiping at the feet of Austrian economics.

Thirdly, I would challenge you on your individual natural rights language which is straight out of Enlightenment Humanism. Strictly speaking individuals have no natural rights. As Christians, we have duties. Only God has rights. In this case, per the first RJR quote, my duty and responsibility to care for my own is my particular responsibility. Since Biblical conduct is regulated by relationship my duty as a Christian to my family outstrips your Humanist idea of individual rights. I have already demonstrated in the first response how all of this impinges upon my duty to my family.

A good book to help you think through your whole “Individual Natural Rights” language is,

http://www.amazon.com/Whats-wrong-rights-Robert-Ingram/dp/B0006CZ1R4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1406212559&sr=8-2&keywords=T.+Robert+Ingram

Fourth, you warn about artificially high wages but I hardly believe that anybody would make the case that we are currently living in a time where artificially high wages is a problem for our families which reflect the middle class. The real problem here is the artificially low wages that would result were we to turn this country into a huge sweatshop. Also, I would repudiate the idea that immigration restrictions necessarily lead to extending more power to the Government especially when the policies you are advocating concerning immigration works to the end of setting in concrete a Tyrannical state. The immigrants we are speaking of here are a natural constituency for the Marxist (Democratic) party. That party will use the votes of the immigration pattern to grow the Government into a centralized top down Usurping State. So, you chastise me for my alleged support of larger government because I want it to “provide for the common defense and yet your support of the current immigration imbroglio assures the rise of the totalitarian state. I fear you have not calculated the impact of Corporatism enough in your thinking Lovey. I also think that you need to listen to the RJR lectures where he points out that Libertarianism and Marxism are two sides of the same coin.

All the Best,

Pastor

Reviewing Rushdoony’s “The American Indian” — Power

“The Indians originally venerated Cortes as a god. They respected strength, they were ruled by very powerful gods, and a man who could overthrow those who would be acknowledged.”

Patrick Marnham
So Far From God: A Journey to Central America — pg. 93

So, starts Rushdoony in his chapter on Power in his book “The American Indian.” The burden of this chapter is to reveal that in terms of worship what the Indian worshiped was “power.” In this context Rush insists the converse was true also in his experience. Because the Indians worshiped power, they likewise despised powerlessness. Along the way Rushdoony labors also to show that this worship of power is something that is now characteristic of American culture.

Rushdoony states the obvious in this chapter that men who will not Worship the God of the Bible, will inevitably worship naked power instead.

“If the omnipotent and all-gracious God of Scripture is not worshipped, men will pursue their adoration of power in other ways.”

Rushdoony notes that the disrespect for powerlessness that the Indians had was exhibited by their disrespect for blacks.

“Owing to this respect for power, there was a corresponding disrespect for powerlessness. The clearest expression of this was their attitude towards blacks…. to them, blacks were inferior and their feelings did not count.”

One wonders if this attitude was really about power so much as it is a mindless ethnocentrism that can be so typical among different people groups.

It is interesting though that RJR contrasts this with the attitude of the white man towards blacks as in telling a story about interaction between Indians and a particular black man RJR concludes,

“He (the black man upon whom a prank had been pulled) soon came to realize that no Indian would regard him as an equal, whereas some white men would and most white men would be reasonably fair to him.”

However after making these kinds of blanket statements Rushdoony turns around and admits that Indians could respect the black man if he was a warrior type,

“In some areas, blacks intermarried with Indians. I am of the opinion that this usually occurred where blacks fought back against enslavement and escaped. Such defiance would have earned Indians’ respect. The Indian attitude was not earned in terms of race or color but of warrior standards….What mattered was a man’s exhibition of the traits of the fighter and the hunter.”

Of course this refers back to the worship of power. According to RJR if any individual revealed power then they might be accepted on some level by the Indian. The best way that I can harmonize RJR here is to say as a general rule the Indian did not respect blacks but exceptions might occur if individuals blacks were to show a warrior spirit that bespoke power.

Rush even connected the peyote cult with the pursuit of power. He notes that the peyote drug creates “gives illusions of power.” At the same time Rush noted that many of the other Tribal members looked down upon the peyote users as being weak, thus showing again the power esteem.

As a brief side-note it is interesting that RJR reports that many of the Indians claimed that the use of peyote was a modern phenomena that was introduced by the country of Mexico.

Getting back to the power theme RJR spends time examining how modern American culture has likewise turned to the cult of power.

“This veneration of power was very notable to me, especially because I saw the characteristic becomem very prominent in the white American culture by the 1960’s. One aspect of it was the rise of ‘groupies,’ girls who eagerly sumbitted sexually to power figures in the popular culture. Popular musicians, athletes, film and television stars have since then been pursued with intensity by women, young and not so young, who feel it is an honor to be used sexually by them. Frankly, nothing I saw among the Indians matched in intensity this power worship that became so prevalent in the United States…. White American culture has far outstripped that of the Indians in its worship of power, with deadly results.”

Clearly, if man will not worship God he will worship that which he believes will give him power. As bad as this is it may be even worse when Christians worship God because of how they think they can bend God’s power to their own selfish use. Too often in the Church today God is worshiped, not because of who He is, but for what He can offer to the worshiper. If it is bad to worship naked power apart from God, how much worse to worship God for how His power can be channeled to serve our own selfish purposes? To often, in the words of Bob Dylan, we think of God as ” just an errand boy to satisfy our wandering desires.”

When are we going to wake up and strengthen the things that remain?

Perhaps a clear sign of Christian maturity is the willingness to worship God when He has determined to be God hidden. There are times in life when God’s providence comes as a severe mercy announcing a seeming powerlessness in some life event. When all seems without the necessary power we would summon will we still be a people who worship God?

In such times we need to remember with Rush,

“God’s being is more than simply power. He is justice, love, grace, law and more.”

May God be pleased to reveal to us the lie that the temptation to worship naked power is.