You can't handle the truth!

Remember when Jack Nicholson played the part of the General, as Tom Cruise cross examined him, in the movie "A Few Good Men"? Where Tom got Jack heated to a point where the General lost his temper? Tom was grilling him over a soldiers apparent accidental death asking the General for the truth stating that we as a society deserve at least that. Then the General screamed "You can't handle the truth!"

The Declaration of Independence says “...we hold these truths to be self evident.” The thought behind this statement shows that these thinkers and policy makers of their time thought that there was a truth.(note: we know that the same men writing these words at the time owned slaves, but I use this to make a point) That there was an undeniable meaning behind thoughts and statements that would be either based on facts or based on inherent or undeniable universal laws. As there is truth, there is also, now, truth by proxy. Today, our society, that being America, has become a people that hold truth to be a collective idea.

Can we find real truth today?

As we now seem to hold truth as a collective, we have become a society that is set more on feeling good about our world than actually knowing about our world. The science behind evolution is being diluted with the right wing propaganda of creationism or intelligent design. However, science is based on fact and creationism and intelligent design are based on belief. These are two very different means of conclusion.

Ayn Rand, author of The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, believed that truth exists independently of the minds and opinions of people. That there was an underlying universal self evident truth that existed beyond the scope of society and its collective manipulations that can cloud the value of universal truth.

It seems that truth can be manipulated by proclamation. Through continuous self serving statements the use of collective intelligence can make a non reality the opposite. As we watch this current political process unfold we must stay aware of the proclamations and the manipulations of truth since, as a collective populace, we do not take the time to educate ourselves to statements that are thrown into the public consciousness. There is a reality beyond our will and we must respect it if we want to succeed.(1) As we have seen in the past, and it has become much more pronounced with this recent administration that the truth can be manipulated and self serving. And look at the results...

When our elected representatives nearly unanimously allowed this current administration to invade Iraq the checks and balances of our democracy were torn. Allowing this, with a judicial branch that stands behind the Bush agenda shows the danger we have allowed ourselves to become. Our representatives did not call on the facts, did not listen to the facts (as we find that nearly all of the facts were heresay, manipulated, and falsified) and did not take the time as outlined in our Constitution to allow for the truth to come out and be verified. Through the collective emotion and the administrations manipulated truth by proclamation the Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Bush team have subsequently taken our country into a never ending war on terror. Immediately after 9-11 the statements at that time were a war on terrorism. Over a short calculated time frame this was reworded to be a war on terror. The collective intelligence was blinded by the collective emotions of the society. As the truth can be manipulated to the extent that the outcomes can dictate our will depends directly on the extent that our understanding dictates reality.

In a democracy it is the people that have to keep the elected officials and political operatives honest and on point. This is where America is slipping. We are losing our grip as the politicians have learned and become quite astute at giving us only the information that will make us feel good rather than the truth of situations. As a society, it seems, we cannot come to face the realities that exist around us which is why most people get their current event news from late night comedian shows. They would rather feel good as they get a little information. There is a saying that “information is power”. It seems that our current state of society seems to choose to be powerless. Perhaps this is why during the past 16 months of Presidential campaigning we have not heard much dialogue on policy or global issues, but more character issues seem to be dominate. There would be light discussions on talking points to make sure that the public knew what they were supposed to be concerned about...

We have become a society that holds truth to be collective intelligence and self serving. We are a Wikipedia society. It seems ironic how Wikipedia has become such an ingrained and integral part of our international society and Internet experience for finding and distributing information. This information being as a collective. The old school of thought that truth and reality were fixed and objectively knowable is going away. Through libertarian thinkers like, Friedrich von Hayek, who says that decentralized markets work best because they are so much more efficient than centralized bureaucracies at digesting information.(2) Although, given the deregulated markets of telecommunications and energy, as an example, there may be room to disagree. Although, we are now not discussing capitalism or markets we are discussing knowledge and truth.

We are a society that is concerned much more with success rather than truth. Due to this we have become a society that is much more concerned with feeling good rather than dealing with the unpleasantness of our society. We see examples of this with the nature of our economic situation to date. We are not looking at the root causes of the ills of our society rather we are looking for band-aids or bailouts. I recently had an interesting conversation with a banker of a global banking institution regarding the Bear Stearn bailout. Perhaps, he pined, if we unveiled the truths behind this transaction we might find more evidence of a truth we would rather not know and believe. Upon some recent meetings to which he had attended he found some interesting clues to market manipulation and conspiracy. It seems that the global money laundering empire of the elite global families like the Rothchild's, Rockefeller's, Bush, and more was about to become exposed if this financial institution were to go bankrupt. As the court documents of this failed institution would have allowed the bank's books to become public knowledge the Amerikan power mongers manipulated the system for JP Morgan to come to the rescue using government backed guarantees. Upon this the public is non the wiser and the propaganda machine gives a manipulated truth to become a collective truth.

The truth will set us free!? We live in an open cage with a very fragile glass ceiling.


(1)George Soros - The Age Of Fallibility
(2)The Economist Magazine