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The enormous gap between what US leaders do in the world and what Americans think their leaders are doing is one of the great propaganda accomplishments.

Michael Parenti

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Michael Parenti
Age: 91
Born: 1933
Born: January 1
Historian
Journalist
Political Scientist
New York City
New York
Great
Propaganda
Think
Accomplishment
Thinking
Enormous
World
Leaders
Americans
Leader
Accomplishments
Peace
Deceit
War
Gaps

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The first atrocity, the first war crime committed in any war of aggression by the aggressors is against the truth.
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Only by establishing military supremacy were the European and North American colonizers able to eliminate the crafts and industries of Third World peoples, control their markets, extort tribute, undermine their cultures, destroy their villages, steal their lands and natural resources, enslave their labor, and accumulate vast wealth.
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The rich have grown richer, but their tax rate has declined. The poor have grown poorer, but their taxes have increased.
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You will have no sensation of a leash around your neck if you sit by the peg. It is only when you stray that you feel the restraining tug.
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Union busting has become a major industry with more than a thousand consulting firms teaching companies how to prevent workers from organizing and how to get rid of existing unions.
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The crucial role communists played in organizing industrial unions in the 1930s and struggling for social reforms, peace, and civil rights strengthened rather then undermined democratic forces.
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Archbishop Romero of El Salvador was a member of the Salvadoran aristocracy. He could not have risen to the top of the church hierarchy otherwise. But after he began voicing critical remarks about the war and concerned comments about the poor, he was assassinated.
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[The ruling elites] know who their enemies are, and their enemies are the people, the people at home and the people abroad. Their enemies are anybody who wants more social justice, anybody who wants to use the surplus value of society for social needs rather than for individual class greed, that's their enemy.
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The most powerful ideologies are not those that prevail against all challengers but those that are never challenged because in their ubiquity they appear as nothing more than the unadorned truth.
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The dirty truth is that many people find fascism to be not particularly horrible.
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The Federalists also used bribes, intimidation, and fraud against opponents of the Constitution.
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The powers that be not only try to control events, but they try to control our memory and understanding of these events, which is part of controlling the events themselves.
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One mechanism of repression is the grand jury.
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The two party electoral system performs the essential function of helping to legitimate the existing social order.
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The problem with capitalism is that it best rewards the worst part of us: the ruthless, competitive, conniving, opportunistic, acquisitive drives, giving little reward and often much punishment-or at least much handicap-to honesty, compassion, fair play, many forms of hard work, love of justice, and a concern for those in need.
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Revolutions are not push button affairs rather, they evolve only if there exists a reservoir of hope and grievance that can be galvanized into popular action.
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To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.
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Generosity toward the lower classes historically has never been an important part of upper-class awareness.
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You see there are people who believe the function of the police is to fight crime, and that's not true, the function of the police is social control and protection of property.
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Every ruling class has wanted only this: all the rewards and none of the burdens. The operational code is: we have a lot we can get more we want it all.
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