The problem with neutrality

But NPR is wonderful. Democrats feel that it’s too conservative while Republicans feel that it’s too liberal, which is a sure sign that it’s doing its job.

A lot of people say that. Another way to look at it is with the two generals. Both are trying to deceive each other in the war, in order to gain an advantage. A neutral village, however, doesn't want to let either of the general's troops in, regardless of their attempts at negotiation and reasoning. The village doesn't let the soldiers in because they believe both are telling lies, and that it would be better to stand in the middle, where both sides cannot benefit and will be pissed.

Eventually, one of the generals got fed up and realized that the other general must be playing him for a fool with these negotiations, obviously the other general had reached an agreement with the village elder to attempt this stalling tactic in order for the other general to pull some surprise attack. The suspicious general, having realized this, orders an attack on the village. The other general, seeing the enemy run to the gates of the village, realizes that the village leader was stalling him so that the suspicious general could steal a march and get inside the village, using it as a fortification to kill the slow general's troops. So the slow general starts to march on the village. The suspicious general sees this as confirmation of his belief that the village elder was in kahoots with his enemy.

Eventually, after the fast general wins and takes over the village, he executes the village leader, his family, and his entire village for allying his village with the slow general. This is what being neutral gets you in war. As it should be. Bookworm might be interested to know that had we not faced Hitler and taken sides when we did, we would have faced both Stalin and Hitler's armies. Just cause one of them would be dead (Slow General), doesn't mean you aren't going to get hit by the entire resource of both of their sides.

Some people believe that truth is derived from a sum of averages. I believe truth is derived from competition, risk taking, and skill. Along with a good bit of luck.

The law of averages people would look at my story and say that the truth was that both of the generals were wrong. I say, the truth is that both of the generals were right. Both generals were benefiting from the villager's neutrality, and the suspicious general realized that he couldn't trust his enemy to keep up the status quo. It was a war to a knife after all, annihilation or victory. The slow general would have done the same as the suspicious general, except the slow general was a bit slow.

Think it through, both generals were benefiting from the villager's neutrality. So obviously one general will come to realize that he will benefit more, if he was the "only" one benefiting from the villager. To do that, he has to capture the village and deny it to the enemy.

Neutrality doesn't mean you're doing your job, neutrality means you're buying time to delay the point when everyone attacks you at once.

If the terroists don't get you like they did Tom Fox, the American people will get you like they did Dan Rather. Choose sides, it is both more responsible as well as much wiser.

One way you can analyze your opponent's propaganda is to do a psychological analysis of the character of their leader and propagandists. Depending upon the result, you will come to the right conclusion as to their biases and goals, without paying one iota of attention to their actual techniques. Studying the techniques might teach you how good their propaganda technique is, and how much truth to lie ration they have in the mix, but it really does not tell you whether their biases are pro-American or anti-American, fake liberal or true liberal, conservative or isolationist, Republican or Democrat.