No More Mr. Expert War Monger

There has been welcome light shed on the use of artificial intelligence, a.k.a. "experts" as sources for the misinformation constantly fed to our media. An attempt to locate a presidential library cum think tank at SMU is directly aimed at such a purpose.

Most of our readers oppose the war criminals in control of the executive branch, and high among the reasons being that they are so immoral that they have instituted torture as an authorized practice in this formerly respectable country. The attempt of that cabal to cover itself with the umbrella of the Methodist Church at SMU is repugnant to us, and recently the Methodist Church has expressed itself in opposition to that too.

When I posted recently about the high hopes we have for rejecting a location of a reputed "think tank" under the auspices of the Liebury there, I got a very appreciated comment which included important facts from a letter from Dr. Weaver who organized the effort to reject the library, among them these. Although I have posted them before, I think it's good to repeat them here, on a Sunday, and reflect on them.

Waterboarding has a long and sickening history. It was used as a means of torture and coerced baptism during the Protestant Reformation and Spanish Inquisition to convert Jews, Mennonites, witches, and other suspected heretics.
(snip)Torture is a crime against humanity and a violation of every human rights treaty in existence. It represents a betrayal of the deepest values of the UMC that founded and built SMU. In the supposedly “less enlightened” 18th century, John Wesley explicitly preached against the torture of prisoners of war:

War itself is justifiable only on principles of self-preservation: Therefore it gives us no right over prisoners, but to hinder their hurting us by confining them. Much less can it give a right to torture, or kill, or even to enslave an enemy when the war is over
(snip)
...Building a monument to this torturer-in-chief on a UMC campus to “celebrate this great president, celebrate his accomplishments” (6) is a defilement of our church that will permanently damage our credibility to share the good news of Jesus Christ.

A church with such good principles does not deserve to be dishonored by this use of a good name like SMU.

Associated for a time with a somewhat conservative talk show, I am familiar with the use of 'think tanks' to influence news. There is a constant barrage of phone calls, emails, letters and press releases from the aspiring "experts", which on the letterhead or with the background of a higher institution have more weight than those of simply educated authorities with a background of actual knowledge. It is with this sort of tactic that the war criminals have gotten into positions of power.

When such discredited self-annointed 'experts' as Richard Perle, Ken Starr, Donald Rumsfeld and their ilk continue to show up on talk shows instead of those who have correctly read the information available to them all and made decisions that were correct - it is because of this barrage.

Lobbying consists of creating a sphere of influence, selling yourself, getting into inner circles. That is what the Liebury at SMU would do, with the backing of a church sponsored institution of higher learning. It would be an ideal way to sell warmongering, and the personnel involved in it.

This should not happen. We need to keep rejecting the winger lobbyists being foisted off on our media as voices of authority, blogging about how wrong they are, and pointing out their errors.

We are the voices of reason, and raising our voice can de-frock the criminals in high power, defeat them and bring real knowledge back into play into the decisions this country makes. Start now.