Those who think the war is going well: A portrait

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Slacktivist paints a portrait of those who still think the war is going well:

Believing such a thing requires a delicate touch, an epistemological finesse. In order to avoid engaging the reality that this construct exists to deny, you need to be able to recognize that reality from a distance so that you can give it a wide berth, all while insisting that there's nothing over there to see.

All of which calls for a certain mental nimbleness. It's an exercise which may be done fervently but requires too much deliberate self-deception to be done honestly.

I find such nimbleness impressive in a way. It calls for a remarkable capacity for sudden, seismic shifts in perception. If James Baker and the former presidents he served side with the version of reality reported by the lying media, then Baker, Ford and Bush 41 must be regarded as newly untrustworthy, exposed as members of the vast conspiracy of deception. James Baker, left-winger. It can't be easy telling yourself something like that without giggling -- or passing out -- from the cognitive dissonance.

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