Hmmmm...Mr. Greenwald did not seem offensive but just overly concise, knowing the venue and using the short time alloted to express important perspectives rarely presented on mass media outlets. From that perspective, he did a good job. Mr. Greenwald was speaking far from absolute truth, however, because absolutism is the enemy of truth, as a matter of seeking transcending principles and using them. Mr. Greenwald was speaking in absolutist terms about a brief (historically) span of incursions by myriad imperialists, without an opportunity for greater historical context, and that is what is disappointing and what Mr. Maher seems to object to, as a finite set of historical incidents was stretched into an argument for absolute right or wrong within the regional conflict at this point in time. This video-clip, presented alone, is inflammatory and indicative of truthiness and absolutism. Corporate-State and Religious-State collusions are too broad of a discussion for condensation, into a sound bite. The brief clip does contain good sentiment about the terror committed in the name of many religions, but expands that point into specific blame, for ancient problems, in a concentrated time span and pointing to a single source, The USA, which is patently false. The Corporate-State violence is being expressed most vehemently by the USA, since its rise to global dominance, as it was by Rome in its era of dominance, or Constantine/Augustine just war crusades, etc. Colonialism and imperialism (corporate-state/religious-state collusion) has a long history, committed by peoples of every region and religion. While Glenn Greenwald makes some valid, but broad-brush, points, the forum (rather than the host) did not allow those points to be communicated with accuracy from a broad set of perspectives. Its hard to do in a brief video clip and Mr. Maher recognized the direction of concision and rightly worked to expand the perspectives, in rebuttal, but Mr. Greenwald remained targeted and narrowly focused in his broad-brushing. There is no doubt corporate-state collusion and religious zealotry has presented its insidious manifestations in the world, from American corporate-state and Neo-con/Christian-Coalition warhawks, in many regions (and over the span of its entire history, beginning with the genocide of indigenous peoples with imperialist motivations). But that is true of Muslim/Arab nation collusions beginning with its founders, as well, in the Fertile-Crescent-Sinai Peninsula-North African region. The Indo-Chinese regions have their own history of insidious lust for money. It doesnt change the terror, no matter what the source. Having said that (and having not had the opportunity to see the whole show), it is refreshing to see a perspective not often allowed on the larger media outlets, controlled by Corporate-State opinion shapers/propagandists (media and corporate interests being global, rather than national expressions). Bill Mahers program has shown an interest in promoting a wide set of perspectives than basic cable tv offers to the masses, who, in large part, cant afford to see Bill Mahers program. One hopes for mass media to present expansions of the perspectives and avoid absolutism and concision, while discussing events and issues, so people can have a chance to discern the direction of current events and issues from and with a longer-term vision...the definition of transcendent principles is derived from (and progresses from) that kind of breadth in perspective, willing to be inclusive, rather than dismissive and exclusionary using absolute terms.
Posted on: Mon, 15 Sep 2014 14:15:46 +0000
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