Great American Myths

Great American Myths

Lies we love and the people who manipulate us

by

R.G. Belie, PhD

Smashwords Edition

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Copyright 2011 R.G. Belie

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This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Great American Myths

Table of Contents

Preface

Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter 2 Arming Yourself with Knowledge – Perceptions and Myths

2.1 Human Perception

2.2 Attributes of a Myth

Chapter 3 The Biggest Myth

3.1 The MeMyth

3.2 Famous MeMythers Exposed

3.3 Ignorance Driven MeMythers

3.4 Non-MeMythers

3.5 Two More for the Road

Chapter 4 Voodoo Economics

4.1 Economics 101

4.1.1 The Law of Supply and Demand

4.2 The Law of Supply and Demand – Debunking Economic Myths

4.2.1 Myth – Rent Control

4.2.2 Myth – Minimum Wage

4.2.3 Myth – Living Wage

4.2.4 Myth – Comprehensive Healthcare Reform

4.2.5 Myth – Wages and Benefits

4.3 The Economic Circle of Life

Chapter 5 The Ruling Elites

(The Great Myths of Big Government, Big Business, Big Unions, & Big Media)

5.1 Introductory Comments

5.2 Definitions

5.3 Government Structure

5.4 Voting

5.5 Free Market Voting

5.6 The Movement toward an Elitist Government

5.7 More Government Myths – Rights and Entitlements

5.8 National Security Myths

5.9 Some Simple Suggestions

5.10 Final Thoughts on Big G

Chapter 6 Personal Myths

6.1 Introduction

6.2 Choice/Abortion

6.3 Personal Relationships, Divorce and Families

6.4 References

Chapter 7 Junk Science

7.1 Introduction to Junk Science

7.2 The Global Warming Myth

7.3 The Evolution Myth

7.4 Junk Science Wrap Up

Chapter 8 The Ten Guidelines

8.1 Introduction

8.2 The Ten

Appendix 1 Mythstakes – The Truth in 10 Words or Less

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Preface

I am an engineer, a problem solver. For over forty years I applied engineering tools like logic, critical thinking, and mathematical analysis to solve thousands of problems and make thousands of design decisions. Engineering is a challenging, yet highly rewarding profession, but it leaves little time for political or government intrigue on the side.

As the years went by, some of these engineering workplace tools began to creep into my way of looking at my personal life and the world as a whole. At first, they just raised troubling thoughts in the back of my head about many of my own beliefs. Over time, however, I made a conscious effort to take the time to be more analytical in reexamining my own views. I was shocked to find that many of my beliefs on various issues were based on feelings and a blind trust in faulty second hand information that I had readily accepted from people I had no reason to trust. I found I had bought the lies and myths hook, line, and sinker, not just once, but over and over.

I also found that I was not alone. In fact, I found that many, if not most, Americans had bought into the same misinformation and more. I found that purposeful lies were being institutionalized into widely held myths at an ever increasing rate.

As time passed, I added to my list of these myths. I finally got so frustrated with the level of willing acceptance of misinformation and the overt attempts to mislead the American citizenry that I decided to write this book as a primer to counter this disturbing trend.

Rather than confuse the issues with even more statistics, meaningless numbers, convoluted circular arguments, and engineering techno speak, I have attempted to provide some basic background on how to identify myths followed by a reasoned discussion of some of the more disturbing and destructive myths. My intent is not to convert your views to mine, but rather to get you to learn to think again and to apply a critical thinking approach to the decisions you make every day. If I accomplish this goal, I have every faith that the American people will again take charge of their lives and their country, making the right decisions to continue the historical greatness of the United States.

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Chapter 1. Introduction

Lies We Love

It’s not hard for me to guess the first reaction of many people to Great American Myths. I imagine the comments will go something like this:

Now wait just a minute. This isn’t ancient Greece or Rome. We’re not cruising some cold Norse fiord of long ago here. We’re not talking about some superstitious back water third world country either. This is the good old US of A, the most prosperous, most educated, most sophisticated, most logical people in the entire history of the world. Our accomplishments are unsurpassed. We’ve even traveled to the moon. In fact, we pride ourselves on our ability to get ‘just the facts, ma’am.’¹ We are too intelligent to get wrapped up in myths, great or small. So why insult us with a book implying we have Great American Myths?

Well, folks, that’s the great irony!

In spite of all our tremendous success and unsurpassed knowledge, our society is still riddled with unfounded myths and misconceptions. These myths are far more than simple children’s stories. They form the basis for many of the decisions we make, the news we hear, how we earn and spend our money, and the way we run our homes, businesses, and country. They misdirect our research investment, who we vote for, and how we run our lives on a daily basis. They even determine who lives and dies! In fact, I would go so far as to argue that a susceptibility to myths has infected modern America, and this susceptibility is undermining the very factors that contributed to our unprecedented success as a country up to this point in history.

In other words, you have been willing sold a bill of goods your whole life. Lenin² pointed the way for modern socialists when he said A lie told often enough becomes the truth, and you have been lied to and mislead so many times that that accepting false facts now comes quite naturally to you. You have been sound bit, lied to, subtly intimidated, and cleverly manipulated. In some cases, you have been misled by people with carefully considered hidden agendas; in others, you’ve fallen prey to people even more clueless and gullible than you. Not only have you been conditioned to accept obvious falsifications as fact, you have been programmed to fiercely believe what you believe, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Society’s trend to instant gratification has led you to believe you can become an instant expert, not realizing that you, like Pavlov’s dog, have simply been trained to respond in a very predictable manner to a manipulative stimulus. Substantial analysis, critical thinking, and rigorous logic have been replaced by knee jerk substitution of feelings for facts.

These myths in some cases have grown on their own volition, but others have been carefully crafted to support the end agendas of special interests. As you will see in later chapters, much to your dismay, you have been systematically programmed to readily accept these myths without critical review of any evidence.

Don’t take it personally, however. You are not alone. Millions of other Americans, including me³, have bought into these distortions, hook, line, and sinker. In some cases, in fact, the myths have become so pervasive, that even those who knowingly created the myths have begun to believe them.

Don’t believe this applies to you? Let me ask you a few simple questions.

Do you believe it’s ok to kill a baby just before it’s born if we call it choice?

Did you vote for an inexperienced, naive smooth talking used car salesman to be President of the United States, the most demanding managerial job in the history of the world, because he was for change?

Did you ever try to attend a global warming meeting that had to be cancelled due to record low temperatures? ⁴

Do you support big socialist government as the answer to America’s problems in spite of its long record of negative success?

Do you believe that science advances through consensus?

Do you think the wealthy, the filthy rich, are an endless supply of tax cash for government to redistribute to others?

Do you think that the US has been held back by its right wing religious values?

Do you believe that Americans are the source of much of the evil in the world?

If you said yes to any of these questions, or know someone who would say yes, read on. Your future (and mine) depends on it.

As you can imagine, the people who have cultivated these deceptions are not happy that you are launching into this book. In some cases, the contents of the following pages threaten dogmatic beliefs. In others, there is substantial financial interest or political power base at stake. Their motivation to distort the truth should be your motivation to put aside closely held beliefs to understand and conquer these myths. You can always revert to the safety of your current beliefs, but for the moment, put them aside to see if what you believe is indeed what you really believe.

I’m not asking you to take my word for it, but just to open your mind for a few hours to take a critical look at some important issues. If my logic and analysis are not persuasive, you are no worse off. If, however, you see through even one of these myths, or merely learn some critical thinking skills, you may change your life for the better forever.

References:

1. Catch phrase for the character Joe Friday on the early TV show Dragnet although Friday probably never said it.

2. Vladimir, the communist revolutionary, not John the song writer

3. I believe that at some time or another in my life, I have had a strong belief in most of the myths contained in this book, but I finally caught on, wised up, got the facts, and figured them out. So can you!

4. Website http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/19882 lists more than a dozen global warming/climate change events cancelled or impacted by record low temps or severe cold weather.

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Chapter 2. Arming Yourself with Knowledge – Perceptions and Myths

Before we jump in to the great myths, it’s important to lay a little ground work to give you the insight into how you understand (how you perceive) and the characteristics of myths.

2.1 Human Perception

Most people think their brains are stuffed with facts. They believe what they believe. They know what they know. At first blush, they believe their factual knowledge base is both broad and deep. We need to step through how humans perceive to get a high level understanding of how this natural human feeling is created and how it leaves you susceptible to the great myths.

In Figure 2.1, I’ve sketched out the basic steps of human perception. They begin with (1) a world packed with a nearly infinite amount of facts and information, some concrete and some abstract. This information is exposed to you in very small amounts through (2) information pipelines where it is exposed to (3) your sensors like sight and hearing. Your sensors, senses, convert these information sources into electrical signals which flow to your brain. Your (4) brain then combines the sensor information into (5) a perception. This perception formed from sensor fusion is also influenced by (6) perceptions already stored in your brain and in some instances, created by your brain. These perceptions are then (7) stored in your brain for later recall. Finally there is a (8) feedback loop where your current perceptions influence your future pipeline and sensor selection to influence which of the thin slices of the world you will try to add to your future perception. If all this wasn’t complicated enough, information in each step is constantly