Explains my youth to a tee.  Like trying to squeeze a square peg into a round hole.

The "fanatical zeal to improve the lot of mankind" historically results in war, individually and collectively.  The Democrats are not democratic and the  Republicans are not republican.  The classic liberal has been replaced with the progressive authoritarian.  The same corruptions of the old Catholic Church have occurred in the secular state governments, leaving the founding principles of Liberty behind.  American 'liberals' are among the most intolerant of all.

God forbid humankind ever learns how to live for 200 years — it will be a long slavery for most.  The quality of life is more important than its length.

The fact that half the world has been conned into believing in human-caused 'climate change' is a perfect example.  The goal is the total regulation of the use of energy by people — ultimate power really.  CO2 is already being treated as a pollutant (!!) when it is in fact a powerhouse for life.  CO2 levels in the air could quadruple (as they have been in the distant past) and life would be teeming.  Every model predicting the rising global temperatures and ocean levels has been wrong.  There is no proof at all, only theory.  The facts themselves discredit the theory.  All one has to do is look at the proposed solutions to understand why.  Politicians are poised to make billions on carbon credit schemes.  Al Gore is responsible for replacing incandescent lights with mercury-filled fluorescent lights, and has made a fortune in the new market.  He's also ready to cash in on the carbon credit market.  These are schemes for funneling more power and wealth to the ruling class, nothing more.  Not a one has cut back their own energy-hogging life style, Al Gore included.  When individuals think for themselves they make themselves unfit for the mob.

I like the distinction Rappoport is making about treating people like stimulus-response machines rather than self-directed people.  The proposed solutions to society's ills are almost always programs to get people to react — the goal then is to try and figure out what stimulus will cause the desired reaction.

Which brings us back to 'why are we here?'  Is there a purpose to/in life?  Who says?  In a way it is a war between the enlightened and the self-deluded, but the battle is within each of us to 'wake up' out of that hypnotic dream that has been cultivated by our would-be masters.  When I answer the questions 'who am I' & 'why am I here?' how much of that answer is really mine and how much is simply parroting what has been drilled into me for years?  How to sift through all that?  Discovering who I am is more of a discovery of what I am not and then finally and simply declaring my intentions.  "Know thyself."

When was this? ;-)

Truth is ever-present, its origin from the mouth of Nature's God. ;-)  I think what Astor means is the realization of the truth rests with the individual.  This shift may set new precedents and be the beginning of a new tradition (until the next big realization).

I like the distinction!

Why throw pearls to swine? ;-)

I like it, but government is not to be the helping hand, because that's what the people are to do.  The government is to protect people's right to the fruits of their labors, not steal from them to give to a favored class of voters.  Every time the government tries to offer a new public 'service' it puts that service into the hands of government exclusively.  Charity precedes a government, it is not a function of government.  If the government takes over charity, then people will be less charitable and come to expect it as a right from the government.  Thus delusion and demise due to socialism.

Open censorship, yes, only increases the attention — look at Alex Jones, he is more popular than ever.  But, most censorship goes unnoticed.  I'm happy there is all this attention on 'fake news' — you know, it has been fake for a LONG time, before the internet took over.  Censorship is common practice, but only 'works' if people don't know about it.

Not the kind of society I wish to empower.  The reason for most people's suffering is due to identifying with one's image rather than one's substance.  The populist masses vote for the one with the best act — an honest man will bring down the whole thing.

When one talks of right and left, Liberty is not even found on the scale.  Communism is on the Left end of socialism and Fascism is on the Right end of socialism — both are Authoritarianism which reside at the Bottom, whereas Liberty resides at the Top. 

I make the distinction between America, Americans, and the US government — they are not all one and the same.  The US government has become a statist, authoritarian, oligarchy, indeed.  America is still a free nation of free sovereign people founded upon the inherent natural born rights of humankind — this hasn't changed.  Americans are a product of their education, but not just what they are taught but what they learn in the field.  Contrary to popular belief, a community is not kept safe by its regulators but by the very 'code' of the people themselves who are self-governing.  That is the ideal.

Corporatism, the merging of corporations and the government, is also known as fascism, and the social media giants now serve as the propaganda arm of the government.  Take a deeper look and it will be discovered that Google, Amazon, Facebook, and Twitter all have multi-billion dollar contracts with the government, particularly the CIA which own and control large chunks of each.

Skepticism is a good thing.  Being able to express that doubt is liberty.

The 'princes' today are the corporate giants regulating speech (i.e. surveillance of public discourse) which claim the right to censor anyone, yet there are tons of laws on the books that prevent businesses from discrimination on the basis of sex, race, and religion — how is it that these monopolies can discriminate against conversations about sex, race, and religion? To have an opinion about any of these topics that does not fit the leftist party line is considered 'hateful' which seems to me to be a fairly hateful assumption.

The search for truth requires the telling of the truth.

No comment.  ;-)

How about the Anti-fa mobs closing down rallies and speeches — and this is 'anti' fascist?  How about all the book burning going on at Amazon, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter?  This IS fascism!

Ron, what is 'Matstsah'?

Censorship and propaganda have been ongoing since the advent of the radio.  Now that the practice is not so easily hidden from the masses, the media giants claim it is a feature for keeping the 'community' safe.  How they define the 'community' does not seem to include anyone expressing viewpoints that are not 'politically correct' with authoritarianism.  Why isn't it enough for readers to down vote a comment and make a reply rather than demand censorship?

"[I]t shall be the duty of legislators and magistrates... to cherish the interest of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries of them..."  This is not a law but an appeal.  Are legislators to 'cherish' the interest of literature/science in their private capacity or push for legislation that would promote and fund these interests? Adams censored the press during his presidency as editorials were quite unkind to him.  He saw it as sedition to a fledgling government, and who knows how right (or wrong) he may have been, but it appears to be a common tendency from the beginning...

Very well said.  Is there any hope for the adults if they were not well principled when children?  For me, my 'awakening' has not been just a rite of passage but the very purpose of living.  Isn't everyone on this journey in some form?  Some wake up sooner than others, some go a long time in Pavlovian servitude to their programmed responses.  Why do some question and some not?  When each of us hold the key to our own liberation, how to get someone to find it?

It just happened to me, too, and the message wasn't that long, but I did walk away for about 5 minutes.