Fantasyland, pt. 2

Both  Kurt Andersen and Jill Lepore touch on the Scopes Trial. Lepore sums up the Scopes trial for democracy:

If the common people hate reason, Lippman concluded, there's no way a government of the people can protect freedom of thought. The person of faith cannot accept reas0n as the arbiter of truth without giving up on faith; the person of reason cannot accept the truth that truth lies outside the realm of reason. The citizens being unable to agree on basic matters of fact,they cannot agree on how to educate their children together. "This is the propagandist's opportunity," Lippman wrote. With enough money, and with the tools of mass communication, deployed efficiently, the propagandist can turn a political majority into truth

Chapter Ten: Efficiency and the Masses,p. 420 (footnote omitted); These Truths: A History of the United States (Norton, 2018).

I thought George We. Bush marked the end of the Republic. Then along came Trump. Ithink Donald J. Trump only fulfilled what Bush and Karl Rover and Dick Cheney started. Relying on mendacity for election soon enough justifies even more mendacity. Common sense stood no chance - rationality has no hope - in the face of successful mendacity. I had been brought up to be a realist, to get my nose out of books, and here was proof what I had been taught meant nothing. The majority denies reality which might just kill all of us. 

Covid 19 has us worried. We are packed in tight as sardines - no6 foot social spacing. We know the guards will bring it in here. I am suspending the novel fore a while. I have118 pages more of Lepore to read. I am stocked full of books. I need to work on these notes.

sch

3/17/20

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