The Politics of Fear Fear is the most powerful enemy of reason. Both fear and reason are essential to human survival, but the relationship between th… - Al Gore

It may well be that the disuse of democracy’s calisthenics — the sharp decline in reading and writing — and the bombardment of every new fear with television commercials and simplistic nostrums disguised as solutions for the indicated fear has given American democracy an immune system disorder that prevents the citizenry from responding precisely, appropriately, and effectively to serious threats to the health of our democracy. So all of a sudden we overreact to illusory threats and underreact to real threats.

Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki told Congress in February that the occupation could require "several hundred thousand troops." But because Rumsfeld and Bush did not want to hear disagreement with their view that Iraq could be invaded at a much lower cost, Shinseki was hushed and then forced out.

Television's quasi-hypnotic effect is one reason that the political economy supported by the television industry is as different from the vibrant politics of America's first century as those politics were different from the feudalism that thrived on the ignorance of the masses of people in the Dark Ages. Our systematic exposure to fear and other arousal stimuli on television can be exploited by the clever public relations specialist, advertiser, or politician.