Though "propaganda" does not fully cover all that I mean by the politics of experience (which includes assumptions which are largely subconscious and subliminal, i.e. "the obvious"), it is nonetheless extremely important to understand how education actually makes one more vulnerable to carefully crafted marketing/propaganda. A classic text on the subject is Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes by Jacques Ellul.

Book reviewer Alexei Proussakov summarized what we need to look out for in his Amazon review of Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion:

The authors did a research of propaganda techniques and set four stratagems of persuasion:

You create favorable climate for the message (called pre-persuasion). You subtly outline what picture has to be drawn in the end. Here you decide what way thoughts and perceptions of the audience will be shaped and channeled. Having established right basis for further discourse you secure the results you seek. At this stage you should identify some statements as axioms, i.e. `what everyone takes for granted' and `what everyone knows'. You attribute labels (positive or negative) to objects of further discussion, put black-or-white colors in non-disputable way. You use generalities to depict the situation - they are usually so ambiguous that you may change their meanings in the future. You use rumors and gossips.

You create a 'source credibility', i.e. establish a favorable image in the eyes of the audience. The message must come from `experts' or `unbiased' and, of course, personally attractive communicators. Try to switch on the self-persuasion mechanism of the audience.

You create a message that focuses the target's attention and thoughts on exactly what you want them to think about. Research has identified at least five conditions that are likely lead to heuristics. Heuristics are most likely to be used when people do not have time to think carefully about the issue, when they are so overloaded with information that it becomes impossible to process it fully, or when they believe that the issues at stake are not very important. Heuristics are also used when people have little other knowledge or information on which to base a decision and when a given heuristics comes quickly to mind as they are confronted with a problem.

You create an emotion of the target that will help you channel thoughts of audience in right direction. Fear appeals are most effective when they raise high levels of fear and suggest a doable and effective response (the authors also explain why sometimes fear does not work). Guilt: once we are filled with guilt, our thoughts and behavior are directed towards ridding ourselves of this feeling that's where propagandists take advantage of us. Feeling of obligation and indebtedness: large initial request and immediate concession by the requester invokes the norm of reciprocity -we concede. Feeling of commitment based on our desire to be self-consistent.

For example, to 'soften up' the target you make him involved in a much smaller aspect of the action. This serves to commit the individual to `the case'. Once people are thus committed, the likelihood of their complying with the larger request increases. Another way is to show uniqueness of the offer (scarcity sells). Use the `minimum group paradigm': You are on my side (never mind that I created the terms); now act like it and do what we say.

The point here is that everyone who allows themselves to be persuaded does so out of self-interest. That's why propaganda is so effective: we all want to believe the miracle of effortless financial wealth can return. Like the South Seas Cargo Cults who tried to re-summon the fabulous offshore wealth of World War II GIs and their bases with simulacrum stone radios, we too are hoping our pleas to crudely contrived stone radios (and stone iPhones, Crackberries, etc.) will magically reinflate the bubbles just long enough so that we can exit before the crowd catches on to the con.

It won't work. Magical entreaties to the Gods of Reinflated Bubbles on our stone cellphones will not create new Bull markets in stocks, housing, the FIRE economy, derivatives and fanciful debt.

Readers often ask me for practical solutions, not just doomsday descriptions of our problems. And I try to comply with these excellent common-sense pleas to move beyond the morass of problems to solutions. So here we go:

Stop accepting blatant financial propaganda as being in your self-interest. Stop being complicit in the lies, the fraudulent numbers, the manipulated contexts, the exaggerations, the half-truths, the distortions, the debauchery of truth and the endless spin.

Every time you see a ginned-up propaganda story like New Home Sales Rose 0.6% then write the perpetrator of the propaganda calling them on it. Demand they seek to report the truth and notify them you will no longer subscribe to, read or watch their propaganda-loaded pap. Once they lose readers, they lose income--and that's as it should be.

Email your representative in the satrapy known as Congress that you insist they demand real numbers and real transparency from our government or you will not only not vote for them, you will actively support their opponent in coming elections.

Tell your friends and family it's all propaganda and warn them not to believe it or act on it. The banking sector is not healthy, it is not a new Bull market in stocks, housing is not coming back, borrowing $2 trillion a year is not sustainable or wise, Medicare is not safe for all time, the Tooth Fairy did not mint that quarter under your pillow, etc.

Take responsibility for your own actions and refuse the temptation to blame others or institutions for lapses in your own critical-thinking and skepticism. Yes, our "leadership" (barf) and institutions have completely and utterly failed the nation. They are busy covering their tracks and evading responsibility via a 24/7 outpouring of the most desperate (and desperately obvious) propaganda.

Vote down Orwellian doublespeak deceptions like California's Prop 1A, a vast expansion of taxes presented as an innocuous-sounding "Rainy Day Budget Stabilization Fund." Talk about a mockery of a travesty of a sham--the entire "revenue enhancement package" is loaded with deceptive phrases like "temporary re-alootment" oops, I mean "reallocation," "modernization act," etc., all carefully crafted to raise taxes and protect various State fiefdoms and other publicly funded elites from cuts in their rich salary, benefits and pension packages.

You want a tax increase? Then start by honestly asking for one instead of trying to pull the wool over our eyes with doublespeak deception. Then describe what every State manager and employee has done to eliminate the inefficiencies, waste and petty corruptions which costs the state billions every year. Describe what every state employee, supplier and subcontractor has done to sacrifice. Remember that one day furlough a month is not a sacrifice to those facing 365 days a year on furlough. Get real and stay real with us and maybe we'd respond accordingly. Lie to us--then prepare to go bankrupt or suffer a taxpayer rebellion that makes Prop 13 look like a Sunday picnic.

Start demanding honest headlines/summaries of our nation's true plight such as:

Phony unemployment number drops, real unemployment rises; our government lies once again.

Demand the unvarnished, un-spun truth for a change; refuse to enable the Big Lies, refuse to believe the propaganda, and refuse to repeat it. Always ask: cui bono? To whose benefit? Always Always Always.

"This guy is THE leading visionary on reality. He routinely discusses things which no one else has talked about, yet, turn out to be quite relevant months later."
--Walt Howard, commenting about CHS on another blog.

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