Sharyl Attkisson on Media Bias by Dr. Joseph Mercola
- In the 1950s, the CIA ran a covert campaign called “Operation Mockingbird,” in which they recruited journalists as assets to spread propaganda, and while the campaign officially ended in the 1970s, evidence suggests the project never really stopped.
- In her book, “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism,” Sharyl Attkisson addresses one of the most pressing issues of our time: media bias and the deterioration of objective journalism.
- Multinational industries, and the drug industry in particular, also wield powerful influence over content relating to their particular interests. As drug advertising became a major income stream for media companies, their reporting on health and medicine became increasingly biased.
- Big Tech companies are also masters of censoring anything that might hurt themselves or their technocratic allies.
- In terms of health, COVID-19 reporting has taken censorship and media manipulation to brand-new heights. All social media platforms are openly censoring dissenting views about the virus, particularly its origin and treatment. Even lauded doctors and scientists have been axed for speaking against the desired narrative dictated by the World Health Organization.
Sharyl Attkisson is an award-winning investigative journalist with uncompromising integrity. Her latest book, “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism,” was released Nov. 24.
In this, her third book, she addresses one of the most pressing issues of our time: media bias and the deterioration of objective journalism — a topic on which she has first-hand experience.
A former anchor at CNN and CBS News, Attkisson now produces her own Sunday television news program, “Full Measure,” as well as two podcasts: “Full Measure After Hours” and “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast,” in which she covers the kinds of stories that mainstream news no longer touches.
Eight-Year-Old Suspended 38 Times for Not Wearing a Mask
Fiona Lashells, an 8-year-old in second grade in Florida, was subjected to an outrageous 38 school suspensions for standing up for her right to not do something that isn’t supported by data and science in a school system — wearing a mask.
July 30, 2021, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis issued an executive order ruling that school districts could not require students to wear masks, ensuring parents’ freedom to choose whether or not their children wear masks in school.1
After the executive order was issued, Fiona’s mother told her she wouldn’t have to wear a mask for the upcoming school year, a relief to the girl, who had complained about fatigue from wearing a mask during the previous school year.2 The Palm Beach County school district, however, had other plans, which culminated in the student missing nearly two months of school.
Why Do People Willingly Sacrifice Their Freedom?
In the video above, Mattias Desmet, professor of clinical psychology at Ghent University in Belgium, reviews the societal conditions under which a population ends up willingly sacrificing their freedom.
Desmet, who also has a master’s degree in statistics, discovered peculiar anomalies in statistical analyses done during the COVID pandemic, which made him realize our global society is starting to enter a “mass formation” state, a type of “collective hypnosis” required for the rise of a totalitarian regime.
In this Aubrey Marcus podcast interview, Desmet reviews the step-by-step formula that results in this collective hypnosis, and how this formula has been deployed on the global population over the past two years.
Needless to say, he warns us about continuing down this path, and provides solutions that we can take, both on an individual and collective basis, to prevent the loss of freedom that will surely follow if we do nothing.
The Four Base Conditions for ‘Mass Formation’
What psychological dynamics and processes might be responsible for this apparent blindness? After a couple of months, Desmet finally realized what was going on. Society was (and still is) under the spell of a mass hypnosis, a psychological process known as “mass formation” that arises in society when specific conditions are met.
The central condition is a lack of societal bonding. In other words, social isolation on a mass scale, which is precisely what the lockdowns were all about. We were all told that any contact with others, including members of our own family, could be a death sentence.
I’ve heard of people who for over a year have not met with a single person, remaining locked in their homes the entire time, for fear of contagion. But social isolation was a widespread problem even before the pandemic. Marcus cites a survey, which found 25% of respondents didn’t have a single close friend. What’s more, the loneliest age group were young adults, not seniors, as typically suspected.
So, even before the pandemic, Western societies were suffering from a lack of community, which is a key condition for “mass formation” syndrome to emerge in the first place.
The second condition is that a majority of people must experience life as meaningless and purposeless. Desmet cites research showing that half of all adults feel their jobs are completely meaningless, providing no value to either themselves or others.
In another poll, done in 2012, 63% of respondents said they were “sleepwalking” through their workdays, putting no passion into their work whatsoever. So, condition No. 2 for mass formation hypnosis was also fulfilled, even before the pandemic hit.
The third condition is widespread free-floating anxiety and free-floating discontent. Free-floating anxiety refers to anxiety that has no apparent or distinct cause. If you’re in the jungle and find yourself chased by a lion, your fear and anxiety have a natural, easily-identified cause — the lion.
However, when you are socially disconnected and feel your life has no meaning, then a free-floating anxiety can emerge that is not connected to a mental or physical representation of a specific threat. Judging by the popularity of antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs, condition No. 3 was also fulfilled long before the pandemic.
The fourth condition is free-floating frustration and aggression, which tends to naturally follow the previous three. Here, again, the frustration and aggression have no discernible cause.
Robbers Hit California Apple Store, Make Off With $20,000 Worth Of Items
A San Francisco-area Apple store was targeted Wednesday by robbers and looters in broad daylight, resulting in thousands of dollars in losses. Police in Santa Rosa, located approximately 50 miles from San Francisco, said the incident occurred around 11:30 a.m. local time, involving four black male suspects. They said the “brazen daytime burglary” occurred in front of staff and customers, with thieves stealing $20,000 in goods from the store. They then fled the scene in a vehicle, officials said. The Santa Rosa Police Department released photos of the suspects, who were described as “four young, Black males between 14 and 18 years old” and who were “wearing mostly black clothing with masks covering their faces.” No details about the vehicles released. Earlier this week, thieves and looters targeted several other locations in the Bay Area, including a Louis Vuitton store, a Nordstrom, pharmacies, cannabis dispensaries, and a jewelry store.
The New COVID-19 Variant From South Africa: What We Know So Far
South African scientists discovered a new variant of COVID-19 that they say might be behind the recent surge of infections in the country, resulting in panic across the world as countries fear the international spread of the highly mutated variation. South Africa was experiencing a rate of 200 new daily confirmed cases until recently when the number suddenly spiked to 2,465 on Thursday. Scientists studied virus samples from the outbreak—found mostly concentrated in Gauteng the most populous province in the country and home to Johannesburg—and discovered the new variant, named B.1.1.529. “Here is a mutation variant of serious concern,” Health Minister Joe Phaahla said at a media briefing Thursday. Phaahla said that the latest variant was behind the “exponential rise” of cases, but experts are still trying to confirm it, as establishing an actual connection takes time.
Fauci: Not Clear If New COVID-19 Strain Can Evade Vaccines
White House COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci said U.S. scientists and other researchers
are studying whether a newly discovered CCP virus variant can evade common
vaccines, although he stressed that it’s not clear whether the new strain is currently
spreading in the United States.
On Friday, European countries signaled they would close o! travel to certain southern
African nations, including South Africa, due to the emergence of the variant.
Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), told
CNN on Friday that o”cials “don’t know that for sure right now” about whether the
new CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus strain has the ability to evade vaccines.
“We want to find out, scientists to scientists, exactly what is going on,” Fauci said. “But
it’s something that has emerged in South Africa and seems to be spreading at a
reasonably rapid rate, in the sense of when they do test positivity they’re seeing it’s a bit
more widespread in South Africa than was originally felt a couple of days ago.”
New Analysis Shows Merck’s COVID-19 Antiviral Treatment Has Lower Efficacy
A new analysis of clinical trial results shows that Merck’s antiviral pill for treating COVID-19 is significantly less effective than previously reported in October, the company announced on Friday. In the updated report, the drugmaker said its antiviral treatment drug, which is called molnupiravir, showed a 30 percent reduction in hospitalizations and deaths from the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, based on data from 1,433 patients. In the company’s full analysis, one patient died in the molnupiravir group, and nine in the placebo group. The molnupiravir arm of the study had a hospitalization and death rate of 6.8 percent. The placebo group had a hospitalization and death rate of 9.7 percent.
Virginia Parents Raise Concerns Over ‘Extremely Invasive’ Survey That Promotes ‘Early Sexualization’
Virginia parents are raising concerns over what they feel is an “extremely invasive”
survey being given to school students that promotes “early sexualization.”
According to its website, the Virginia Department of Health is conducting the survey “in
collaboration with the Virginia Foundation for Healthy Youth, with support from the
Department of Education.” It is funded “through a five-year grant provided by the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”
“The Department of Health will be gathering information about the health risk
behaviors of youth. The Virginia Youth Survey (VYS) has been developed to monitor
priority health risk behaviors that contribute markedly to the leading causes of death,
disability, and social problems among youth and adults within the Commonwealth of
Virginia. The survey is administered every odd year in randomly selected Virginia
public schools.”
Michael Leaser, director of external relations and community relations for The Family
Foundation and resident of Fairfax County, Virginia, is concerned about the overreach
of the survey.
“For us, one of the core areas is parental rights,” Leaser told The Epoch Times. “From
our perspective, parents bear the ultimate primary responsibility for the children’s
education. We, as parents, permit public schools to educate our children, but it’s
ultimately our responsibility. Frankly, for some of these questions we’re concerned
about them even being asked. We think they’re a little too personal.”
The middle school children survey (pdf) asks questions many parents feel are invasive
and/or subjective that could be easily misinterpreted by young children.
Omicron COVID-19 Variant Found in More Countries, Sparking Global Concern
Health o!cials on Sunday announced that the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus
Omicron strain, which the World Health Organization labeled a “variant of concern,”
was found in several European countries over the weekend.
Last week and during the weekend, WHO and other officials sounded the alarm by
saying that the Omicron variant could be highly infectious and may re-infect people
who already contracted COVID-19 previously, although WHO officials criticized the EU,
the United States, and the UK for imposing travel restrictions last week. Also unclear is
how the variant a”ects vaccinated people.
Meanwhile, top South African doctor Angelique Coetzee told news outlets that the
variant causes unusual yet mild symptoms in the patients she has treated so far, saying
they were “so different and so mild from those I had treated before.”
Nonetheless, the Netherlands’ National Institute for Public Health and the Environment
said Sunday that the variant was found during the sequencing of the 61 positive CCP
virus results. The agency said that the sequencing “had not been entirely completed”
and added it was “possible that the new variant will be found in more test samples.”
Also on Sunday, Italian o!cials confirmed the first case of the variant from a traveler
who came from Mozambique, located in southern Africa, according to a statement.
Officials did not say when the passenger arrived or their nationality.
Danish officials confirmed two cases of the new variant on Sunday, according to
the Danish State Serum Institute. Two passengers arriving via plane from South Africa
had tested positive for the Omicron strain, they told CNN, adding that both passengers
are in quarantine.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Saturday said that no
cases of Omicron have been detected so far in the country, although top federal health
officials last week said it’s not clear.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, a top White House advisor and the face of the federal government’s
COVID-19 response, told the “Today” show Saturday that he “would not be surprised” if
the Omicron variant was in the United States already, saying that “when you have a
virus like this, it almost invariably is ultimately going to go essentially all over.”
Cases have also been detected in Germany, the Czech Republic, Israel, Austria, and
Belgium in recent days, according to officials. The European Union on Friday
announced it is restricting travel to Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique,
Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe—while the United States is slated to impose a
travel ban on those southern African nations starting Monday, Nov. 29.
The UK also confirmed two cases of the variant connected to travel to the southern
African region, officials said.
“We will require anyone who enters the UK to take a PCR test by the end of the second
day after their arrival and to self-isolate until they have a negative result,” UK Prime
Minister Johnson told a news conference Saturday.
Australia, Canada, Morocco, Oman, Russia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Singapore, and Saudi
Arabia have also announced similar travel curbs. Israel on Saturday said it would shut
down its borders to foreign nationals for two weeks—in possibly the most restrictive ban
in the world.
Oil Prices Drop to 2-month Lows as New COVID-19 Variant Puts Markets on Edge
Oil prices plunged more than 5 percent in early trading on Nov. 26, hitting a two-month low as the emergence of a new COVID-19 variant spooked investors, driving down risk assets like stocks and pushing up havens like gold and bonds. Brent crude, the global benchmark, fell 5.8 percent to $77.49 a barrel by 6:43 am New York time, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude was down around 6.0 percent, at $73.33 a barrel. Crude prices could face additional pressure from the recently announced coordinated release of stockpiles from strategic national reserves in a number of countries, including the United States, in a bid to cool soaring energy costs. Besides oil taking a tumble, overnight headlines about the new variant sent a broader wave of risk-off sentiment across markets, with major stock indexes falling in Asia and Europe, with investors pivoting towards the safety of havens like gold and bonds.
Dow Jones Drops 900 Points on Opening Bell as New COVID-19 Variant Roils Markets
The Dow Jones fell over 900 points just after opening bell on Nov. 26, with other major Wall Street stock indexes—and risk assets more generally—also seeing sell-offs as news of a new COVID-19 variant spreading in South Africa seems to have sparked a broader risk-off sentiment among investors. By 10:30 a.m. New York time, the Dow was down around 870 points, or 2.44 percent, after briefly falling more than 900 points before seeing a slight relief rally. The benchmark S&P 500 fell nearly 100 points, or around 2 percent, after markets opened, and by 10:30 a.m. was trading down around 89 points, or 1.89 percent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq was down around 200 points, or 1.23 percent. Overnight headlines about the emergence of the new COVID-19 variant in South Africa sent a ripple of uncertainty across markets, knocking down U.S. and global shares, sending crude oil prices tumbling
Goldman Sachs Slams Omicron Panic: ‘Mutation Is Unlikely to Be More Malicious’
Investment bank Goldman Sachs has asserted that concerns over the COVID-19 Omicron variant likely are unfounded. “This mutation is unlikely to be more malicious and … the existing vaccines will most likely continue to be effective in preventing hospitalizations and deaths,” Goldman said in a Nov. 26 note. “We do not think that the new variant is sufficient reason to make major portfolio changes.” The World Health Organization (WHO) named the Omicron strain, which was discovered in South Africa less than a week ago, as a “variant of concern” on Nov. 26, sparking travel bans to several African nations. The WHO also explained why it disrupted its naming convention to skip naming the latest variant “Xi” in accordance with the Greek alphabet, after critics said the U.N. health agency was attempting to appease the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Indiana Educator Who Blows Whistle on CRT Teaching Now Banned From School Buildings
Tony Kinnett, an Indianapolis-based educator who went viral on social media for exposing how critical race theory (CRT) is being implemented at his school district, says he has now been placed on leave and denied access to school email and buildings. In a Twitter thread, the award-winning science coach revealed that he has been locked out of his school email and Google Drive by Indianapolis Public Schools (IPS), Indiana’s largest school district serving about 23,000 students. According to Kinnett, the IPS required him to “work from home the last two weeks,” because staff reportedly have “clinical anxiety” over working with him to the point that phone calls had to be made to each team member before he entered the office so they could avoid seeing him. Finally, Kinnett said he has been “banned from going to any IPS school building or hosting any professional developments.”
Roadmap for Prosecuting COVID Crimes
The Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989 imposes fines and prison sentences on anyone who “knowingly develops, produces, stockpiles, transfers, acquires, retains or possesses any biological agent, toxin or delivery system for use as a weapon”.
The problem we face today is that our federal government has been captured by forces that seek to destroy the U.S. from within. As such, we cannot trust the federal judiciary to prosecute and hold those responsible for the pandemic and the toxic COVID shots accountable.
To circumvent the corrupted federal judiciary, we need to focus on locally elected prosecutors instead. Depending on the state, they may go by titles such as district attorney, state attorney, prosecuting attorney or county attorney.
Organize locally to find people willing, as a group, to call on your local, elected district attorney to convene a grand jury and indict the individuals suspected of being involved in the creation of SARS-CoV-2, and those responsible for the COVID shots.
The charge that applies is “murder and conspiracy to commit murder.” For starters, 15 researchers listed on a key paper can be indicted, plus those who funded the research. Those to be indicted in relation to the COVID shots include the chief executive officers, chief operating officers and chief scientific officers of Pfizer, BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson
Francis Boyle was interviewed in 2020 about the likelihood of SARS-CoV-2 having been engineered in a lab. Boyle’s background includes an undergraduate degree from the University of Chicago, a juris doctor (lawyer) degree from Harvard and a Ph.D. in political science. He’s a professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law, and wrote the book, “Biowarfare and Terrorism.”1
In 2020 when we initially dialoged, any mention of SARS-CoV-2 being a manmade bioweapon was highly censored and had we uploaded that video to YouTube, we would have been banned early last year rather than a few months ago. Today, the lab leak theory has been acknowledged as likely even by bought-and-paid-for mainstream media.
We also have loads of documentation showing Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), funded unlawful gain-of-function research on coronaviruses when there was a federal moratorium on that kind of research. The National Institutes of Health and EcoHealth Alliance also appear to have colluded to avoid triggering a secondary review of these gain-of-function experiment
Fauci is the highest-paid federal employee in the U.S., and 68% of his $437,000 a year salary comes from bioweapons research.
Instead of safeguarding public health, Dr. Anthony Fauci turned the National Institutes of Health into an incubator for pharmaceutical products, and essentially sold the entire country to the drug industry.
Fauci has had a hand in creating the vaccine gold rush. In 2000, he met with Bill Gates, who asked to partner with the NIH in an agreement to vaccinate the world with a battery of new vaccines. In 2009, this agreement was rebranded as “The Decade of Vaccines,” the objective of which was to implement mandatory vaccinations for every adult and child on the planet by the year 2020.
One of the darkest stains on Fauci’s career, aside from his role in the COVID pandemic, was his handling of the HIV epidemic. Suppressing the use of repurposed drugs, Fauci zeroed in on AZT, a toxic drug that has killed an estimated 300,000 AIDS patients.
The similarities between the AZT scandal and what’s happening today with the COVID jab and remdesivir are striking. Again, Fauci has suppressed all treatments using inexpensive and nontoxic drugs. U.S. taxpayers have paid for research, while drug companies have raked in the profits, all while having zero liability for injuries and deaths
Island of Rhesus Monkeys in South Carolina Exposed as NIAID’s Source for ‘Excruciating Experiments’
A group that investigates taxpayer-funded experiments on animals has disclosed a document exposing the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ (NIAID) “excruciating experiments” on rhesus monkeys. The monkeys, which are owned by NIAID, are acquired from Morgan Island off the coast of Beaufort, South Carolina. Justin Goodman, vice president of advocacy and public policy for the White Coat Waste Project (WCWP), told The Epoch Times that the nonprofit taxpayer watchdog group obtained the document in October through the Freedom of Information Act, revealing that the NIAID has spent $13.5 million in taxpayer funding on experiments that involve injecting monkeys with various infectious diseases such as Ebola and the Lassa virus that result in hemorrhaging, pain, brain damage, loss of motor control, and organ failure. Dr. Anthony Fauci is the director of NIAID, a division of the National Institute of Health (NIH), itself a part of the U.S. Department of Health
Naturally Immune People at Little Risk of Reinfection, Severe Disease From COVID-19: Study
People who recovered from COVID-19 are at little risk of contracting the disease again, according to a study published this week. Researchers in Qatar examined a cohort of over 353,000 people using national databases that contain information about patients with polymerase-chain-reaction-confirmed infections. The studied population contracted COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, between Feb. 28, 2020, and April 28, 2021. Reinfections were counted if a person tested positive at least 90 days after their first infection. After excluding approximately 87,500 people with a vaccination record, researchers found those with immunity from having recovered from COVID-19 had little risk of reinfection and severe cases of the disease. Just 1,304 reinfections were identified. That means 0.4 percent of people with natural immunity and without a vaccination record got COVID-19 a second time. The odds of severe disease were 0.1 percent that at primary infection, according to the study.
Florida Reports Lowest Daily COVID-19 Cases per Capita in US
lorida is now tied for the lowest daily COVID-19 cases per capita in the United States. A Nov. 26 update shows the Sunshine State reported a daily average of 1,393 CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus cases as of Friday, or about six cases per 100,000 people. That represents a five percent decrease over the past two weeks, data from the state shows. Hawaii also had a daily average of 81 COVID-19 cases, or about six per 100,000 people, according to the data. Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory, had 82 COVID-19 cases, representing about 2 cases per 100,000 people. Other southern states like Texas, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana saw low COVID-19 case averages in recent days, the data shows. Michigan saw a daily average of 8,457 COVID-19 cases, or 85 cases per 100,000 people—the highest in the United States, according to the data.
US-based Company Developing Vaccine That Targets New COVID-19 Variant
An American biotechnology company is working on a version of its COVID-19 vaccine that specifically targets the newly identified Omicron variant. Maryland-based Novavax has already started developing the version, with plans to start testing it next month. The updated formulation revolves around a new spike protein, which triggers a response from the human immune system. Scientists will base the spike protein on the genetic sequence of Omicron, a newly identified variant of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, Novavax told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement. COVID-19 is caused by the CCP virus, sometimes called SARS-CoV-2. The redesigned vaccine will be ready “to begin testing and manufacturing within the next few weeks,” Novavax said on Friday. The company said clinical trial data shows that its vaccine will likely provide protection against new and emerging variants. The vaccine, which utilizes recombinant nanoparticle technology, “allows us to adapt quickly to strain changes
Big Pharma Hunts Down Dissenting Doctors
The American Medical Association explicitly teaches doctors how to deceive patients and the media when asked tough questions about COVID-19, treatment options and COVID shots.
The AMA also supports expansion of COVID jab mandates for private employees, and together with the Biden administration encourages employers with 100 employees or more to implement mandates even though the Fifth Circuit Court has permanently blocked the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) from implementing and enforcing its COVID jab rule.
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the OSHA emergency temporary standard (ETS) exceeds the scope of OSHA’s authority and/or is unconstitutional.
The AMA, the National Council of State Boards of Nursing and other leading nursing organizations threaten doctors and nurses who speak out against COVID measures and/or the COVID jab with revocation of their professional licenses.
Aiding them in this task is a liberal front group called No License for Disinformation, created by Chris Gilroy, a marketing strategist who also created EverydayAmericanJoe, a website dedicated to supporting Joe Biden’s presidential campaign
What to Be Thankful For By David Boaz
Not long ago a journalist asked me what freedoms we take for granted in America. Now, I spend most of my time sounding the alarm about the freedoms we’re losing. But this was a good opportunity to step back and consider how America is different from much of world history — and why immigrants still flock here.
If we ask how life in the United States is different from life in most of the history of the world — and still in 2004 different from much of the world — a few key elements come to mind.
Rule of law. Perhaps the greatest achievement in history is the subordination of power to law. That is, in modern America we have created structures that limit and control the arbitrary power of government. No longer can one man — a king, a priest, a communist party boss — take another person’s life or property at the ruler’s whim. Citizens can go about their business, generally confident that they won’t be dragged off the streets to disappear forever, and confident that their hard‐earned property won’t be confiscated without warning. We may take the rule of law for granted, but immigrants from China, Haiti, Syria, and other parts of the world know how rare it is.
Equality. For most of history people were firmly assigned to a particular status — clergy, nobility, and peasants. Kings and lords and serfs. Brahmans, other castes, and untouchables in India. If your father was a noble or a peasant, so would you be. The American Revolution swept away such distinctions. In America all men were created equal. Thomas Jefferson declared “that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” In America some people may be smarter, richer, stronger, or more beautiful than others, but “I’m as good as you” is our national creed. We are all citizens, equal before the law, free to rise as far as our talents will take us.
Equality for women. Throughout much of history women were the property of their fathers or their husbands. They were often barred from owning property, testifying in court, signing contracts, or participating in government. Equality for women took longer than equality for men, but today in America and other civilized parts of the world women have the same legal rights as men.
Self‐government. The Declaration of Independence proclaims that “governments are instituted” to secure the rights of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and that those governments “derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Early governments were often formed in the conquest of one people by another, and the right of the rulers to rule was attributed to God’s will and passed along from father to son. In a few places — Athens, Rome, medieval Germany — there were fitful attempts to create a democratic government. Now, after America’s example, we take it for granted in civilized countries that governments stand or fall on popular consent.
Freedom of speech. In a world of Michael Moore, Ann Coulter, and cable pornography, it’s hard to imagine just how new and how rare free speech is. Lots of people died for the right to say what they believed. In China and Africa and the Arab world, they still do. Fortunately, we’ve realized that while free speech may irritate each of us at some point, we’re all better off for it.
Freedom of religion. Church and state have been bound together since time immemorial. The state claimed divine sanction, the church got money and power, the combination left little room for freedom. As late as the 17th century, Europe was wracked by religious wars. England, Sweden, and other countries still have an established church, though their citizens are free to worship elsewhere. Many people used to think that a country could only survive if everyone worshipped the one true God in the one true way. The American Founders established religious freedom.
Property and contract. We owe our unprecedented standard of living to the capitalist freedoms of private property and free markets. When people are able to own property and make contracts, they create wealth. Free markets and the legal institutions to enforce contracts make possible vast economic undertakings–from the design and construction of airplanes to worldwide computer networks and ATM systems. But to appreciate the benefits of free markets, we don’t have to marvel at skyscrapers while listening to MP3 players. We can just give thanks for enough food to live on, and central heating, and the medical care that has lowered the infant mortality rate from about 20 percent to less than 1 percent.
A Kenyan boy who managed to get to the United States told a reporter for Woman’s World magazine that America is “heaven.” Compared to countries that lack the rule of law, equality, property rights, free markets, and freedom of speech and worship, it certainly is. A good point to keep in mind this Thanksgiving Day.
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