Obama, my Hairdresser and the Power of Propaganda: Spiegel Online International

[steve2470]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,584853,00.html

Obama may have come out on top after the third TV debate but it's too early to write off McCain. SPIEGEL ONLINE blogger Peter Ross Range learns at his hairdressers the power of misinformation in this year's presidential campaign.

So I'm sitting in the hair salon, getting a haircut, and my Korean immigrant hairdresser begins telling me all the reasons she plans to vote for John McCain.

First, she says, Barack Obama wants to “give away money to the poor people.” That, she declares, “is socialism.” Admitting that she earns about $30,000-40,000 a year before tax, she begins defending the lawyers who earn $250,000 or more and would have to pay a higher tax rate under Obama’s tax plan. “These are my customers. They have lots of bills, two or three kids in college, big houses, two cars. Things are hard for them, too.”

It was breathtaking.

Here an up-by-her-bootstraps first-generation immigrant, who lives in a small city apartment that she shares with her sister, is coming to the rescue of highly-paid Washington lawyers with big houses in the suburbs. “They shouldn’t have to pay more taxes than other people,” she continues, snip-snip. “They work hard, just like I do.” Snip, snip.

more at link above

[glowing]

1. There's a lot of people who believe in the "class" system.. that they

are undeserving of a better life because they have been bamboozled into thinking that those docs and lawyers are the one's Obama is actually targetting.. In reality, it is the Paris Hilton's of the world.. those who are born with a silver spoon in their mouths and will never have to know what it means to be hungry or without servants... Its those who have amassed the wealth from things that everyone "needs" and have lived off the spoils for many years, rigging the entire system... Its disgusting.. but people commit suicide all the time..

[madmax]

2. Stockholm Syndrome?

:shrug:

[sandnsea]

3. Did they get an SBA loan? Student loan? Product analysis?

They need to be educated as to how the government has benefited them and why we tax the rich to pay for it.

[blogslut]

4. Poor thing

Ten years from now, when her back gives out, her hands go numb from carpal tunnel syndrome and she can't breathe due to years of inhaling ammonia gases, I wonder if she'll be so sympathetic. Odds are she's self-employed and by the time her body turns on her, under a McSame administration, there'll be no Medicaid/Medicare or SSI benefits to help her.

[madaboutharry]

5. I recall reading in a book on the sinking

of the Titanic in which the author discussed how many of the passengers in steerage sat complacently while the ship was sinking. The author wrote how it was as if they had long ago accepted their "low status" and acted in a manner consistent with not believing they had as much right to a seat in a life boat as someone of a higher position is society. It is very sad that anyone would still see themselves that way today.