This series has been, in essence, a book report on an ignored watershed work whose central thesis defines the undercurrents that have developed and flowed through our present milieu primarily here in this country, and but to some extent abroad as well. Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death traces how we as a society have moved from a print and word oriented culture to one embracing a visual and visceral worldview. This movement has been driven largely by advances in technology that have been abused, largely by our own human nature. Neither Mr. Postman nor I are anti-technological Luddites, but just as fire can warm a house or burn it down, so technology can edify and enhance or decimate and destroy. The choice is in the hands of those using the technology, which makes the outcome dependent on human nature and agenda...not a particularly good thing.

This movement from typography to television has drastically altered the nature of communication throughout our culture, and not for the better. In the process, it has degraded the cognitive and communicative skills of generations of Americans to the point that our country suffers at multiple levels from a mental atrophy bordering on retardation. Our collective attention span is woefully inadequate to the task of surviving, let alone thriving, in the world we have created. Likewise, our worldview has become increasingly self-centered to the point that demographic survival is questionable. (For example, back in the mid-twentieth century, Life magazine was a prominent publication. Then it was People magazine, focusing a bit more inwardly on humanity at large. The inward journey continued with Us magazine (versus Them?) and it seems to have come to a final narcissistic conclusion with Self magazine, as the reading habits of America reflects its inner poverty of thought.)

Mr. Postman and I are not alone in this diagnosis. Others have seen it as well. Over at Eject! Eject! Eject!, in a more recent and excellent essay entitled "Seeing the Unseen Part 1," Bill Whittle observes (emphases are that author’s, not mine):

"We live in a sea of information, an Information Age: and yet, it has been almost half a millennia since mankind has been so unwilling or unable to use critical thinking to separate the intellectual wheat from so...much...chaff! Critical Thinking – the ability to analyze data, determine its usefulness and fidelity, to learn how to assess reliability, question methodology, weight expertise and all the rest – is in shockingly short supply these days. It’s not just a shame; it’s an epidemic, it is a fatal metastasizing disease in a democracy where information is used by the public to make the decisions that steer the ship of state. For the ability to think critically allows us to see the unseen; to find the truth behind the falsehood, as well as the falsehood behind the truth."

If you’ve followed me through this series, you can now hopefully see the root cause of the above observations. Regrettably, this paucity of cognition and cogitation has also impacted the alleged Christian churches of this country. This is despite the fact that our standard of life and conduct, the Bible, states very clearly and in multiple places that we Christians are to be people of "the book," not the image. (e.g., "I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name." Psalm 138:2) Indeed, the situation is so serious that in his 1995 book entitled The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, Mark Nolls writes, "The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind." Joe Carter of the Evangelical Outpost blog suggests that things have gotten better since then, but at best the downward spiral has only slowed. Rather, the American culture, lock, stock, and barrel, has so invaded the church that as recent as 2003, Alan Wolfe can write in The Transformation of American Religion that , "...in the United States culture has transformed Christ, as well as all other religions found within these shores. In every aspect of the religious life, American faith has met American culture – and American culture has triumphed." I submit that this is a result of the decay in thought processes, is not a good thing, and is certainly an unbiblical development when we are commanded to be salt and light, not tapioca and grey.

The situation is not much better in the fundamental Christian circles in which I reside. There the prevailing philosophy often seems to be, "God said it, I believe it, that settles it," with no thought about it. Ask for evidence of how they know God said it, you get either a vacuous stare or exhortations to faith and trust, etc. We are all too often exemplified by Mr. Pupkin in Stephen Leacock’s Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town:

Perhaps the primary result of this massive paradigm shift in mental processing has been to leave us vulnerable to the infection of those who wish to conquer and/or control us. There are two enemies we currently face, one a long term internal nemesis and one a shorter term external invader, that make this a vital issue. Both aid, abet, and utilize this vulnerability, albeit, not necessarily consciously; all too often, they are simply in the categories of "useful idiots," although the "knowledgeable strategist" exists as well.

The external enemy is the Islamofascist threat currently creeping across the globe in a savage imperialist drive unequaled in human history. The horrors of Nazi Germany, lasting about a decade, pale in comparison to the centuries of oppression and blood on the hands of the practitioners of the Muslim faith, however much they may protest, murder nuns, and burn churches to the contrary. Yet, I would argue that, were we intellectually capable as a society, this threat could easily be defended against and defeated because a minimal level of cognitive prowess allows one to recognize and prevent the spiritual, cultural, and moral corruption that undermines such defense efforts. Logical and rational self defense mechanisms, and, when necessary, strategies for offensive action, are currently being ignored and/or vociferously opposed and sabotaged because of the efficacy of our internal enemy and the success of his strategies.

This internal enemy is the liberal, leftist, socialist, Marxist-Leninist, whether or not he calls himself that, recognizes himself as that, or knowingly embraces that ideology. He is here, he is not asleep, and he has infected many with his suicidal multicultural worldview. Initially this enemy had an external focal point in the communist Soviet Union, but by the time that collective fell, the disease had sufficiently disseminated throughout our institutions that the focal point was no longer needed. The infection can continue its undermining of all with which it comes in contact. I would argue that it is the internal enemy that needs to be addressed first and foremost if we are to survive as a nation (although the external one cannot be ignored either).

As a review and reminder, some of the strategies that have been successfully implemented, expressed in their goals for this country, include:

Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States. The tail spin of the Democratic Party into extreme leftist rhetoric, policies, and platforms makes it clear which party they have captured.

Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights. Two words: Activist judges.

Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks. It may no longer be "the party line," but the indoctrination into socialist ideology in our schools continues full steam ahead. This is one of the most critical of the leftist strategies. Many of the other strategies depend upon their success here.

Infiltrate the press. Get control of book review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions. The bias of the MSM is apparent to all who are willing to see the manifestations and has almost become a joke in its blatancy. The only ones who seem incapable of seeing this bias are those in the MSM itself, as evidenced by their continual protestations of "fair and balanced" in the face of highly conspicuous unfair and off-balance reporting!

Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms." Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art." This is self-evident by just walking around your public buildings. Realistic statues of people or things are out, meaningless monstrosities are in, all in the name of "modern art," and "sophistication." Most fail to see that the Emperor has no clothes!

Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio and TV. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy." Again, their success here is self-evident. This is the homosexual agenda that they are attempting to push down our throats with activist judges since every referendum clearly shows the opposition by the majority.

Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a "religious crutch." This has been going on since the early 1900's. The infiltration started in the seminaries, thus using the strategy noted above by taking over the schools that train the next generation of pastors. (And as an aside regarding Christianity as a so-called crutch, if the broken leg is real, and the crutch is real, you are a prideful fool and an idiot if you don’t use the crutch!)

Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state." Similarly, discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a world-wide basis. A living document is too malleable to be of any authority. Thus the rise of this false interpretation to legitimize twisting the rule of the Constitution to achieve many of the other goals listed here. Activist judges again play a major role here.

Discredit the American founding fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man." Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of "the big picture." The historical literacy of most Americans is dismal at best. The enemy’s success in rewriting a false version of our history has been outstanding, again, because of their success in invading the educational institutions of this country.

Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents. The attacks on this front continue with sex education in schools, and most recently has spilled over into health care, with vaccines for sexually transmitted diseases being pushed rather than the moral virtue of chastity before marriage. Can’t let reality interfere with our fun!

Many of the above dovetail into each other in a tapestry of cultural and national putrefaction and rot from within.

Ignorance begets ignorance, and we appear to be in a downward spiral of intellectual aptitude that reveals itself in the milieu of personal and national morality, spirituality, and culture. Nor is the Church immune despite the biblical injunction to be salt and light. The salt has lost its savor, and the light has become darkness indeed. The lament of Hosea is applicable today: "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children." (Hos 4:6) Note that it is not just for ourselves that we fall. Our children are affected as well, and dramatically so. So...what to do?

While it is vital to realize that a problem exists, it is only the first step. To stop with the diagnosis only and to make no effort toward the development of a solution (therapy) is to be part of the problem. Whiners are not appreciated however accurate their grievances. Postman’s own answers to the problem are, even in his own estimation, inadequate at best. The first is to use television to educate people about the problems of watching too much television! But if the audience is already brain dead from the drivel proceeding from the idiot box, something radically different is going to be needed to shock them out of their complacency, and more television isn’t going to be the answer. Likewise, his second answer is to hope that the schools can be used to educate the people about the problem, but they are already part of the problem on so many levels that there is little hope here. It is not that education itself is at fault, but that the institutions of education as they now exist are too infected with the decay to be able to provide the necessary treatment.

Before I list my ruminations on what to do, let me first offer some hope. Obviously, if the problem is the current focus on the visual and visceral, the correction is to move back to the typographic and cerebral. This is not impossible. Our country was established on a typographic foundation, and that foundation can be restored.

Two developments in this country in the last decade suggest to me that there is some some movement back in the right direction. The first is the rise of the homeschooling movement, with its return to an emphasis on learning the basics, on mastering practical skills for life, and on traditional approaches to doing so that have been successful for centuries of human history (like, reading, writing, and arithmetic...with standards of excellence, oh my!). Some Christian schools are catching on as well. Speaking from personal experience, there is a whole generation of young people coming of age whose cognitive skills exceed that of their public school counterparts.

Those readers here that are in the public schools may take exception to this, but I would ask for an honest appraisal of the public school system as a whole. Yes, there are some exceptions, and I realize not everyone is able to homeschool. But only the blind cannot see that Political Correctness pablum and Zero Tolerance idiocy run rampant through our primary and secondary schools, and our "higher education" institutes have been thoroughly subverted to leftist agendas in the overwhelming majority of the cases.

The second reason for hope is (drum roll please!) ...the rise of the blogosphere on the Internet. Here the printed word still takes priority without sacrificing some visual input (e.g., YouTube) in context. Those who read more are more likely (again, there are exceptions), to paraphrase Mr. Whittle from above, to think critically: to "analyze data, to determine its usefulness and fidelity, to learn how to assess reliability, question methodology, weight expertise and all the rest." Those active in the blogosphere must read by definition, YouTube notwithstanding.

The first thing is to equip ourselves with the aforementioned skills necessary for critical thinking. Turn off your TV and read, and, no, I don’t mean romance novels. And write; start a blog and allow comments to get feedback and elicit mind stretching threads/conversations. Study basic statistics, learn some of the principles of rhetoric, start asking questions of stories in the MSM. Probably equally as important, pass these skills on to your children. "And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes." (Deuteronomy 6:7-8) I am using a very liberal definition of children here: basically, anyone and everyone on whom you have a mentoring influence. The blogosphere is one place in which this kind of education is readily and freely available. Our fellow Townhallers frequently offer excellent analysis and commentary on current events, and often link to other sites providing the same. Don’t just read them for their cheerful destruction of liberal amentia. Observe how they do what they do, follow the mental processes used, and learn to imitate the techniques where they are appropriate.

Talk radio is another good source. I love listening to Hugh Hewitt cross examine liberals as he leads them to commit hari kari on themselves simply using the precise questions needed to reveal their bias, their inconsistencies, and their falsehoods.

In addition, and I think this is just as critical, engage ideas, not people (i.e., foreswear ad hominem attacks in the form of vitriolic name calling and slander and address the issues). The essay on tolerance to which I linked awhile ago is one place to start. Ad hominem all too frequently degenerates into more heat than light. It is all too easy to do because it requires no thought other than deciding what colorful expressions one can invent for and/or attribute to one’s victim. Thus, it is considered a logical fallacy devoid of truth content despite the joy it may give the attacker at the expense of his target.

To Christians, I would admonish you to read your Bible. It will be surprising, to some at least, how the Bible contains much relevant instruction in this regard as well. Indeed, we are told of a particular group of Christians that "...were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so." (Act 17:11) In other words, they thought critically!

For another example, God, through Solomon, has what appears to be contradictory advise on its surface: "Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit." (Proverbs 26:4-5) Let me let Matthew Henry explain these verses in his commentary:

Note that Mr. Henry does suggest the use of ad hominem in some cases, but with a particular style and purpose in mind that is not directed at an emotional attack to merely chagrin and marginalize the one so addressed, but rather for the benefit of him (perhaps) and any audience (certainly) to the exchange.

Christian, God tells you to "...sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear." You have no excuse to remain silent, although notice how you are to respond: "with meekness and fear." And that would be a fear of God, not of man. (Cf. also 2 Timothy 2:24-26)

In short, grow up! Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:11, "When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." And he then finishes this epistle with this exhortation: "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong." (1Cor 16:13)

Once you have mastered some of the above skills, begin to hold our elected officials feet to the fire of facts and data: I personally am sick of all the lies and distortions and demonstrable falsehoods out there in the political arena. Get to know your representatives in government at both the State and Federal levels, and communicate both your disagreement and your agreement on their stated positions and voting records. Christians, pray for them! (1 Timothy 2:1-2)

Now, in some Christian quarters there seems to be a reluctance, even a resistance, to becoming involved in the affairs of government, as though this kind of activity is inappropriate for a Christian, whose primary job should be the evangelization of the world, not running for office. The problem with this is it ignores a number of Scriptures that say otherwise, such as "They that forsake the law praise the wicked: but such as keep the law contend with them." (Proverbs 28:4) This requires a recognition of what is wickedness and an active opposition to those who would promote it in our society. Given that we wrestle not with flesh and blood (Eph 6:12), it is extreme naivete to believe that "a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty" is just going to happen. Indeed, this tendency was around when John Calvin wrote his Institutes of the Christian Religion, to which I would refer my reader, particularly Book 4, Chapter 20, in section 2 of which he writes:

We currently see the hard copy newspaper business falling on hard times as the old MSM struggles to cope with the reality of an Internet age where news travels faster than the paperboy can deliver it and the verification by multiple online sources followed up with blogstorms when necessary makes the dissemination of falsehoods increasingly more difficult (but nevertheless doesn’t stop it). In part, because trust in the MSM is ebbing low, circulations are dropping. I would suggest applying this approach to our institutes of education. Boycott liberal colleges and universities. Don’t send your children to Harvard to have his or her faith decimated and all your values you’ve instilled in your children drained out of them by the insidious tripe of liberal professors. If for no other reason than that you want your children to succeed and have the tools they need to do so.

If you have any doubts, go get Allan Bloom’s book, The Closing of the American Mind and (re)read it closely. Then check out the results cited in Patrick Buchanan’s recent Townhall article here. You may also want to check out a fellow Townhaller going by the call sign of Procrustes who has an excellent post invoking Dr. Bloom with some very disturbing news regarding the "fair and balanced" treatment of doctoral candidates in major universities across this country where intellectual freedom no longer truly exists. I would suggest, therefore, that parents seek out institutes of higher education to which to send their children where they might learn the skills they need to succeed (which includes the ability to think critically).

I’m going to let you in on a little secret the Ivy League doesn’t want you to know. It is really quite simple. For most industrial jobs (forget academia), what matters most is basic knowledge that is applicable to your particular discipline regardless of where acquired. The specifics are generally developed by on the job training. Demonstrable "trainability," communication skills, and the ability to work on a team are vastly more important for success and the bottomline than the fact that you got a degree from Princeton or Yale. And yes, I do speak from personal experience. My undergraduate degree is from an Ivy League college. The prestige associated with it has never, neither now nor since my graduation (back when dinosaurs roamed the earth), translated into anything by way of salaries, benefits, or regard in the eyes of my coworkers. Diddly squat. Nada. Nichts. Zilch. What counts is getting the job done regardless of how much work it might take to do so (i.e., a work ethic).

And before I close, let me here ask my readers if they have any other suggestions for strategies, now that the problem has been revealed? I don’t claim to have all the answers, but I did want to follow my own advice and offer some of my own thoughts for solutions.

I refer once again to God's response to Solomon's dedicatory prayer for the temple, in 2 Chronicles 7:14,

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."

Who is responsible when things go wrong on a national level? God's answer: "My people, which are called by my name!" Not those wicked Dumocrats. Not those vile leftists. My people! We Christians, those of us who name the name of Christ, who are to be salt and light in our world, are to blame. Why? The answer is there in the verse. We do not humble ourselves as we ought, but presume to know how to worship and serve our God using our "creativity" rather than His instructions. We do not seek God's face and pray as we ought, but continue in our narcissistic ways ignorant of God's will as revealed in His Word. (How much dust is on your Bible?) We do not repent from sin revealed in our lives as we ought, in part because our standard operating procedures call for the quenching of God's Spirit within us rather than being filled with His Spirit as the first step.

The Hebrew word for "pray" in this verse is particularly revealing. It is the word pâlal, and in addition to the ideas of intervening, interposing prayer, it contains the concepts of mediation and judgment in its root meaning. It is a word used repeatedly for prayer to prevent God’s full judgment on sin by repenting of that sin (e.g., Numbers 21:7) and asking for God’s forgiveness and healing.

Tough words, but then, reality can be tough. God's not interested in making you or me comfortable. Our chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever, not to feel good about ourselves and have a fun time in the here and now.

We are in a struggle for the existence of our country, but it starts with a struggle for our own souls. At such times as these, it is fitting to look to the leaders of our past who have faced similar struggles and won through them. I can think of several such, and I wish to close my pontificating here with some words of giants of freedom whose language can stir us, perhaps even to thought and action.

Theodore Roosevelt:

Winston Churchill:

Lastly, I want to quote here the entire text of Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait, a very moving piece of music with selected quotes from Lincoln. If you can find a recording, it is well worth the listening. In a very real sense, here at "home" we face a similar situation of civil war now, although it is being fought with ideologies and words rather than bullets and battles. The damage can be just as real. Anyway, here it is for your edification and my closing thought(s):

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