Bora Celik

“Whatever the source, a steady diet of bad information, conveyed in bad faith, can over time become a serious threat to a democracy. Over time, a determined effort to undermine the very idea of truth softens the ground for anti-democratic impulses. This is why the Founders felt it critical that an American electorate be well informed, and why being a discerning and informed citizen is now more important than ever before.”
― Jeff Flake, Conscience of a Conservative: A Rejection of Destructive Politics and a Return to Principle

“Those captivated by the cult of celebrity do not examine voting records or compare verbal claims with written and published facts and reports. The reality of their world is whatever the latest cable news show, political leader, advertiser, or loan officer says is reality. The illiterate, the semiliterate, and those who live as though they are illiterate are effectively cut off from the past. They live in an eternal present. They do not understand the predatory loan deals that drive them into foreclosure and bankruptcy. They cannot decipher the fine print on the credit card agreements that plunge them into unmanageable debt. They repeat thought-terminating clichés and slogans. They are hostage to the constant jingle and manipulation of a consumer culture. They seek refuge in familiar brands and labels. They eat at fast-food restaurants not only because it is cheap, but also because they can order from pictures rather than from a menu. And those who serve them, also often semiliterate or illiterate, punch in orders on cash registers whose keys are usually marked with pictures. Life is a state of permanent amnesia, a world in search of new forms of escapism and quick, sensual gratification.”
― Chris Hedges, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle

“When your raison d’être stops being How can we hold to the principles of limited government and economic freedom? and becomes How can we hold on to this majority for one more cycle? then you’ve become the very thing that you’re supposed to be against. That corruption of the spirit opens the floodgates to actual corruption, and before long you have Congressman Cunningham giving his price list to lobbyists for “services rendered.”
― Jeff Flake, Conscience of a Conservative: A Rejection of Destructive Politics and a Return to Principle

“Balance was interpreted, it seems, as giving equal weight to both sides, rather than giving accurate weight to both sides.”
― Naomi Oreskes, Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming