the attitude with arnie arnesen the tuesday edition noon to 1pm EST Oct 14 streaming live at wnhnfm.org
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Arnie Arnesen
Oct 13, 2025, 5:36:26 PMOct 13
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The Attitude with Arnie Arnesen
opening thoughts: Hannah Arendt The Origins of Totalitarianism & a poem Gone Government by Lyn Ekedahl
producers: Dave Scott and Stephanie Collins
Hannah Arendt, in her book, The Origins of Totalitarianism, explored how truth can be systematically eroded until people lose the ability to think for themselves.
She observed that totalitarianism thrives not through persuasion or conviction, but by breaking the link between words and reality—by turning people into beings for whom truth and falsehood no longer matter.
She noted that the goal of totalitarian education was never to instill belief, but to destroy the very capacity for belief. When people no longer know what to trust, when facts become interchangeable with fiction, the ground of moral judgment collapses.
Arendt wrote:
“This constant lying is not aimed at making the people believe a lie, but at ensuring that no one believes anything anymore. A people that can no longer distinguish between truth and lies cannot distinguish between right and wrong. And such a people, deprived of the power to think and judge, is, without knowing and willing it, completely subjected to the rule of lies. With such a people, you can do whatever you want.”
Her insight remains unsettlingly relevant. When truth is corroded, it is not replaced by another belief—it is replaced by confusion. And confusion, left unchecked, becomes the perfect soil for control.
Hannah Arendt (1906–1975), a German-born historian and philosopher, spent her life examining how freedom is undone not just by violence, but by the quiet decay of truth itself.
Gone Government by Lyn Ekedahl
Our government is gone—shut down,
Now Vought and Trump can go to town.
Environmental stuff is dead
In all states blue and some states red!
Federal workers take more hits
As agencies are smashed to bits!
Health insurance will once more
Be denied to those most poor.
Speech that’s free gets more remote
As gerrymanders kill the vote.
Due process is a thing that’s dying,
As phony lawsuits Bondi’s trying.
Trump vilifies our cities great,
Sending troops, heart full of hate.
Our great experiment thus fades,
A victim of these hard-right raids.
All courtesy of Trump and Vought.
If they could, they’d build a moat.
The autocrats in gleaming castles—
The rest of us-their lowly vassals!
But, in the vassals lies the power.
Strong resistance still can flower.
No Kings Here can show the Don
He may well lose his biggest con!
Our government is gone—shut down,
Now Vought and Trump can go to town.
Environmental stuff is dead
In all states blue and some states red!
Federal workers take more hits
As agencies are smashed to bits!
Health insurance will once more
Be denied to those most poor.
Speech that’s free gets more remote
As gerrymanders kill the vote.
Due process is a thing that’s dying,
As phony lawsuits Bondi’s trying.
Trump vilifies our cities great,
Sending troops, heart full of hate.
Our great experiment thus fades,
A victim of these hard-right raids.
All courtesy of Trump and Vought.
If they could, they’d build a moat.
The autocrats in gleaming castles—
The rest of us-their lowly vassals!
But, in the vassals lies the power.
Strong resistance still can flower.
No Kings Here can show the Don
He may well lose his biggest con!
part one:
Melvin A. Goodman is a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University. A former CIA analyst, Goodman is the author of Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA and National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism. and A Whistleblower at the CIA. His most recent books are “American Carnage: The Wars of Donald Trump” (Opus Publishing, 2019) and “Containing the National Security State” (Opus Publishing, 2021). Goodman is the national security columnist for counterpunch.org.
part two: Megan O'Metz is a ProPublica reporter covering issues in Wisconsin and throughout the Midwest.Previously, I worked at the South Florida Sun Sentinel, where I was on the investigative team for over 15 years. My colleagues and I were finalists for the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for stories about widespread fraud in federal disaster aid programs after a series of devastating hurricanes. I also shared in the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for reporting on the failures of school administrators and police officers in connection with the Parkland school shooting. Early in my career, I covered the statehouse in Pennsylvania.
Five Ways the Department of Education Is Upending Public Schools The Trump administration has made a rapid succession of hires and decisions at the Department of Education that could spur profound changes in how schools operate and children learn. Here’s what to know.
These Activists Want to Dismantle Public Schools. Now They Run the Education Department. https://www.propublica.org/article/education-department-public-schools-activists-linda-mcmahon-trump
KEEPING THE POT STIRRED SO SCUM DOESN'T RISE TO THE TOP - Anonymous
KEEPING THE POT STIRRED SO SCUM DOESN'T RISE TO THE TOP - Anonymous
D. ARNIE ARNESEN
15 Rumford Street
Concord NH 03301
nha...@gmail.com
(C) 603-321-7654
Host of "The Attitude with Arnie Arnesen"
D. ARNIE ARNESEN
15 Rumford Street
Concord NH 03301
nha...@gmail.com
(C) 603-321-7654
Host of "The Attitude with Arnie Arnesen"
Award Winning Public Affairs Show (NHAB 2018)
airs noon to 1pm and 7pm EST M-F at 94.7FM (concord nh)
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