Sigh....

With all due respect to both KD and Aunty, my post was not meant to be used as a hammer maliciously thrown in the direction of a specific party. A stated conclusion was intentionally excluded in hope of something either broader in context or more distilled would be forthcoming. Perhaps a cold G&T is in order for the latter, or this for your consideration of the former....

The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate. -- Noam Chomsky