Back in high school, I remember hearing the Young Americans for Freedom and other Goldwater supporters claiming that African-Americans would flock to their side.
Talk about blind faith! Just who were they talking to? Where were they spending their time?
I could see ways that wasn’t grounded in any reality.
No wonder I started backing away.
It was a sensation I also felt as the Vietnam war began building up.
Or as a homemade sign on the Antioch College campus boldly warned: Help Goldwater and LBJ nuke Vietnam.
At the time, all eyes and ears were cast on the conservative’s sword-and-bomb rattling. The president, we were assured, was more reasonable and reasoned. And then, once elected by a landslide, LBJ, to our horror, ramped up the American involvement. Remember the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution? As we learned later, it wasn’t grounded in any reality.
The promise, of course, was One More Year. Talk about blind faith! Just who were they talking to? Where were they spending their time?
Are we, as a people, ready for some uncomfortable true statements? We need to get grounded in reality rather than unsupported ideology. Just who are we talking to? And where are we spending our time? Let’s run some numbers, for starters.
Jnana's Red Barn 
Barbara Tuchman, in several books, has a lot to say on this topic.
Trouble is, as humans, we have a lot of difficulty shutting out our own pet propaganda, while easily recognizing it on the other side. Then, too, reality is so much more easily viewed in the rear view mirror.