If you'd like to win over the hearts and minds of your fellow Americans, I suggest that you read [i]The Tipping Point[/b] by Malcom Gladwell.  [url]http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0316316962/qid=1012311564/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_3_2/103-2009514-5391044[/url]

This isn't the sort of "Fight the System" book you'd find at a gun show, but it does have some important insights into culture and psychology that you can use that way.  Are you unhappy with the bias in the news and entertainment media?  Then learn how to work around them.  Do you want to change attitudes about guns and RKBA?  Then learn how people form opinions.

The premise of the book is that social trends don't spread the way we might expect.  The forces at work are subtle, but real; they "infect" societies the way diseases infect populations.  So if your goal is to influence people, small changes to few critical "tipping points" can be more effective than trying to spread a message through sheer volume.

Even if you don't want to use these strategies, you might want to learn how they're being used against you.

Thanks for the "tip". [;)]
I will look for it at the bookstore. By the reviews you link to, it seems like a real eye-opening book.

BTW, I wonder if posting on certain "select" internet forums would also be considered a mechanism to inoculate a new epidemic of change?

Possibly... but it would be very difficult.

Most of the "selling" of a message involves an element of personal charisma (mostly body language) that can't be communicated in a text message.  What's more, the ease of sending electronic messages has deflated the value (as perceived by the recipient) of any individual message.

And for those of you who need more convincing, there's a chapter that deals with the "epidemic" of school shootings.  It's particularly interesting because Gladwell, who comes across as a typical NYC liberal, doesn't blame guns at all.  Plus there's another chapter that deals with Bernie Goetz and Giuliani's clean-up of NYC.