Turns out one can only "manufacture consent" within certain parameters which are not far from the bounds of physical reality. The media lost a lot of credibili

Turns out one can only "manufacture consent" within certain parameters which are not far from the bounds of physical reality. The media lost a lot of credibility from the second Iraq war which (almost to the publisher) they were cheering for. So when Washington Post (among others) started the Ra Ra for invasion of Syria to topple Assad more than a few eyebrows went up. The public might be generally uninformed and uninterested but they aren't flat out stupid. And memory isn't quite as short as is apparently believed in some quarters. This leaves an information vacuum. Which predictably is filled with anything that can match up with what people already "know" or otherwise want to believe. Less is more when it comes to propaganda. Make it unreasonable and it all stops working.