QUOTE : Propaganda, and the ideologies it develops and encourages in order to further its ends, is the life-blood of democratic operations. These elements combine to distill a beverage that the average man can drink, and which will intoxicate him so that he applauds actions he does not understand and fills out ballot sheets covered with names of men he does not know. We recognize the fruits of this distillation in various forms: political slogans, catchphrases, party platforms, and most of all ideologies which are by definition over-simplifications of reality. All of these represent pre-packaged sets of opinions, most of them meaningless or at least too vague to present any specific and useful meaning, which serve to comfort the consumer, telling him that he comprehends the actions of the State agrees with them—nay, that they are his actions. The program offered is the program he himself wanted. This function—the manufacturing of certainty for the individual—is one of the primary functions of propaganda. The individual thirsts for it; and the government cannot do without it. It satisfies both, and so both collude to keep the intoxicating beverage flowing.