ATTYTOOD: Expert: America is losing the war of fake ideas!

We love the idea of "contrarian" thinking...in theory. In reality, as this famous case right here in Philadelphia proved, a lot of contrarian thinking goes against the grain because it's also...well, kind of stupid.

In that vein, let's hear it for the newly revamped Los Angeles Times and a retired-general-turned prof named Walter Jajko for thinking waaaay outside the box today. Jajko's op-ed has the cheery title, "It's propaganda time." A more accurate headline would have been: "It's propaganda time...oh and by the way that's a good thing!"

Jajko knows a thing or two about propaganda, apparently. The retired Air Force brigadier general was an assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Oversight from 1994 to 1998. He now hangs his hat at the Institute of World Politics, which, according to a Wall Street Journal blurb, is "rooted in American values: of democracy, of free markets, of traditional Judeo-Christian concepts about the just use of force."