Make 'Em Pay
In 1882, the US Navy shelled a Tlingit village in Alaska and burned it to the ground. Recently, after almost 150 years, the Navy is apologizing, along with apologies for other such incidents. Now, obviously, the incidents were immoral -- should never have happened -- but I'm not sure how a naval officer today apologizing for something the Navy would never do today is of any benefit to anyone living today. I don't see how holding someone accountable today for what was done more than 100 years ago makes sense. Well, okay, whatever. I suppose we'll need to put that on our list of reparations.
This is News
Starbucks made the news by telling office workers ... they had to come to work. Imagine that! The youngest generation complains that 8 hours a day is too much and office workers are outraged that they'd actually have to ... work in an office. Between COVID, government regulation, and societal pressures, we're choking free enterprise to death. Before long they won't be able to make any choices about their own businesses, and that can't be a good thing ... for employers, employees, or the nation as a whole.
Silence Isn't Always Golden
The Washington Post (WaPo) has refused to endorse a candidate, and the world goes crazy. They reported the loss of 250,000 subscribers not for what they said, but for what they didn't say. James Carville is quite sure the mass exit is an endorsement (by readers) of Kamala. So clearly the public demand is that WaPo not only endorse a candidate, but that they endorse the Left candidate. Which suggests that WaPo readers have no interest in an unbiased news source. I suppose we knew that, but it doesn't bode well for a "free press" ... or rational Americans.
Defining the Enemy
I'm just wondering. When did Elon Musk become "the enemy"? In his early days, he was hailed as a godsend. His electric cars were magnificent. He might even save the planet!! (Okay, no one said that last bit.) But when he ceased toeing the line politically, he became public enemy #1. Okay, #2. Trump has #1 wrapped up tight. So now they want him to stop launching satellites. The California Coastal Commission has already sued to stop Musk (and no one else) from using Vandenberg. What made Musk, the entrepreneur, the enemy of the state?
Choose Wisely
North Korea has tested an intercontinental ballistic missile days before the election. They claim it can hit the US. I sincerely hope that Harris gets elected so she can hit North Korea with such a word salad that they would never dare to do it. Or ...
Your Best Source for Fake News
The Supreme Court ruled that Virginia could remove noncitizens from their voter rolls (actual story) ... you know, like the law says ... and the Democrats are miffed because the court ruled in favor of adhering to the law. How can our system survive if the courts rule in favor of the law?? Joe Biden called on deplorable "garbage" (in the form of Trump supporters) to tone down the rhetoric (actual story), and Trump scores a coveted endorsement from Hefty.
Must be true; I read it on the Internet.
13 comments:
Make 'Em Pay
I can see the Navy acknowledging the tragedy that it was. However I'm not sure that will actually be enough in their eyes. According to the article, the village has been more than compensated than they even proportedly asked for.
This Is News
My work never afforded me the opportunity to work from home, but I can imagine how productivity could be hampered for many people, leading to employers paying more money for less work. I might internally grumble, but I'd understand. But then again, I'm actually concerned about the companies I work for.
Silence Isn't Always Golden
The mass exodus of subscribers just proves that WaPo's endorsement never moved the needle anyway. The majority of it's readers were already going to be voting for whoever was the Democrat. I don't think anyone was on pins and needles wondering who they were going to endorse and thus help them choose who to vote for.
Defining The Enemy
Clearly he made the vile choice of thinking for himself. One of the significant differences I've noticed between the Left and Right is that when someone leaves the Right, well that's dumb, but good riddance, but if someone leaves the Left, you are now the enemy of all that is "wholesome and good".
Choose Wisely
I'm sorry, are we supposed to be afraid of 40 year old technology that we've been designing specific defenses against from a much larger threat? My opinion? They made that thing just to impress their own people into thinking they were a global superpower. If they want to get added into MADD, I'm sure we could spare the two missiles to flatten them.
Your Best Source for Fake News
That Biden one isn't so much fake news as it is simply exaggerated news. I don't think I've seen a single video of anyone tearing down a Walz/Harris sign from someone's front yard, but I've seen several the other way. The Right is simply full of evil, deplorable, halfwits, not deserving of rights or freedoms.
Make 'Em Pay
I agree that such proclamations do no one any tangible good, but at the same time, to officially acknowledge wrongdoing by our government in the past isn't a bad thing to do. It can make it clear to the intellectually challenged that we indeed regret and eschew such behaviors. And of course, those who would cite such long ago actions to suggest our national character has not improved (at least in this respect) have one less arrow in their quivers.
That's the best I can figure on the subject.
This is News
Indeed. It's another example of how private enterprise is pressured to abide the public will, and worse, the demands of those who would be without income if not for the companies of whom they dare make demands.
Silence Isn't Always Golden
I have no problem with any news source endorsing candidates. For a WaPo to endorse a lefty is no surprise. Where I used to live, the local paper, while mostly left-leaning, would provide a list of endorsements at election time, and some were actually GOP candidates, too, which I appreciated. It demonstrated at least an appearance of deeper thought than to merely go straight ticket just because they're Dems, too.
I find this story particularly hilarious given just how bad a candidate Harris is, but that withholding endorsements for either candidate causes such an outcry of their readership indicates just how intellectually bankrupt the typical lefty is. WaPo is clearly not suggesting they should vote for Trump, but merely stating they can't in...uh..."good conscience" endorse a total buffoon like Harris. Imagine being a lefty so bad that even WaPo won't endorse you!
Defining the Enemy
I think you answered your own question earlier in the piece: Musk won't toe the party line. It's why they turned on Trump, which wasn't due to policy, but due to running as a Republican.
Choose Wisely
Foreign bad actors were never doing this type of thing during the Trump years. If Trump was the international laughingstock his detractors insist he was, what does this say about how our enemies regard this administration or will if...God forbid...Trump loses to Harris?
Historically, in the US, newspapers have always been partisan. The theory was that anyone could, with minimal investment, produce a newspaper and slant it however they wanted. Newsprint is virtually unlimited. Where things changed was with the advent of broadcasting. The broadcast spectrum is limited and is owned by the people, therefore those who used that spectrum were held to a different standard. The airwaves were limited, therefore their use was regulated to benefit the public. Obviously cable changed that and opened the door for more people to access their bandwidth, which has resulted in a trend toward "citizen journalists", harking back to earlier times.
In terms of the FCC, newspapers and non broadcast entities are held to different standards than the broadcast networks. They can endorse if they want. However, as newspapers became more about journalism, they realized the need to establish a separate entity (editorial board) to engage in partisan political activities. This theoretically allowed the news side to be unbiased and fact driven and allowed the paper to endorse.
Like Art, I don't really care who endorses who. I do expect that the broadcast networks will be held accountable for their adherence to FCC standards and rules.
I just wish broadcasting and journalistic sources were held to standards of truth. The garbage radiating from too many sources is such unvarnished lies that you'd think libel and slander laws would be in play. Hearing Kamala say that if Trump was elected women would no longer be able to see a gynecolologist was such absolute nonsense, and, yet, no one in the press appears to bother pointing it out, just as an example. I'm in favor of truth in advertising laws and I'm appalled that it doesn't apply to politics.
Stan,
The notion of journalistic standards when it comes to things like Truth, accuracy, and unbiased reporting have always been self regulated. I'm not sure how the government (not that your suggesting this) can square freedom of speech with a test of Truth. You'd think that journalists would want to be know as Truth tellers and would take pride in accuracy, but not so much anymore.
To some degree it should be decided by the marketplace, news sources that lie would go out of business. Unfortunately, that's not the case.
I see Truth in politics as a separate, but related, issue. Harris or P-BO should be free to spew whatever lies they want to, it should then be the job of an unbiased news media to report what they say accurately, then provide the context to demonstrate that they are lying. I agree that some sort of Truth requirement should be applied to politicians, I'm not sure how it would work. Unfortunately, the US has a long history of politicians lying about their opponents.
You're right, Craig, that there are no external "journalistic standards of truth." In our system, that's supposed to be the people. In our American way the people should be holding the media (and the politicians) accountable for their lies. As a whole, America has not, and the constant flow of journalistic falsehoods is what we've earned for our foolishness.
Stan,
That is correct, although there used to be some pretty decent industry standards back in the day. Now journalists want to shape the discussion and change the world instead of simply reporting the news.
At this point, I say pull everyone's broadcast licenses, let them either migrate to cable/satellite/streaming or bid for them at auction. Auction off the rights to the public airways to whoever wants to pay top dollar for them, and disband the FCC entirely. Get rid of the pretense of the MSM news divisions as some sort of keepers of journalistic integrity, and let the market sort things out.
Hasn’t the news become like everything else in our culture, i.e. “give the people what they want”? It seems that each side will spin a story a different way to attract viewers in support of that view. So “truth” has become just another commodity in the marketplace. When I flip channels through the TV news outlets, I see the exact same event, speech, etc., presented in opposite ways, depending upon the political slant of the channel; it all just seems a matter of personal (or partisan) interpretation or opinion. Since I wish to be a balanced person (and I can’t research and think through every issue out there), I tend to ignore both sides, as I deem them all untrustworthy, frankly.
Interestingly, this morning I saw this link at another blog I read:
https://amgreatness.com/2024/11/01/im-done-hugh-hewitt-quits-washington-post-storms-out-of-room-during-live-wapo-broadcast-over-bias/
Actually, Lorna, the news has become "We'll tell them what to think." I'm not exaggerating. They discovered their power of changing minds (kind of like Joseph Gobels) and have set out to change how we think rather than simply tell us what we want to hear.
(I assume you meant Joseph Goebbels.) But don’t you think that as long as we have freedom of speech protection in the Constitution, and holding conservative opinions is not currently outlawed, that we can still find views being promoted in the media that we can support? (Afterall, as I mentioned, I do see both spins when flipping through TV news outlets.) And since we are “on guard” for propaganda and “brainwashing” attempts in our media/culture, won’t that help us resist that? I know their goal is to change minds and control our thinking, but we are “on to them” and therefore can fight it (at least I am trusting in this). I know there is massive deception coming as part of the End Times, but those of us with the Spirit of Truth can know we won’t succumb, no?
As long as you knew who I meant. We currently have access to good information and bad. The real problem in our society is the ability to tell the difference. I had to teach my kids, for instance, to really listen to what their favorite songs were saying because, if they didn't, false ideas would be planted involuntarily. We need to pay close attention, and people don't much like doing that. That's why we currently have "TLDR" and live on soundbytes. And who knows how long our freedom of speech will hold out. There are growing voices that would like to remove them. So, no, I'm not worried about the media taking ME down the wrong path, but there are many I know and care about who are in danger.
Stan, I totally agree that we need to teach others how to seek the Truth and how to find it. Yet in a country where freedom of speech is enshrined in our constitution, false/offensive speech is still protected. Which emphasizes the importance of teaching people to seek the Truth.
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