This Purpose In Mind

After Dan Rather was booted from his coveted anchor position from CBS's Evening News because of his failure to verify a news source, which the world now knows was exposed by a maven bloggerite, I decided that it might behoove me (as a student of politics and international relations) to join in the fun in the bloggesphere.

I suppose my decision to start a blog really didn't stem from the necessity to have an outlet to tell the world what my opinions are or how I feel about certain somethings, but really came from my curiosity to comment about today's current events; to have an opportunity to really ponder what the news mean to me, my family and community.

In thinking about my approach for this blog, I began to think about how I could make the time I spend writing it beneficial to me and those who read it. Thinking about this blog reminded me of how truly privileged we are to live in a country where we, as citizens, have a right to voice our opinions and concerns. However, in today's world where the overall spectrum of media news have run a muck attempting to vie for our every attention and even win influence over our very conscience, I believe that most people (professionals and academics not excluded) have lost their ability to critically think about the news for themselves. The media with its ability to frame news stories in such a way to bias it is apparent everytime one turns on the television. Take FOX News for example, who ironically, for some reason calls their journalism "fair and balanced" when it is apparent that the station leans further right from the center. Please let me not single out FOX News alone before the reader accuses the author to be a liberal, but every news outlet is culpable: CNN, Al Jezeera, and even PBS. There will always be bias no matter what news is reported since stories are interpreted differently and the words that are used to report them are always laden with value-judgments. This prompted NPR to hire an ombudsman in response to CPB's accusation of its middle to left stance, but that is beside my point. (For more on the framing issues, read The Language of Politics, by Adrian Beard)

My point is that most people (including myself at times) do not critically examine what is really being written or said on the news. As a result, for the average American who is busy raising a family, paying off a mortgage and working a job(s) accepts what he or she hears on the news, written in the newspapers, as fact, and unfortunately, is unable to readily distinguish what is fact from opinion.

Let me give a personal example. I was over at my wife's parent's home to celebrate this past New Year's Eve with her family. In attendance were my wife and I, her parents and grandparents, and her little sister who is in high school with her boyfriend. During the course of the family dinner the topic of politics and Iraq entered into the conversation. The issue of whether we should have invaded Iraq became the topic of interest. Here we were enjoying our roast pork and baked potato when my father-in-law mentions the present situation in Iraq. My wife's grandmother, who continues to be staunchly against the war mentions that "our soldiers shouldn't be there in the first place since they never found WMD." Her son, my father-in-law retorts: "Remember Bush (Jr.) gave a compelling speech at the UN that Saddam had weapons...they were not [abiding by the UN resolutions]." My grandmother retorts back, "But even Bush said they had faulty intelligence." I sat there as this banter went back and forth for several minutes going nowhere. I wanted to say something that would give better context and information to their discussion but I prudently decided to stay out of it. What I realized as I listened to their entire political conversation that evening was that it consisted only in sound bites and headlines filtered to them by the media. Not once did they question the source, or even attempt to examine each other's perspective; they did not look at other possibilities. In short, while they knew the news, they failed to decipher it and failed to examine the arguments which they presented. As a result, their conversation ended, like always, in a heated debate that prompted my little sister-in-law to sigh and exclaim, "Can we change the subject?"

This is a disturbing phenomenon that I believe is becoming more and more of a widespread trend in our society. While there are savvy news readers and watchers out there who take advantage of the Internet, watch McNeil & Lehr's News Hour and attempt to carefully unmask the true story behind the story, other Americans have become more passive, ensnared in partisan politics as a result of being forced fed by today's media bias. If I am right and this is the case, then what is public opinion worth when people cannot even formulate opinions of their own? How do we get to Yankelovich's public judgment? If people are just parroting the media and have allowed it to influence their opinions and perspectives, then public opinion is worth nothing since people are not thinking. Our ability to exercise free speech is diminished. While some argue that more cable news channels that offer varying perspectives does in fact reinforce freedom of opinion and of speech, it doesn't address my concern of thinking and pondering the news on our own. If there is anyone to blame it should be ourselves and not the media. If we cannot formulate our opinions and judgments, can we truly say we are fit to accept our civic responsibilities, i.e. voting? Do we really know the details behind a policy? If the answer is no, then that would be like marking our voting ballot blindfolded, the practice of which makes an absurdity of democracy.

How can we think more critically? How can we have a civil discourse about today's current events with civility and understanding? I decided to write this blog with this purpose in mind. In the coming postings I will attempt to the best of my ability to examine news stories that are affecting our times. I will endeavor to evaluate the stories critically, examining common and new angles. While no one can promise objectivity, I promise sensitivity and civility in my discussions in which I hope the reader will find sincere and compelling.

A little tidbit on the title: So why take a title of Alexander Dumas' heroic protagonist? Simple, as Edmund Dantes took on the alias of The Count of Monte Cristo, so do I. Keeping out of the public eye is a good thing as the the Medicis learned; so did Hamilton and Madison in their convincing and persuading of the Federalist Papers. Thus, I do the same. To know the author is to already bias the content. Therefore, the content is more important than the person.