2005/02/08
How do you calculate inertia?
Yes, I am new to blogging and I'm still trying to figure out the mechanics.
Re: Dan Rather, Eason Jordan, Connie Chung, Peter Jennings, etc.:
Who knew that the MSM had this much inertia?
I don't mean their manner of conducting business. That sort of thing can turn on a dime - a fortuitous idiom, eh?
No, I mean the energy of over half a century of credulity on the part of the american public. I'm not old enough to remember Murrow, but I do remember Huntley and Brinkley. I have half a memory of Viet Nam and therefore some of Cronkite. If you didn't trust these guys, who could you trust?
That's not an idle question. Who was there I could have tuned in to? It's not like Goldwater had a network. Even amidst the anti-establishment, there was no call for critical thought. Don't trust anyone over thirty? The unspoken corollary allowed for trusting the news - if it agreed with the under-thirty mindset, but thought wasn't a part of that either.
I have digressed, but not far.
The habitual examination of our facts isn't and hasn't been. It's ironic that the temptation that is slowly eroding the Main Stream Media ( MSM ) is what fuels the blogs.
OK, I know for a fact that no one is reading this right now. If there's a time to do the boring foundation work, it's when no one is watching. If any one from the future reads this, they'll already be predisposed to forgive a little, stylistically.
The Free Press:
It is in a constant balancing act between two conflicting truths:
People are paying to find out the facts. People are easily bored, and facts are dismally boring.
You want the TRUTH from your newspaper? Turn to the classifieds. If it isn't the truth, you'll discover it with a phone call or two. You can get right to the source! Not terribly entertaining, is it? Well, *I* enjoyed the Beanie baby boom, but that's another story.
After that, what we get is varying levels and layers of testimony.
I have got to tell you a personal story. I must.
When my son, was young - fifth, sixth grade - we were in a grocery check out line with the Weekly World News. There was the great hunter on the cover, with his elephant gun on his hip and the head of a ten foot long bumblebee under his foot.
"Son, do you believe that?"
Well, of course he didn't. Not that he was confident in his wisdom, but in the way I asked the question. I'm pretty transparent.
So we go outside to and get a copy of the local paper. There, on the cover was the great School Board doing something forgettable.
"Son, do you believe that?"
So now he says "Yeah!" with a confidence not wholly justified by my demeanor. The stench of ... educationalists ... was about him.
"Why?"
The premise of journalistic professionalism is that they give accurate and reliable testimony.
That's a fun digression. The premise of medical professionalism is that they will try to help one heal. The premise of engineering professionalism is that they will throughly calculate every contingency. The premise of accounting professionalism is that they will apply the current standards of fiscal evaluation without bias or for evasion.
If a doctor, or an engineer, or an accountant consistantly injects their personal/political bias into their work and screws up like Eason Jordan, by God, they are out of the business, making restitution, and might be going to jail.
A moment of reflection for lawyers. We don't need that long for a "journalist". Teachers belong to unions, and are, by self-declaration, "laborers."
In fact, "journalists" by plying their trade in and amongst the First Amendment can't be brought to account, save by the economic pressure of the customer, who doesn't wish to be bored.
So, I'll be obvious.
MSM journalists "sex up" the story to sell the papers, but bloggers "sex up" their prose by telling the facts better. I know that the point is obvious, but isn't the symmetry just Shakespearian?
It's like watching a train wreck that takes thirty years to happen. I mean, ever since Gulf War I the MSM has been piloting their huge mass against unacceptable truths betting that their irresistable force will succeed before their structure comes apart.
Remember all the entertaining but false stories that were told getting Clinton elected, and keeping him in office. Consider all the things that had to go down the now ubiquitous "memory hole." During Clinton's impeachment - I can't say "trial" because that's misleading - proceedings the National Enquirer was a peer to the MSM. Think back to all those silly stories, horrific stories they told in this President's election campaign and first term.
Who knew that they would still have enough left to almost elect a duplicitous stiff like Kerry?
Later: what's that smell?
Re: Dan Rather, Eason Jordan, Connie Chung, Peter Jennings, etc.:
Who knew that the MSM had this much inertia?
I don't mean their manner of conducting business. That sort of thing can turn on a dime - a fortuitous idiom, eh?
No, I mean the energy of over half a century of credulity on the part of the american public. I'm not old enough to remember Murrow, but I do remember Huntley and Brinkley. I have half a memory of Viet Nam and therefore some of Cronkite. If you didn't trust these guys, who could you trust?
That's not an idle question. Who was there I could have tuned in to? It's not like Goldwater had a network. Even amidst the anti-establishment, there was no call for critical thought. Don't trust anyone over thirty? The unspoken corollary allowed for trusting the news - if it agreed with the under-thirty mindset, but thought wasn't a part of that either.
I have digressed, but not far.
The habitual examination of our facts isn't and hasn't been. It's ironic that the temptation that is slowly eroding the Main Stream Media ( MSM ) is what fuels the blogs.
OK, I know for a fact that no one is reading this right now. If there's a time to do the boring foundation work, it's when no one is watching. If any one from the future reads this, they'll already be predisposed to forgive a little, stylistically.
The Free Press:
It is in a constant balancing act between two conflicting truths:
People are paying to find out the facts. People are easily bored, and facts are dismally boring.
You want the TRUTH from your newspaper? Turn to the classifieds. If it isn't the truth, you'll discover it with a phone call or two. You can get right to the source! Not terribly entertaining, is it? Well, *I* enjoyed the Beanie baby boom, but that's another story.
After that, what we get is varying levels and layers of testimony.
I have got to tell you a personal story. I must.
When my son, was young - fifth, sixth grade - we were in a grocery check out line with the Weekly World News. There was the great hunter on the cover, with his elephant gun on his hip and the head of a ten foot long bumblebee under his foot.
"Son, do you believe that?"
Well, of course he didn't. Not that he was confident in his wisdom, but in the way I asked the question. I'm pretty transparent.
So we go outside to and get a copy of the local paper. There, on the cover was the great School Board doing something forgettable.
"Son, do you believe that?"
So now he says "Yeah!" with a confidence not wholly justified by my demeanor. The stench of ... educationalists ... was about him.
"Why?"
The premise of journalistic professionalism is that they give accurate and reliable testimony.
That's a fun digression. The premise of medical professionalism is that they will try to help one heal. The premise of engineering professionalism is that they will throughly calculate every contingency. The premise of accounting professionalism is that they will apply the current standards of fiscal evaluation without bias or for evasion.
If a doctor, or an engineer, or an accountant consistantly injects their personal/political bias into their work and screws up like Eason Jordan, by God, they are out of the business, making restitution, and might be going to jail.
A moment of reflection for lawyers. We don't need that long for a "journalist". Teachers belong to unions, and are, by self-declaration, "laborers."
In fact, "journalists" by plying their trade in and amongst the First Amendment can't be brought to account, save by the economic pressure of the customer, who doesn't wish to be bored.
So, I'll be obvious.
MSM journalists "sex up" the story to sell the papers, but bloggers "sex up" their prose by telling the facts better. I know that the point is obvious, but isn't the symmetry just Shakespearian?
It's like watching a train wreck that takes thirty years to happen. I mean, ever since Gulf War I the MSM has been piloting their huge mass against unacceptable truths betting that their irresistable force will succeed before their structure comes apart.
Remember all the entertaining but false stories that were told getting Clinton elected, and keeping him in office. Consider all the things that had to go down the now ubiquitous "memory hole." During Clinton's impeachment - I can't say "trial" because that's misleading - proceedings the National Enquirer was a peer to the MSM. Think back to all those silly stories, horrific stories they told in this President's election campaign and first term.
Who knew that they would still have enough left to almost elect a duplicitous stiff like Kerry?
Later: what's that smell?
2005/02/06
Introduction - The Return of Porky Pig
There are moments of stark clarity when the smallest protrusion indicates the iceberg.
Watch the cartoon with me: Porky is warm in his house and the cats are scheming outside. Co-opting the radio, they announce NEWS! Aliens have landed! Run for your lives!
Porky turns off the radio and in one ( 1 ) sentence unmasks CNN, foretells the blogs, and damns public school graduates to decades of darkness.
"Oh, that's silly", says he.
This should be a mundane moment. It was for him, decades ago. For us in the 21 century, it's a terrible new lesson.
In the by and by, I hope to get to CNN, myself, and blogs, the public schools, the stock market, gun control, imminent domain, engineers, accountants, doctors, lawyers, judges, and probably back to Porky again.
I'm crossing my fingers that I'm as brilliant here, as I am in the shower.
Just now, however, I have to set up Apache for virtual hosting, and insert A records in DNS. Maybe that will work. It's a Mac Vs. Windows thing. I may be a Guru, but I'm not a Jedi, yet. The point is: this blog's is going to be fun. I promise.
What you will read here will be, as far as I know, unique, and I testify that it's amusing to me.
Watch the cartoon with me: Porky is warm in his house and the cats are scheming outside. Co-opting the radio, they announce NEWS! Aliens have landed! Run for your lives!
Porky turns off the radio and in one ( 1 ) sentence unmasks CNN, foretells the blogs, and damns public school graduates to decades of darkness.
"Oh, that's silly", says he.
This should be a mundane moment. It was for him, decades ago. For us in the 21 century, it's a terrible new lesson.
In the by and by, I hope to get to CNN, myself, and blogs, the public schools, the stock market, gun control, imminent domain, engineers, accountants, doctors, lawyers, judges, and probably back to Porky again.
I'm crossing my fingers that I'm as brilliant here, as I am in the shower.
Just now, however, I have to set up Apache for virtual hosting, and insert A records in DNS. Maybe that will work. It's a Mac Vs. Windows thing. I may be a Guru, but I'm not a Jedi, yet. The point is: this blog's is going to be fun. I promise.
What you will read here will be, as far as I know, unique, and I testify that it's amusing to me.
