Wirt has mastered the left's strategy of accusing their enemies of doing
exactly what the left is doing.
Indeed last night, as a consequence of Wirt's message, I watched the elite
media newscast, something I had not done in several years. I watched Peter
Jennings deliver his impression of a few bits of "news" on ABC World News
Tonight. I did not learn anything newsworthy from that broadcast, because I
had the full details from the Internet and Fox News before Jennings even
started talking.
However, if Peter Jennings were my only source of news, I would have learned
the Democrats had a memorial in Minneapolis on Tuesday night for senator
Paul Wellstone and the Senate Republican minority leader Trent Lott could
not take some criticism and had walked out, bad sport that he was. Please
note that of the entire ABC news broadcast, this was the only piece, which
Jennings did not deliver himself. I guess he just could not bring himself
to saying anything even remotely reproachful about the Democratics.
If Peter Jennings were my only source of news, I would not know the Governor
of Minnesota, Jesse Ventura had also walked out in total disgust. He was
interviewed about this and he said he felt violated and abused by the event.
I would not know Governor Ventura was so angry he was thinking of appointing
a non-Democratic to finish Paul Wellstone's term, which runs until January,
instead of appointing a Democrat in respect for the family.
If Peter Jennings were my only source of new, I would not know that one was
supposed to cheer loudly for the Democratics and jeer loudly the Republicans
who attended the supposed memorial of a tragically dead US senator.
If Peter Jennings were my only source of news, I would not know of the
wide-ranging flap this supposed memorial had caused in Minnesota and indeed
around the nation. I would not know this memorial rapidly deteriorated into
a most partisan political rally where the memory of Paul Wellstone was
invoked repeatedly to help sway the watcher to vote "one more time for
Paul."
If Peter Jennings were my only source of news, I would not know the head of
the Democratic party had apologized the next morning for the event, saying
it got a little bit out of hand. I would not know this controversy had
overshadowed Walter Mondale's anointment as the replacement for Paul
Wellstone.
On Fox News Network, I caught a lot of the speeches live on Tuesday night
and then a complete report late that night and the next day at news time. I
got both sides of the story as they interviewed participants and people in
charge.
If Peter Jennings were my only source of news, I would know virtually
nothing about this issue and certainly not from him directly. Instead,
Peter Jennings spouted off about how Republicans were trying to hide their
plan to get rid of social security, a tactic taken directly from the
Democratic playbook.
If NBC were my only source of news, I would know absolutely nothing about
this event. Their newscast did not even mention it.
Who is guilty of censoring the news?
BTW, throughout the evening yesterday, I went to the ABC news website.
There was nothing about Governor Ventura's reaction or even anything about
the event.
Denys...
-----Original Message-----
From: HP-3000 Systems Discussion [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of
Wirt Atmar
Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2002 3:07 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: OT: A little astronomy for a Wednesday afternoon
Tom writes:
> Speaking of Harrison Schmitt and "shocking revelations", the Detroit Free
> Press ran a story today about what NASA is doing about rumors that the
moon
> walks did not happen.
>
> See http://www.freep.com/news/nw/moon30_20021030.htm
The terms "The Dark Ages" and "The Renaissance" were marketing phrases
dreamt
up by people within the secular humanist wave that swept Europe in the late
1500's, and were meant to symbolise in the least number of words, like any
good marketing phrase, the differences between the rebirth of independent,
critical thought and the stultifying religious doctrines that had dominated
Europe for the previous 600 years.
The "Dark Ages" weren't completely dark however. There were people,
especially among the Arabs, English, Poles, Germans and Dutch, all far
enough
from the power centers of Rome, where scientific investigation continued
during that period. Indeed, even in Italy, the wave of university
construction that began in the late 900's in Egypt and England was
relatively
quickly taken up in Italy too and a number of universities (essentially
unchanged today in basic function) flourished in Italy by the 1200's.
Nonetheless, despite this learning, the common folk of France, Italy and
Spain tended to the believe the "Fox News Network" version of the news
rather
than a more obvious and simple truth: that the aqueducts that laced Europe
were well-known to have been built by the Romans during their time of
conquest of Europe to simply transport water. The level of human achievement
that the aqueducts represented fostered the belief among the less
well-educated and least powerful peasantry that they were built by the
Olympian Gods to carry wine to the their orgies, I presume simply because
those who believed in such a vision could never imagine themselves doing
anything so grand.
Given the modern rise of conservative home-schooling and the packing of
school boards with troglodytes for whom thought must pass religious tests, I
sometimes greatly worry that we're not on the cusp of a new "Dark Age". If
people watch enough of the "Fox News Network" and Jerry Falwell, the
percentage of the population who believe that we never went to the moon,
that
the Earth is only 6000 years old, and that the complete occupation of the
West Bank by Jews will signal the second coming of Christ will likely rise
from 20% to 50%. At that point, we're likely lost.
Wirt Atmar
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