A short essay on my frustrations
I'm generally ticked off by the actions and words of most politicians, the rampant silliness of celebrities in Hollywood, as well as scandals in Academia but these days I reserve the bulk of my frustration for three primary groups:
Moderate Islam
The simple fact of the matter is that there is only one demographic on the face of the planet with the power to end Islamic Terrorism tomorrow. And that's the so-called moderate muslim majority. I'm assured daily from all sides that our enemy isn't the Arabs, and that it isn't the religion of Islam. The President himself goes out of his way on a regular basis to clarify this point. Our enemy is but a small segment of the greater Islamic world. We are not at war with Islam as a whole. Well, I think that's correct. But it continues to baffle me why the majority of the world's muslims (dying in numbers that dwarf american casualty statistics) havn't yet stood up, and at the top of their lungs shout, "Stop!"
American News
To me, it seems the standards of journalists today stand in direct opposition to their catchprhases. "The Paper of Record." "We report, you decide." "Coverage You Can Count On." "Where The News Comes First." All of these phrases pay homage to the high standards of unbiased, straight fact reportage. But what follows is nearly always anything but. It's left to to the paying customer to sort fact from entertainment, opinion from analysis. Frankly, it's exausting. And in recent years, I've noticed a disturbing trend towards "adversarial journalism." That's where one agrieved party with an axe to grind against another party runs to the media and says, "So and so is evil!" And the newscasters put both parties on the air for a shouting match calling this spectacle, "Fair and Balanced." That's not news, that's the Jerry Springer Show.
Americans cheerleading for America's defeat.
I'm a classical liberal. I believe in concepts such as the rule of law, freedom from tyranny, representantive government, equality of opportunity, all of which are articulated in our Constitution, quite possibly the greatest document ever produced in the history of Mankind. But these days, those calling themselves liberals have been acting in a decidedly unliberal fashion. They've called for speech restrictions, they've called for a central authority for our healthcare, they've called for the punishment of successful private companies. They describe my country in terms of class hatred, when the ideal is a classless system. They describe my country as empire-like, when the ideal is soveriegnty and self-determination. In short, liberals used to believe in freeing nations, but today they pine for dictatorship.
***
None of these people are evil. They're not bad people. They're just the groups who frustrate me. I speak arabic and find Islam fascinating. I'm a news junkie. Like those calling themselves liberals today, I'm all about righting injustices. It's just the means to an improved society that we disagree on.
Moderate Islam
The simple fact of the matter is that there is only one demographic on the face of the planet with the power to end Islamic Terrorism tomorrow. And that's the so-called moderate muslim majority. I'm assured daily from all sides that our enemy isn't the Arabs, and that it isn't the religion of Islam. The President himself goes out of his way on a regular basis to clarify this point. Our enemy is but a small segment of the greater Islamic world. We are not at war with Islam as a whole. Well, I think that's correct. But it continues to baffle me why the majority of the world's muslims (dying in numbers that dwarf american casualty statistics) havn't yet stood up, and at the top of their lungs shout, "Stop!"
American News
To me, it seems the standards of journalists today stand in direct opposition to their catchprhases. "The Paper of Record." "We report, you decide." "Coverage You Can Count On." "Where The News Comes First." All of these phrases pay homage to the high standards of unbiased, straight fact reportage. But what follows is nearly always anything but. It's left to to the paying customer to sort fact from entertainment, opinion from analysis. Frankly, it's exausting. And in recent years, I've noticed a disturbing trend towards "adversarial journalism." That's where one agrieved party with an axe to grind against another party runs to the media and says, "So and so is evil!" And the newscasters put both parties on the air for a shouting match calling this spectacle, "Fair and Balanced." That's not news, that's the Jerry Springer Show.
Americans cheerleading for America's defeat.
I'm a classical liberal. I believe in concepts such as the rule of law, freedom from tyranny, representantive government, equality of opportunity, all of which are articulated in our Constitution, quite possibly the greatest document ever produced in the history of Mankind. But these days, those calling themselves liberals have been acting in a decidedly unliberal fashion. They've called for speech restrictions, they've called for a central authority for our healthcare, they've called for the punishment of successful private companies. They describe my country in terms of class hatred, when the ideal is a classless system. They describe my country as empire-like, when the ideal is soveriegnty and self-determination. In short, liberals used to believe in freeing nations, but today they pine for dictatorship.
***
None of these people are evil. They're not bad people. They're just the groups who frustrate me. I speak arabic and find Islam fascinating. I'm a news junkie. Like those calling themselves liberals today, I'm all about righting injustices. It's just the means to an improved society that we disagree on.