Good News? Bad News?

A while back, I went on a tear about Fox News and just how bad they are at actually delivering news, and how people who listen to them need to hold themselves accountable. Since then, I think someone defriended me on FaceBook for the note. I suppose I had one too many friend. Fox is part of a right wing media conglomerate controlled by Rupert Murdoch, where his goal is to control the message, and thereby have a strong say in our government. And he’s very successful through truly deceitful means. Even the name of the conglomerate is deceitful- News Corp. It’s not. It’s lies with a bit of truth sprinkled in to help people suspend disbelief about the lies. He’s not the first to do it, but seemingly he’s the most effective. Let’s take a moment to pay tribute to the master, however, William Randolph Hearst, the newspaper magnate.

Is there a good honest news source? My preferred news sources these days are as follows:

Google News

This is perhaps the most popular news aggregator there is. Google doesn’t actually do any of the reporting but just groups together related stories, and I can compare points of view based on the source of the story. Say, Fox versus The Guardian.

National Public Radio

NPR remains a strong source of news with stories that one can listen to on the radio that are more than just sound bites. They have in depth interviews with key political players as well as scientists. I have always found their business reporting to be somewhat limiting. This leads to a more controversial preference.

The Wall Street Journal

The Journal is the paper of record for business news, even though they are part of News Corp. It is rare that you read a retraction on a story that matters (I can’t remember one, actually). But they are a relatively recent addition to the conglomerate, and so the impact has been limited to what stories they choose to report, headlines, and their editorial staff. Hosting a shady character like Karl Rove immediately disqualifies what was already a colored view, even prior to the takeover.

Note that nowhere in my list are any of the major television networks. That’s largely due to several factors:

I live outside the United States and so my access to network programming is somewhat limited;
Their stories tend to be short and lack depth, except for news magazines, which I don’t have access to.

Take the OfCourseImRight Poll:

Loading ...

More lies from the lying liars who tell them

Some time ago, now Senator Al Franken wrote a book called Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them. I read the book, and found it to be a lousy read as petty, spiteful, and true. You may not agree with his politics or his style, but the one thing you can say about Senator Franken is that he has always valued the truth. On the other hand, I don’t know why anyone actually believes Fox News at all. Because they and their chief liar Bill O’Reilly are at it again! This time, it’s a railroad job against Senator Coburn, who had the audacity to call my Congresswoman, Nancy Pelosi, a nice lady, and who said, when talking abut the insane notion of putting people in prison for buying insurance, that “The intention is not to put anybody in jail. That makes for good TV news on FOX but that isn’t the intention.”

Bill O’Reilly can’t have that, so he claimed, “We researched on Fox News if anybody had ever said you’re going to jail if you don’t buy health insurance. Nobody’s ever said it.” Guess what? The New York Times did some investigating and found at least six instances where someone on Fox News did say it.

When reporter at the New York Times was caught some months ago for plagiarizing, he was forced to resign and the entire newspaper was shamed. Not so for Fox when they just make stuff up, as apparently they have no shame! And so I think they deserve a new name: The Republican Liars Network (RCN). Not all Republicans are liars, and not all liars are Republicans, but those who choose to believe what they know to be lies, aren’t much better than the liars themselves, especially when they act on that information in the voting booth.

All I can ask is please, Senator Franken, don’t update your book. There’s just too much material.

Remembered: Jaime Escalante and the Public Schools of California

CNN reported the death of legendary teacher Jaime Escalante on Tuesday. Escalante was a mathematics teacher in East Los Angeles. He was made famous only in part by his wondrous ways with students, but also by the sheer disbelief that the state and district had that any teacher could helped students in that district score well in math. He was then immortalized in the movie Stand and Deliver, starring Edward James Olmos.

We need more teachers like him, and we need more people to believe that there can be teachers like him. The so-called “No Child Left Behind” Act, is leaving all children behind, and desperately needs to be reformed. Perhaps one thing we could do is pay for more teachers’ educations in exchange for several years of service. Perhaps another thing we can do is fund schools properly. It’s a particularly serious problem in California, with no easy answer. Here is a well written article that explains how the local tax base cannot even take matters into their own hands unless they expend a WHOLE LOT. Not that it would help East LA, mind you. Perhaps this obituary should be for the California public school system.

Airlines’ motto: Squeeze now, apologize later

Who’s getting squeezed? Of course we all are. with additional costs for everything, including seat assignments, baggage, and (Heaven help you) change fees, airlines are making money again, on our backs. One might think there would be an easier way to do this, like simply increasing fees, but for whatever reasons, it’s not the case. Southwest has always been on the forefront of charging for this or for that. It’s latest adventure into charging people who seem too large seems to have gone awry, thanks to the light shown on this policy by Hollywood director Kevin Smith. A spokesman told CNN, “We want to assure everyone that has expressed concern over the situation that we will use this experience in our customer service program when training our employees on the correct way to apply the policy.”

This discussion isn’t about the size of individuals, or even Southwest’s policy on large people. It’s about the fact that they were able to impose a policy, which until this point hasn’t really given them much grief. And why not? Many people agree with the policy in principle: you take up more than one seat and you should pay for it. The problem is, of course, in how the policy was implemented, and this is often the case. Often the result of poor training, contracting of services, or just underpaid staff, passengers are subjected to policy fabrications. A classic case that we have suffered is whether our FAA-certified car seat can go on board a passenger plane. What often happens is that it is allowed in one direction, and then we have to argue for it to be allowed in the return direction. Worse was when we were in Newark Airport and were told by a staff member that we would not be allowed to rebook our flight when a security incident occurred, even though Continental Airlines had stated on its web site that we could.

And so what do the airlines do after such events? They apologize. They ask for our forgiveness. I would gladly give them that forgiveness, were it not for the fact that forgiving often doesn’t go both ways. If I need to make a change to my flight will they forgive me? If my daughter is ill and we need to reschedule our trip, will they forgive me? Of course not.

The underlying problem is that individual consumers have very little buying power. Even large corporations get very little say in how airlines treat them. With market entry costs in the tens of billions of dollars for an airline, consumer protection laws are needed to keep airlines honest. Kevin Smith should be compensated for the poor service he received. So should people who are less visible, who are not Hollywood directors. America really needs the same sort of protections that the European Commission implemented in 2005.

Airlines may argue that such regulation hampers their ability to offer tailored services, or that it is simply too costly. It’s difficult to quantify the impact of such legislation as well, because airlines airline statistics in Europe are not easily available. Still there is a moral need to address the problem. Agree? Disagree?

Loading ...

Saddle Up, Boys: Iran is Next

It seems to me that back in the 1940s when the U.N. Security Council was formed, its purpose was for governments to work out differences before one decided to take unilateral action. This seems to have never worked well, our latest example being the disingenuous Chinese who feign interest in diplomacy with Iran, when it has become perfectly obvious to even the most casual observer that Iran will not give up their pursuit of nuclear weapons.

But is it the Security Council that is failing, or is it just the way we deal with it? When the same block of characters (and we can expect Russia to join in the obstructionism) constantly put commercial interests in front of greater protection of societies, perhaps the best way to deal with them is to ignore them and proceed blockades, sanctions, and limited military actions, as may be appropriate. The lawless government of Iran must be checked with first the real threat of such actions, and then actual, well, actions that support principles long mouthed by all, and practiced by few. Is this cowboy diplomacy? You bet your sixshooter, but it’s not like any other options are being presented by our so-called partners in peace.

It’s time to take on not only Iran, but clear misbehavior on the part of those who sit in the Security Council.