Iranian Door Open a Crack?
The posting of Tuesday, January 24
included a piece from Stratfor.com which hinted at a possible rapprochement
with Iran. All listeners to Tuesday’s
State of the Union address will recall President Obama’s saying, “Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a
nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal,” but it should not be forgotten that he
continued his remarks by adding “but a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible, and far better,
and if Iran changes course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin the
community of nations.” This is the direction in which Friedman’s piece in our
last posting pointed, and his reasons for saying so should be noted. If you skipped over that posting, check it
out now. The door is open, even if no more than a crack. I get the feeling that there is something
going on which you won’t see on TV nor in the newspapers. But you may on this blog.
JL
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Reaction to the State of the
Union Message
I
received an Email from a friend who was elated after hearing the President’s
State of the Union Message, constrasting it to the un-statesmanlike utterances of
the aspirants for the Republican presidential nomination. I cautioned him to be less optimistic in the
following Email, reproduced below:
Many elections have been lost because candidates overestimated the
intelligence of the voters. Obama should carry all 50 states easily, but he
won't, and he may not even be re-elected. An enormous amount of education, and
debunking of the lies the Citizens United decision will allow to be broadcast
daily, must take place. You can start by trying to convince some of your
unenlightened neighbors that the President was not born in Kenya, is not merely
a mouthpiece for George Soros, is not a socialist, is not out to destroy the State of Israel and
that he is not a Muslim. Then you will get an idea of the problem at hand right
here and throughout the nation.
JL
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Ever write a "Letter to the Editor" of your local paper? It's a great way of voicing your opinion. The Florida campaign to re-elect Barack Obama makes it easy for you to do so and in view of the Republican primary here, suggests you give it a try. Just go to http://fl.barackobama.com/Write-a-Letter and you're on your way! And if you aren't interested in writing a letter in support of the President, the templates at the site can be used for any kind of letter you choose to write. The site automatically forwards your letter to the paper of your choice.
JL
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Reporters and Professors –
Makers of our Opinions?
I
frequently hear complaints from conservatives saying that the opinions of those
in the media and of academics should be taken with a grain of salt because
those groups are traditionally liberal and hence, are not giving conservatives
a fair shake. With this complaint in
mind, let’s look at how the media and the academic world approach things.
Professors
are supposed to be objective. That means
that they should take in viewpoints and ideas and look at them from a logical
viewpoint, adding up the facts, measuring the pros and cons, and come up with
empirical decisions, factually based and not prejudiced by previous opinions. Therefore, their conclusions based on facts
and logic should be taken seriously.
My
gut feeling is that conclusions drawn by academics are liberal 75% of the time. Some of this may be attributed to the
idea that academics must maintain a mindset open to new ideas and that in itself
is a liberal idea, but that does not mean that the other 25% of academics are any
less objective in reaching their conclusions. All it means is that one should not generalize
about academics and that there is room for disagreement as to whether they are
always liberal or not.
Similarly,
professional journalists, in print, video and internet media, should be
striving for objectivity in the same manner.
Bloggers and pseudo-journalists, and I admit that I am one of them,
often are not so objective and should be distinguished from real journalists,
and often ignored.
Achieving
objectivity is not an easy thing for a journalist since newspapers, television
networks and electronic media often have an agenda to promote, and it is
inevitable that such agendas hamper true objectivity to varying extents. There also are sponsors paying the bill for
media who must not be offended. Even
public radio and television find it difficult to always be objective since their
non-commercial nature is in itself a statement as to where it stands in our
otherwise commercial society.
Nevertheless,
most journalists at least try to be objective, even if their doing so is no
more than window dressing. Unfortunately, some are hopelessly opinionated and
that is why a Sean Hannitty on the right and a Rachel Maddow on the left cannot
be counted on to be objective, although each would stoutly maintain that they
are. But they are not. They spend too
much time “preaching to the choir.” Most
journalists, more so in print than on TV, nevertheless try to be, as Fox TV
claims it is, “fair and balanced.” The
very use of the word “balanced,” unfortunately, is a confession that what some
journalists produce is indeed prejudiced and needs to be “balanced.”
Sometimes
there is a marriage of the academic and the journalistic such as Princeton
professor and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. Many think he is opinionated. I am sure he feels that he is totally
objective. But so does another purported
academic (my prejudices have just sneaked through), Newt Gingrich, feel that he
is objective, basing his ideas on fact and logic. One should not be the judge of one’s own
objectivity.
By
and large, however, if I have to make a judgment call, I must conclude that the
opinion of an academic or a reporter is more likely to be based on facts and
the result of logical thinking than the opinion of someone who is not an
academic nor a reporter. And more often
than not, as I indicated above, academics end up on the liberal side of
political and economic arguments and this, I suppose, applies to reporters as
well. That’s why conservatives often
criticize the liberal media. But don’t
liberals similarly criticize Fox News?
Does
this mean that liberal answers are therefore the correct ones and that conservative
ones are not? Does it mean that
conservative answers are not based on facts and logic? Can the words “liberal” and “conservative” be
reversed in the preceding two questions?
The answer to questions like these has to be “Maybe” or “Maybe Not.” Think about this the next time you hear
someone screaming about the liberal media or the head-in-the-clouds academic
world, or the ideologues on Fox or MSNBC.
Learn the facts, if you can.
Apply some logic to them. Form
your own opinions. (Send them to me for
inclusion on Jack’s Potpourri.)
And
as an exercise in forming your own opinion, try to do so after reading the
following article.
Jack Lippman
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Facts
About the Keystone XL Pipeline – Form
Your Own Opinion
The
following, which can be read in its entirety at http://debatepedia.idebate.org/en/index.php/Debate:_Keystone_XL_US-Canada_oil_pipeline presents
two sides of the arguments regarding the Keystone XL Pipeline, which the
Administration is not authorizing at this point. Included are the Pro and Con arguments
concerning the Environment and Human Safety.
Check out the above site for still more information, including the
sources of this pro and con information.
Form your own opinion. Don’t
leave it to the reporters and academics.
Let us know and we will include it on Jack’s Potpourri.
JL
Environment: Is the
Keystone XL pipeline tolerable for the environment?
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Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears. If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by contacting me at Riart1@aol.com.
Also, be aware that www.Jackspotpourri.com is now available on your mobile devices in a modified, easy-to-read, format.
Our family
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as www.jackspotpourri.com.
Check all of them out, find out what “drek” really means and feel free to submit your thoughts and articles for publication on these sites, which, while still “under construction,” already contain some interesting content.
Jack Lippman
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