The Future of News and Opinion
January 31, 2006 | 0 Comments
The President’s State of the Union speech ended just a few minutes ago and already the blogosphere is a buzz deconstructing the speech and analyzing just about everything from who stood up during which point to the ramifications of what President Bush said. In many ways, the blogosphere has become the new delivery vehicle of information and opinion in this country.
Blogs have come a long way since the term was coined almost 7 years ago, when blogs were mostly an extension of one’s personal journal that the world was able to access. Today, blogs have moved to become more topical in nature–just look at the different categories for this years Bloggie Awards. There is a blog for people interested in celebrity gossip, cooking tips, and advertisements–there is even a blog about designing other blogs. But a vast number of blogs out in the some 26.8 million blogs on the internet have to do with news and politics. Technorati, a sort of clearing house for the blogosphere, lists five of the internet’s ten most popular blogs are political opinion in nature.
The political blog became mainstream in America during last year’s heated Presidential election. There were bloggers situated on both sides of the isle evaluating the other sides messages, stance on issues, and ratifying their own. Since then, the blogging world has moved from just being accepted to being embraced by traditional media outlets. NBC’s Dateline features a look at the blogosphere once a week, CNN’s The Situation Room has “internet reporters” who look at bloggers opinions daily, and Slate–an online news magazine owned by the Washington Post/Newsweek has a column called “The Daily Blog” that looks at just that–what the blogosphere is talking about.
Blogs are a way for people to freely deliver information and their opinions to the world–and for the world to respond to them. This open dialog between the reader and the author has never been seen before. Traditional outlets have “letters to the editor” but never has the dialog been conducted in a real time public forum. This free exchange does not come without it’s dangers–in this case the danger is slant.
The traditional media, whether it will admit it or not, contains a bias to either the left or the right. Each paper, magazine or network has it’s own slant either subtle or great. When it comes to the blogosphere, the slant is usually pretty large–and identifiable–thanks to being comprised of opinionated postings. While this is a danger, it is also a strength. Instead of trying to cover their slant under the disguise of fair journalism, blogs embrace it as their raison d’être. This is also, in a very round about way, holding the traditional media to a higher scrutiny. Because traditional outlets are now featuring blogs on their programs and in their pages, they are–for the most part–showcasing both sides of the isle–relating opinions from all vantage points.
The blog has redefined the op-ed piece and will continue to do so in the future. Traditional outlets, in looking at the blogosphere and featuring it’s contents, will in turn be holding themselves more accountable–pushing them toward a truly unbiased relating of the news. Who would have thought the blog could be so powerful?
Oil, Iran, and the Nuclear Future
January 21, 2006 | 0 Comments
The world is facing a huge problem in the coming months. Iran wants to pursue a nuclear program claiming it is to power their country. Considering how oil rich Iran is, the world stage sees through that claim and knows they want to pursue the technology for weaponry purposes. Ok, so what’s new? North Korea seems to pull this stunt every six months. Granted, Iran and North Korea are very similar. They both want to be players in the world market, show that they can do things true superpowers can, but they also want to hold the cards. You could call Iran and North Korea attention whores–but in a horribly terrifying way.The problem with the recent surge of nuclear demands on Iran’s part is that it has been simultaneous with anti-Israeli rhetoric. The new president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has said that he is skeptical that the holocaust happened, and that Israel should be “wiped off the map” and moved to someplace where people are more sympathetic to the Jewish cause, ie Europe or Canada. So needless to say an antisemitic Iran equipped with a nuclear bomb in firing range of Israel would be a huge problem–especially because Israel, also nuclear capable is of the sort to bomb first and ask questions later.
The chances of nuclear war escalating out of this situation are slim, but the there is another consequence to the current Iran situation–oil. Apparently 50% of the worlds oil passes through Iranian controlled ports, which means, if they wanted to, they could throw a huge wrench into the world oil market. Even though the USA doesn’t receive a single drop of Iranian oil, thanks to various trade embargoes, our price of oil will skyrocket if Iran were to slow down supply. Remember Hurricane Katrina, and the mass panic and fear that oil was going to be interrupted sending gas prices as high as $5 and $6 a gallon in some places? Yeah, we’d be looking at that again, or even worse. So you may be thinking that China and Russia wouldn’t stand for a huge cut in oil production and would step into intervene–or maybe Saudi Arabia would so as not to loose money on oil sales. Fact of the matter is no one seems to know what would happen. Russia buys oil from Iran under the table so maybe nothing would change. Fact of the matter is there are three things that need to happen in the next few months.
First, America has to address our dependency on foreign oil. This means calling the five big oil executives back to congress to testify, this time under oath. They are making money hand over foot thanks to high gas prices and congress should force them to start cutting into their prices to alleviate the price at the pump, and force them to start reinvesting some profits into alternative fuel production–we’ve got enough corn fields to produce ethanol until the cows come home, or what about hydrogen? If we force big oil to pay for the research we’ll have these technologies perfected and running safely in a few years.
Next, we need to open up oil drilling in ANWR, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Yeah, it’s a wildlife refuge in Alaska that is the ancestral home of two Indian populations. One of the two wants to allow drilling. So that makes one Indian tribe and a boat load of Democrats who constantly kill this bill in the Senate. ANWR drilling would produce one million barrels of oil a day. Granted, it isn’t much but that is one million fewer barrels we have to rely on from the seemingly endless supply of hostel oil rich countries.
The final thing we need to do is enact a regime change in Iran. Though, this time it can’t be done militarily. Iran is simply too large of a country to pull off a successful ground campaign. It would require taking all of the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan and calling up a boat load of others to pull it off successfully. This is not an option. We know it, Iran knows it, it just wont work. Even if it could, President Bush would never get congress to approve it. So you turn to the UN to place sanctions on Iran. Ok, even if Iran hadn’t recently moved all it’s money to untouchable Swiss accounts, we all know that UN sanctions are next to useless. Alright, so then how do we put pressure on Iran and remove Ahmadinejad from power? The answer lies in the successful fall of Communism fifteen years ago.
Communism fell throughout the world in just a few months because of educated students living in the Communist countries who wanted freedom from oppression. Supposedly there is a huge percentage of the Iranian population that desire the same freedoms though have yet to come forward and act upon it. In fact, we as a country have been waiting for the Iranian situation to solve itself in this way since the Clinton administration. Well, it is now more apparent then ever that the time for a social uprising and potential coup is now. With the inspiration from a few special forces units and CIA agents, the right people in Iran can be convinced that it’s time to act. The way to a safer Iran is through it’s own people. We learned this with the fall of Communism and frankly we are relearning it in Iraq. We just need to light a fire under the Iranian people and get them started.
2005: A Retrospective, or something
December 29, 2005 | 0 Comments
The year is drawing to a close and while this means many things, it also means lists of all different sorts. From the Top Ten Failed Tech Trends of 2005 to the Top Ten Grossing Films of 2005 to the Top Ten Junk Emails of 2005 to the Top Ten Sexy Geeks of 2005 which I unfortunately was left out of. While these lists try to nicely encapsulate 2005 into little categories, I think it takes a broader look at the years huge–and I do mean huge, as in colossal, giant, just plain ole big–news stories to see just how crazy 2005 was. So here we go, a look back at 2005 from the eyes of Mindless Chatter.
While the histories books have yet to be written, no one is going to be able to think of 2005 without thinking of Hurricane Katrina. In terms of shear devastation, there hasn’t been a storm to hit America that is quite like Katrina. One of the fiercest storms in recorded history, Katrina killed thousands of people and left New Orleans under water for over a month. Rebuilding is going to take years and the population of the region will never be the same. Katrina also brought racial and economical issues back into the forefront of American politics and because of this the total effect of Hurricane Katrina will not be felt for years to come.
Terrorism was in the news again this year with the horrific train bombings in London. Coordinated attacks went off on three London subway trains and a bus within thirty minutes of each other. London, however, turned the tide and released video footage of the bombers which lead on a swift investigation leading with arrests of other terrorists living and potentially operating in London.
The Supreme Court saw huge changes this year with the resignation of Sandra Day O’Connor and the death of William Rehnquist. John Roberts, first named to replace O’Connor, was then nominated, confirmed, and sworn in as the 17th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Alito has been nominated for O’Connor’s seat and confirmation hears have been set for early 2006.
Perhaps the biggest story of the last thirty years or so from a religious standpoint was the passing of Pope John Paul II and the Conclave that followed. After four elections, Joseph Ratzinger of Germany was elected the new Pope of the Catholic Church.
For a good portion of the year Nattalee Holloway dominated the news. First it was the story of her disappearance, then of the suspects, and eventually the ineptitude of the Aruban government. While all this coverage is just a little ridiculous, the tragedy of it all is that this girl was probably raped, killed, and dumped in the ocean and a few teenagers are going to essentially get away with the perfect crime.
In the legal world there was the Scott Peterson trial, the crazy ass “Runaway Bride” and of course, the lovable petifile Michael Jackson. Thats right folks, Jacko was acquitted of molesting that boy. There isn’t really much more to say about that case.
While I’m pretty much over writing this article as it became quite boring and I’m sure it’s quite boring to read, I’m going to wrap it up by saying that Iraq held three elections this year. Three. Incredible. Here is to 2006 and what the news will bring us in the coming 365 days. Perhaps I should start campaigning for next years Sexiest Geeks list.
Done.
Supreme Showdown
July 2, 2005 | 0 Comments
Here we go. The fight of the decade is about to get started, and no it has nothing to do with Iraq. Today, Sandra Day O’Connor–the first female appointed to the Supreme Court–announced her retirement after 24 years of service. Shortly there after, the gloves came off.
For a while now both sides of the political isle have been preparing and making threats about what will happen once a vacancy was made in the high court. Now that the time has come, the rhetoric has gotten worse. Seemingly minutes after Justice O’Connor announced her retirement Senate Democrats, led by Ted Kennedy, came out with a statement demanding a moderate nominee. The White House announced no name would be released for at least a week though, a short list is no doubt already in place.
Whoever receives the nomination, however, is no doubt about to face the fight of their lives. Senate approval is required and if you thought the filibuster and so called ‘nuclear option’ talk of a few months ago was bad, just wait–it’s all about to come back. Dems will threaten to filibuster to hold the vote, Republicans will threaten the nuclear option to push the vote. Hopefully this will all be settled before the court begins its next session in October–though it probably won’t.
Whoever comes to replace O’Connor will hopefully bring some common sense back to the court. Lately the rulings handed down from the Supreme Court have been questionable at best. Two opinions referring to displaying the Ten Commandments were rendering practically contradicting each other. In one opinion the Commandments were allowed to be shown in front of a Texas statehouse, in the other it was not allowed to be shown in a Kansas courtroom. Another opinion, which is perhaps the most ludicrous in the past few years, sates that local governments can take private property and give it to another private owner so long as the new owner can build something on the property that generates more tax revenue–i.e. take your house and build a strip mall. Is this fair? No. Does it make sense? No. Has the court lost its mind? It is highly likely.
Part of this has to do with the fact that Supreme Court Justices serve for life. Perhaps term limits are a good idea to bring new blood and fresh ideas to the court. But that will be a debate for another day. For now, Sandra Day O’Connor’s seat is on the table and that is really all that matters.
Florida’s Proposed Amendments
October 22, 2004 | 0 Comments
This post was written by guest author, Shannon.
Disclaimer: I did not write or compile this information. I merely received it in an email and therefore, I cannot vouch for its accuracy. However, from what I can tell, it seems to be a very unbiased compilation of information regarding Florida’s proposed amendments.
AMENDMENT 1
Official Title: Parental Notification of a Minor’s Termination of Pregnancy
Official Ballot Language: Proposing an amendment to the State Constitution to authorize the Legislature to require by general law for notification to a parent or guardian of a minor before the termination of the minor’s pregnancy. The amendment provides that the Legislature shall not limit or deny the privacy rights guaranteed to minors under the United States Supreme Court. The Legislature shall provide exceptions to such requirement for notification and shall create a process for judicial waiver of the requirement for notification.
Amendment Type: Legislative
Sponsor: Florida Legislature
Proponents: Florida Right to Life Committee
Proponents’ point of view: Proponents argue that it is critical for parents to be involved in helping their daughters make important decisions when pregnant and that parents should know when their daughters undergo surgery. Based on evidence from other states, proponents believe teenage abortion rates will go down if this is passed.
Opponents: Planned Parenthood and ACLU
Opponents’ point of view: The proposed amendment will limit the fundamental right to privacy. They believe notification laws postpone medical care and increase risk to patients. In addition, the opponents believe the ballot language is misleading to voters.
Your Vote: If you support this issue being added to the Florida Constitution as an amendment, vote yes. If you would like to keep this out of Florida’s Constitution, vote no.