Journalists may learn to be unbiased yet...

Hallelujah! Tom Brokaw actually gave equal interviews to Bush and Kerry tonight on Dateline. He really pressed both of them to step up and really answer the hard questions we all want to know. Neither candidate was given an edge over the other. Perhaps the big news about unbiased journalism is really getting into some people's heads. Perhaps we can have more of the same no matter who becomes or runs for president. It's a hopeful thought anyway.

Truth and fiction are so often the same thing...

I am a big fan of J.R.R. Tolkien's middle earth stories. When I read the news that a new species of human was found in Indonesia that was similar to his hobbit descriptions, I was very excited. Just think, humans that adapted to jungle life by becoming as small as a 3 year old. How cool is that? I'm sure Tolkien wasn't a prophet, or was he? Anyway, he seemed to get this one right.

Compare that with the other big news in science. The revelations of Saturn's moon, Titan, seem so similar to me to Arthur C. Clarke's Space Oddesy description of Jupiter's moon, Europa. An icy planet with the right formulas for life. Wow! Of course, for those of you familiar with his books, he uncannily fortold many interesting things that have happened or been discovered in space. How weird is that?

Good writers help the common man discover more about the world, life, and himself. Sometimes, not even the writer realizes how well he does that. I wonder what we'll discover next?

America is a democracy, not a dictatorship...

It's six days until election, and in some ways I've become more undecided than ever. All the noise and mud slinging back and forth and issues strewed way out of proportion. It's really obnoxious.

What really irritates me the most, is how much everyone is making of the presidential race. Yes, it is important to have a president with common sense, good values, and all that. What's more important though is to know and vote for good state and county representatives. These are the people that represent you and what you stand for. These are the people that make our democracy, a democracy. It doesn't matter squat what the president's plans are for health care, Iraq, or any number of things if congress and the house doesn't approve it. And, for all those little things in your life, many are state laws which are dictated by the govenor and the county representatives.

So please, those few of you who read this, vote on November 2nd. Your vote DOES count, especially when you vote for not only a worthy president, but good local representatives as well.

Everything I need to know I learn from Google

I'm not the type of person who likes a lot of fluff. I like simplicity and honesty. What's the point of beauty without substance? When I'm searching the internet (or anything else) the last thing I want is to go through tons of pretty pages, and not find the answers I want.

Enter Google, stage right. Now, if Google were just a search engine in itself, I would be pretty happy. Here is a simple page with no banner or pop up ads, just a great easy tool to find what I need in the vast internet space. But Google is more than that... Google has a mission. The founders didn't start in it for money. They didn't go out to monopolize the computer industry and make everything fit for them. They wanted to be a useful part of someone else's business. All they wanted was a simple way to bring the world's information to the average person.

The great thing is that Google keeps trying to make that information easier to find. Just having a powerful search engine wasn't enough. There are tools to find books, define words, locate places, and more within the search engine. Then, to add to the simplicity Google provides a web browsing tool bar to BLOCK popup ads. They create a separate news area, that searches the world's news without bias. They provide an email service that doesn't annoy with banner ads or spam and is fully searchable. Of course their blogger is simple, yet powerful as well. There's even a catalog searching area. Now, they are adding a computer desktop to easily search your files. What will they do next?

Not only are these programs powerful, yet simple; have relevant ads, yet free from obnoxiousness, they also play well with most programs and are working on others. There's no bias or monopolizing like so many big companies do today. Just a mission to bring the world to everyone. So for that, I thank you, Google. Don't ever lower your standards. You are my computer hero.

Does racial profiling equal bigotry?

This morning I read in the news that the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) is suing the FBI for questioning Muslims and Arabs about terrorist activity and for researching Muslim life by visiting mosques, etc.

Before I go any further, let me be the first to say that the joy of living in America is that anyone (no matter ethnicity, religion, or creed) is welcome. Being American means that we embrace diversity. I am so glad we have that freedom here. I also believe that, in its infancy, the ACLU was a very important part of giving that freedom to Black Americans who deserve it as much as anyone else in this country. I'm proud to be an American, and I'm proud to have friends of other cultures and belief systems.

However, because I'm proud to be an American, I want to see my country and my freedoms protected. So, let's make some observations. Out of the terrorist attacks we've seen to our country (and to others), what percentage of them were Muslim or Middle Eastern? Who is currently making threats to our country (and to others)? The FBI has done what any good detective does. They aren't accusing anyone or forcing anyone to involuntary interrogation. They're just investigating where their clues lead to protect ALL Americans, including law abiding Muslim Americans.

Let's say I observe a hit and run one day on the road. Since it happened so fast, I obviously don't know exactly who did it. I didn't even get the license plate number, but I did see that it was a Georgia plate (no offense to Georgians) and that it was a green SUV. When I give my report to the police, should they not use my information to their advantage? What if they said, "We don't want to be prejudiced, so we're going to stop every car we see that looks damaged." Or perhaps, "We can't be prejudiced, so unfortunately we can't find the person who did it." No! They're going to look for a green SUV with Georgia plates. Duh!

Not every Georgia driver with a green SUV drives recklessly. It would be ridiculous to think so, and it's ridiculous to think every Muslim is a terrorist. But, for that day every Georgian driving a green SUV might be slightly investigated. No infrigment of rights, just some questions and observations. And so, unfortunately we find ourselves in a world where we must observe a certain profile of people more closely. Is that bigotry? I don't think so. Just common sense in a bad, bad world.

It's unfortunate that a few bad people can make a bad mark on so many other great people. For that, I am sorry.

People are only biased when they're against you...

Several months ago I saw a bumper sticker which read, "Mass Media Produces Ignorance." In this election year I find that to be more true than ever. This candidate says this, and the other candidate says that, and the media reports what it will.... I enjoyed watching the presidential debates, but I found it interesting that afterward, the commentary on what each person said took as long as the debate itself. Now, if I just watched each candidate for myself, why do I need someone else to tell me what they said and more than that, what they ment? (I must give NBC credit this time for including a small fact check segment after the last debate. It was totally unbiased and actually shed some truth on the candidates.)

Now perhaps it is just me, or the specific news clips I have happened to hear, but it seems to me that recently I hear much more of what Kerry blames Bush for not doing with a small rebuttal from Bush. However, the one time a certain media group shows a segment on the faults of Kerry, everyone jumps on them for being biased.

Here's a thought: why can't we be really unbiased and talk about the independant candidates as well. Could they perhaps be a part of the presidential debate? Does one really need to be a Democrat or a Republican to be president?

Let's not be mindless drones and let the media do our thinking for us. I'm not anti media. Journalism has an important place in society to inform. It's like a library of current events, but a library that should be totally nonfiction, without opionion. Opinion has a place as well, just not in the news...

Welcome to My Little Corner

Well, I've been thinking about publishing my thoughts for a long time. so now I'm finally getting around to it. We'll see how well I keep up with it...