Punditry

Sometimes in the morning I'll switch back and forth between CNN and FOXNEWS while I'm getting ready for work. The differences between the two are pretty funny, but the similarities disturb me.

For example, this morning at 6:30 CNN was running another attack story on Sarah Palin. I feel like Palin is a complicated issue - she comes across way too naive to me, and perhaps not knowledgeable enough, for politics, and it's pretty easy to take advantage of that. I'm not saying that she's an innocent victim, but I think that a lot of what she's said or actions that she's taken have been taken a few steps out of context by CNN. Here are my feelings about Palin: if she's honestly not qualified for politics, then fine - leave her *alone* and shut her out of your political coverage, and that'll do more than any attack story (without being so personally vicious) to ensure that she doesn't bring her naivete into a forum where she's impacting everyone's lives.

FOXNEWS, meanwhile, was running a story about how damn annoying it is that Obama has been in the news, and on entertainment shows, pretty much non-stop since being elected. He's been laughing about the economic situation (to try and "reassure" Americans) but he's starting to come off blase, according to them. Of course, there's always the argument that Obama is trying to make the public feel like they're connected with the person / administration that is making all sorts of momentous decisions about our MONEY and what's going to HAPPEN with it over the next few DECADES. If someone is going to be spending a large part of my paychecks for me, then yeah, I damn well wanna feel comfortable and familiar with the guy. I'm not sure that I AM entirely comfortable with Obama, but I think it's a cheap shot to criticize him for making so many TV appearances.

So I felt like both stories were pretty worthless, in terms of adding substance to my life. I can do without the character attacks on both sides. It was kind of funny to see both sides bending over backwards to vilify the other.

Here's what bothers me: when I turn on a news channel, particularly a news channel - I want to SEE THE NEWS!! Hello? I want updates on Iraq. I want to know how many people died where, and how, and what progress we're making. I want to know the political situation over there. Did you know that they had wildly successful elections several weeks ago? I want to know how the political transition is going. I want to know what new members have been installed in which provinces, and how they're relating to the public.

I want to KNOW about the economy. I want to hear about the stock market. I want updates on every single piece of legislation that's been passed recently, and every single piece of policy. Did you know that they recently introduced policy or legislation (I'm not sure which) to basically just CREATE more money, dump it into the economy, and hope that stimulates spending without causing hyperinflation. That could cause MASSIVE damage economically, or if the fed is careful to cut off the money supply at just the right time, it could actually do a lot of good. But - either way, I want to know what's going on.

I honestly don't care if both channels want to be completely partisan in their approaches. If FOXNEWS wants to only cover the good news from Iraq, and CNN the bad, and CNN only the good economic news, and FOXNEWS the bad - that's honestly fine with me. If I can look at both sides and hear intelligent arguments on their perspectives, then fine - I can look at both channels and make up my own mind. But for goodness sake, I want to see substance coming from both. What bothered me most about the Palin/Obama stories was that neither one DIRECTLY related to ANY of the major news happening in the world. Neither one talked about policy, or perspective, or policy makers, or really much of anything.

That bothers me. How hard is it supposed to be to find out about what's really happening....?

End rant.

OW!

I got a tetanus shot yesterday and now my left arm fugghin hurts. I remember getting them as a kid and being a bit stiff but nothing like this.

I know, kind of a crappy update after not writing anything for a long time.

Not much is new, I suppose. Work and school continue to go on. I'm starting to second guess whether or not I should really take a class over the summer. On one hand, I really want to finish the degree as quickly as possible, and don't have much interest in stretching out the process even longer. (It's already going to take me at least 3 1/3 years). On the other hand, I'm getting really burned out and given that I'll have a number of other things to juggle this summer I'm not sure it's a great idea. Thankfully I have awhile to decide.

There's also the fact that I kind of want to switch careers...not yet, but in a few years. I think I'd really like to be a teacher or counselor. I want to do something where I work with people, and do something slightly different every day. I find my classes really interesting now, so that's good, but if I'm honestly planning on switching then it's kind of pointless to keep working on a degree toward the current one instead of a degree toward the future one. Taking different classes would cost more, though (more than I really have to spare at the moment) and would also commit me to the switch. I'm not sure that I'm ready for that commitment. I love my job now, it's just not something I see myself doing forever.

Ahh there's so much to do in life!! How to do everything?