The strange mind of Al Gore..

TPMCafe:Gore on the Threat to American Democracy

on the face of it, seems to be reasoned speech on the value of the free press.

But there are subtle hints, here, that he thinks it is TOO free.

It would appear to the dispassionate reader that he lauds the 'net as allowing the citizen discourse on the issues of the moment... but then:

Noted: Gore's reference to 'fabricated' sources, is what got Rather busted.

So in context, while we cant dispute the paid actors or paid columnists... though we might differ on how really EFFECTIVE they were, it seems to be the thought that counts.

And, Schizo Al ignores the fact that the 'digital brownshirts' (hows THAT for cloaked invective!) seem to be, on the whole, nipping at Dubya's heels or outright biting at him for some of his current policy decisions!

- Cronyism for appointments to SCOTUS and FEMA

- Immigration Policy (or lack of it)

What rankles here is that Gore implies that criticism by either the press or citizen journalist/bloggers is dangerous... he lauds Tom Paine, now, but neglects to note that Paine was regarded by the "Blue-Colony" elite establishment, THEN, as seditious and fear-mongering. Sorta like a "Broadsheet Brownshirt", eh?

So which is it, Al... Is the 'net - which you godfathered {that part IS TRUE, BTW}- a force for good or evil? Or the voice of "We The People..", regardless of the political views expressed!

And you lament the 'scandalization' of the news.. are you saying that started lately... like say, ummmm, with Fox News?

I dont think it did... I think you are blowing smoke.

Yellow Journalism got it's moniker LONG before TV or even radio... and for that matter, existed before Tom Paine.
Of course, that's inconvenient for the point you are trying to make.

What I THINK is, that you are distressed that YOUR informed message isnt being accepted without quam by the idiots in the "Red States"

The clarity and focus, he neglects to mention, were clarity and focus on "reporting facts" later found to be NOT TRUE! So.... tell me again how that emotional disparagement of the supposed actions of a minority 'our finest hour'?!!!!

Are you SURE, AL?!!!!

And who WOULD those forces be... Google? Umm...look AGAIN, Al! They are bona fide "enlightened Liberals"! Or maybe you're concerned that they'll turn to the dark side.

Or are you pointing to advocacy of the UN taking control of Domain Name Services?

Fighting over America's control of the Internet

Since the UN already arbitrates rights to URL names.. such as "fatalbert" {which it awarded to Bill Cosby, against a squatter's claim} ... one has to wonder WHY it's important for the UN to have control over DNS.

Coould it be that it needs control over access to sites which dont follow "informed" speech or ideas?

So anyone who reads this, MIGHT just want to read that speech again.. and figure out for themselves just WHAT Gore advocates as a remedy.

To help you out, questionaires for journalism students and current journalists point to 85% identifying themselves as Democrat or Liberal.. and taking up journalism so as "to make a difference".

So I guess you'd have to wonder if Gore REALLY wants the press to be objective.. and report facts without bias.

 

Do a blog search and you'll find no shortage of those who think "Weird Al" refers to Gore, not Yankovic.... though the more mainstream conservative bloggers pass it off as just another sign he's off his rocker.

One who cant be labelled 'conservative' is Michael Barone of USNews

There seems to be no shortage of those Libs who've strived and failed in their agenda and who blame it all on 'digital brownshirts', Mary Mapes being the most laughable, according to those excerpts published and hooted at with glee.

Yes, Mary.. faxing distorts CHARACTERS by aliasing. But it doesnt MORPH them into a replica of a Microsoft font.

As one who had worked on typewriters and word processors back in the seventies, the first thing I did was to zoom on the PDF's and look at the vertical alignment of the characters on succeeding lines... they did not align and were obviously proportionally spaced. The upper and lower loops were distorted as one would expect from a fax fed top or bottom of page... but the horizontal scan is more high-def than the line advance and the curvature on the sides is relatively intact.

Since no mech mechanism - NOT EVEN an IBM composer- was able to make such slight changes from char-char/line-line, it was obviously a fake.

Those brought up addicted to Kool-Aid, however, will never give up.