Jon Stewart on the Factor

I watched Bill O'Reilly interview Jon Stewart. A couple of things struck me. Yes, Stewart's intelligent. Second, he and O'Reilly seem to enjoy each other. But third, and this is the one that annoys me, Stewart's assertion that FOX "sells the clearest narrative" and laughs that FOX calls itself a "news organization" annoys me. He marvels that FOX has managed to "mainstream Conservative radio."

Stewart maintains that because there's opinion on FOX that it must not be a news organization. Is he not aware that the line-up on MSNBC now features at least three ranting liberals in their respective shows? It must only be a "narrative" when you don't agree with it. I wonder if it's occurred to Jon Stewart that the reason most Americans trust FOX is because FOX bothers to give the back story on most of their coverage? Does it occur to him that for years Americans have been given only what left-leaning journalists want us to know? Has it occurred to him that Americans want more to the story than just what happened ten minutes ago and might want meat with their milk?

A friend called after spending two hours sitting in an auto shop's waiting room. FOX played on the shop's TV. She said she'd never watched it before and was shocked because it was the most thorough news coverage she'd seen. This was a week or so before the Scott Brown won the Massachusetts Senate seat vacated by Ted Kennedy. The point is, my friend learned what I learned a couple of years ago: FOX news is in the business of educating viewers about what's going on. Guess that's a good "narrative."

When there's something going on in the world that requires attention, right now only FOX can be trusted to tell the story. Once I started watching FOX, I developed a more thorough understanding of the news. After 25 years of watching the news and reading the paper, it took FOX news to bring it together for me. Clearly, I'm not alone. Yes, there are most definitely opinion shows, but if you can't tell the difference between Glenn Beck and Shepard Smith, you must be a liberal.

More than anything, I'm worn out with the attitude that anything that doesn't jibe with left-leaning sentiments is less than.

Watching the "News"

A couple of questions:

If the majority of Americans turn to FOX news, not ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, or CNN for their news, why are the latter referred to as the "mainstream media?"

How disappointing is it that the aforementioned "mainstream media" networks lean so far to the Left that when a news organization (FOX) sits in the middle, they appear to be on the Right?

Troubled

Today I am troubled. I am troubled by the nastiness I see in the papers, in the news, and in the world around me. The constant insistence of the Left that anyone who doesn't agree completely with Obama is a racist wears thin. It seems to me that calling someone a racist is losing it's meaning. It's crying wolf. "Racist!" or "racism" used to stop people from continuing with their arguments. Now it's merely the first step in the debate. It's become the first response from the liberals.

"Racist!" Whew. Finally. Hope you got that out of your system. Maybe now we have have a discussion about policies.

There was an op-ed in the local paper today that torqued my jaw. The writer concerned himself with pointing out the instances of racism he'd seen and the bigotry he'd witnessed. Nevermind he called Tea Party Patriots that foul, lewd name Anderson Cooper coined for them. So while this writer is professing his moral superiority, he's calling the Right names. Classy. Really, this just confirms my hypothesis that those who are engaged in the business of calling dissenters "racists" are actually the ones with the prejudice problem.

This afternoon I sat down with my Bible. Prayer bubbled from my lips and my heart begged God to open our eyes and our ears and our hearts to him so that we might see each other through him. God is the only one who can unite us. Whether we choose to allow him to work through us is another thing all together.