Wiston Papers

My Two Cents Worth

In today’s Washington Post, columnist Walter Pincus argues that it is almost impossible for U.S. voters to sort through what he describes as false and misleading foreign policy and defense issues tossed around by presidential candidates.

There is an assumption in this article that we Americans are passive consumers of news and information.  That we are spoon fed analysis of such policy proposals and initiatives.   And that we are easily bamboozled.

    Whatever happened to the maxim  "Do it yourself?"

    In this day of ubiquitous digital sources of information,  websites for any number of government agencies, NGOs, and think tanks,  Americans have no excuse for befuddlement and confusion.

Is Mr. Pincus privy to information unavailable to the rest of us?   As a columnist he certainly knows some key individuals who could steer him in a certain direction.     

But I can—with a little more effort—do the same thing by asking a few key questions on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.  The information is out there...and someone will get back to me with it.  I just have to evaluate it for myself.

We who are interested can just do some hard work to find what we need.    The rest of us  can just accept what Mr. Pincus labels “distortion.”  But isn’t that our choice?

POTPOURRI:

1--A headline from today’s New York Times:  “Tasers Pose Risks to Heart, a Study Warns.”

You think?

2--A headline from the Washington Post:  “Romney: I would have ordered Osama Bin Laden raid”

Any president would have. That's obvious. The only debate would have been when and how.   This really is a non-issue. Please, let's move on.  

Steve Coon 

May 01, 2012