and informative. And I believe they have fallen down recently on that."
---Samuel Dash (chief counsel for the Senate Watergate committee)
When Walter Cronkite relayed the news to us, he relayed the news...not his opinions. Although his emotions were sometimes clearly portrayed on his face, his words were always factual and his content always unbiased. When we wanted entertainment we watched Carol Burnett, when we wanted opinion we asked our friends, but when we wanted truth we turned to the newscasters.
The news-media today has lost its way just as surely as the politicians that it follows. These people, who were once the conscience of America have turned into a group of exhibitionists, looking for the "big story" rather than the truth. Several weeks ago I read a passing story about another explosion set off in North Korea, but every media outlet focused instead on Melania's choice of heels when visiting a flooded Houston.
This profession that held our hands during the assassination of JFK and then helped us to share his dream as we walked the moon in 1969, now spend their time focused on the size of our president's hands and his ridiculous night time tweets. They continually print pictures of him that should have been deleted, while they focus on the worst parts of each of his speeches. It is true that it is their job to hold politicians accountable, but whose job is it to hold them accountable
I actually don't need the media to highlight all of the president's missteps. I am much more interested in reading about the policies he plans to follow, and the policies that I believe in and he plans to dismantle. It has always been the responsibility of the press to dig deeply enough into our politician's motives to find the truth behind the facade. Now it seems that the facade is all we get to see.
I want to turn on my nightly news and see the likes of Huntley, Brinkley and Cronkite. I want to feel secure in the knowledge that what they tell me is 100% factual, and that their bias will never color the news that they are relaying. We are losing too much with the infighting of our senators and representatives and a president whose lack of political savvy is a detriment to his ability to lead. It would be a tragedy of we add a strong and unbiased press to the list of things we lost in the 2016 election.
Between the political in-fighting and the threats from other countries, the news is often frightening, and Brad Thor brings terrorism front and center in his novel, Use of Force: A Thriller (The Scot Harvath Series Book 17). The body of a well known terrorist washes up on shore, and panic sets in as the CIA tries to figure out what he was doing here. This book made me as nervous as the real news often does.
As always, a complete review will follow this blog.
Happy reading,
- Beverly