Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

We Report You Decide

I have not done well with my bog the past few days. Even when I'm tired in the evening I try and write something but this week I've been in something of a slump.

We report, you decide

One of the tenants of todays Journal is exemplified in the Fox News Motto. However, I’m not sure that it should end there. I think journalism should go beyond the facts and more into the analysis of the facts. The reason I believe this is that most readers and listeners are not trained analysts and tend to latch onto whatever course of action that springs most readily to mind. I’m not trying to insult the intelligence of the average American but rather expressing what I have learned over a lifetime and continue to see evidenced from day to day.

My wife and I were discussing this on our way home from Stephen’s Point today. I bought two ten foot lengths of PCV pipe and asked the clerk to cut each one into four pieces of equal length. This clerk seemed together enough however, I could see he was struggling once he measured the length of one of them. I am not happy to report that the lengths of the four pieces varied by as much as six inches. For the second piece I talked him through the process as tactfully as I could.

In response my wife related to me something she had seen on TV. There is a journalist who goes out and interviews people on the street and gets some amazing responses. I believe it was the same guy (Jesse Watters?) who asked the question, “What do you prefer, Obama Care or the Affordable Healthcare Act.?” It was a trick question because both are the same thing, however the humor was in the distinction made by those being interviewed.

Anyway Watters went to a Miley Cyrus concert with some placards of famous people and asked some of those attending who the person was. One was VP Biden. The other was John Kerry.

One girl didn’t know who the VP was and speculated he might be a used care salesman. Another couldn’t identify the Secretary of State. When prompted with ”… he comes from Massachusetts…,” she replied “John Kennedy… “ then another girl walked up and said, “I know who that is… its Al Gore.”

The point of citing these examples is to reincorce the contention ;made above.