Quote:
Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA
I'd disagree in that what they give you is their slant - good, bad, indifferent - on what's happening in the world. And with a subtext of whatever they'd like you to think/believe about topic X.
Will you at least grant me that I'm current on topics at a rate ahead of the general population of 50% +1? Screw what my take on them is for this purpose, just that I'm aware of the existence of issues X, Y, Z? If not then you can ignore the rest of this because you kind of have to accept that stipulation for this point to work. If so, then let's carry on to the point.
How is it possible that I'm fairly aware of the issues at hand but can't tell you what magazine I read last? Or that I can't name a single magazine I read on a regular basis? The sheer number of sources available plus the incredible accessibility of information in today's multimedia not only means there's a lot out there but that there's also less brand awareness than probably ever before. Did I read article X on ajc.com, onlineathens.com, or latimes.com? Who the fuck knows, the content was largely the same regardless of the source. Did something come from The Heritage Foundation or The Cato Institute or The National Review? Hell if I know, once I've vetted the source to my own satisfaction then the specifics of where it came from matter only insofar as someone needs me to point them to a copy and a little Googling tends to turn that up.
The other thing that I'm starting to sense here is what I kidded RainMaker about earlier in the thread: a lack of confidence in one's own beliefs/thoughts/ideas.
I'm quite well behind the concept of taking relevant input into a situation -- i.e. give me everything you've got about the status of North Korea's governmental stability, weapons/military capability, detailed economic situation, cultural interpretations of various stimuli, etc, etc, and et al -- but at the end of the day, those inputs combined with what should be simple common sense to determine a course or courses of action concerning them. I don't doubt my ability to grasp whatever information is relevant to a given situation, I don't believe Palin does either (and I suspect that's a portion of her appeal as well), but sincerely believe that more often than not the general direction of what to do/where to aim is reasonably obvious & then it becomes a matter of tweaking those to fit as well as possible to at least move in the desired direction.
In short, it's not all brain surgery. Now ask yourself another question or two: How often does a voter find themselves thinking "damn, how stupid does a politician have to be to get ISSUE X wrong?". And how often is that same stupid politician carrying one or more degrees, three allegedly intellectual magazines in their briefcase, and a staff of speechwriters (and/or lobbyists) still needed to make them sound like they have even the slightest clue? Combine the correct answers to those questions & you'll see where the magazine flap is a non-issue for a lot of us.
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I know this wasn't to me, but let me chime in.
Yes, magazines/websites/MSM/whatever all give you news with a slant. It's up to you as an educated reader to take their bias into account when reading them and mentally "correct for it." The process of doing so is a key piece of being a critical thinker, and it's something that is a good thing for an elected official to have, the ability to manage multiple inputs and evaluate them and determine a course of action based on the sum of the parts rather than one part that is just "particularly shiny" or whatever.
I would grant that you are more educated and up on the issues than the majority of the population yes. And to be honest, I couldn't tell you what was the last article I read in a magazine either. Although I'd venture it would be "The Nation," and if you were asking about a newspaper it would be the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal. Just the fact that me (or you, or whoever) can rattle those off is enough though. I don't think Couric was going to come back and say "what article?" and start trying to hit her hard on that. She just wanted some creampuff "I read the New York Times over coffee on the plane or in the hotel every morning" type answer.
And I personally doubt Palin's ability to grasp whatever info is relevant to a particular situation. She's not exactly "educated" by most senses of the word. How long did it take her to finish college, community college no less (right?), after how many transfers, with a degree in communications? After which she went on to be a tv news anchor. Not exactly a job requiring intelligence and critical thinking. She quit her only real job requiring intellect and difficult decision-making halfway into it. Not a great track-record. She's yet to demonstrate the ability to grasp information relevant to particular situations on anything more than a surface level.
As far as your comments about "ISSUE X," this is where I think the disagreement comes in. Me personally, if I see an educated person come to a conclusion different than my own I don't immediately go "man that person is so stupid, their decision was wrong...how can intellectuals be so stupid!" I might disagree with it from a policy level, or believe that they didn't weigh all the factors correctly, but if they're reasonably well-educated then I am at least open to considering the possibility that they might in fact be smarter than me, or have access to more information than I have, or be considering additional follow-on actions, or factors that I didn't consider.