Imagine a world with nuance and without hyperbole.

TMZ comes within a single word of committing journalism.

It's easy to forget that the news media once did actual reporting, and what it meant to a society when the "Fourth Estate" was a functional entity. Every once in a while you see a brief glimpse of it even today.

Truth-tellers and Liars

What an upside down world. Journalists are jailed for telling us the truth about our governments, and liars are paid big bucks to read propaganda off their teleprompters. Chelsea, Julian, and now Glenn all punished for revealing the crimes committed by those in power.

After last night's debate debacle, I decided to find out who this terrible journalist that CNN forced upon the nation was. Right at the top of a google search was this, even worse article from the WashPo.

Hope and Change

Part I: Hope

...but that was in another country; And besides, the wench is dead.
--Christopher Marlowe

The United States is the world's first liberal democracy, a product of the The Enlightenment. As such, the founders built it on the principles of unity, liberty, tolerance and equal rights. And they designed it to make policy based on factual knowledge and bathed in the light of reason. But, today, in the time of Trump, factual knowledge is getting clouded over in several ways.

Matt Taibbi's everywhere this month, especially over the past few days. As some reading this may remember (going back over a decade at "the other place"), I've been a huge fan of his for a long time. I was active in Boston political media, back in the early 80's, when his father, Mike, was a leading local newscaster there; and I met him (and worked countless times with his tv station's news staff) a few times, as well.