"Nobody uses the word lie anymore,” producer Aaron
Sorkin said. “Suddenly, everything is 'a difference of opinion.' I don't
believe the truth always lies in the middle. I don't believe there are two
sides to every argument. I think the facts are the center. And watching the
news abandon the facts in favor of ‘fairness’ is what’s troubling to me.”
If lying about facts were a capital crime in journalism, the
halls of Fox News would be festooned with funeral wreaths. Of course, the
audience for Fox News doesn't want news, or even facts. They want only to be
told that whatever ugly nonsense they and their dim-witted great-grandparents
believed is true, and nothing else. Tea Baggers and their kin are accustomed to
functioning without facts. When they are confronted by the evidence that they
don't have any facts, they get that same look Wile E. Coyote has when he
confidently steps off the cliff into thin air.
When those nasty, dangerous verified facts are in play, 21st century Republicans are satisfied just to make a lot of noise in hopes of drowning them out.
It is not facts that the American people lack today. They
have them literally in the palm of their hand. It is critical thinking skills.
They’re also steeped in a corporate-dominated, religiously
bamboozled culture that ignores both facts AND critical thought anytime they
are inconvenient to the bottom line or the prevailing dogma.
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