Titanic Post

BY JENNA KERN-RUGILE
Newsday.com
August 22, 2008
On July 27 a man walked into the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville and opened fire, killing two people and seriously wounding seven others.

As someone who has chosen Unitarian Universalism as her faith, I was shaken by the news. Unitarian Universalism congregations, like ours on Long Island, define themselves as a “liberal religious community” - not liberal in the political sense, but because we believe in open-minded discourse and welcome people of all persuasions.

How could such a community become the target of hate? (more…)

It’s not just that world events are ignored in favour of celebrity gossip. News anchors skew the facts to provoke debate.

Kieren McCarthy
guardian.co.uk
Thursday August 07 2008

For years it has been a joke that news in the United States is terrible: obsessed with trivia and celebrity; fronted by Botox bimbos; forever interviewing citizens about some artefact of small-town life when a major news story is breaking elsewhere.

Well, the truth is that it’s far, far worse than that. There are a multitude of news channels - CNN, MSNBC, CBS, NBC, PBS, Fox. But after an hour of flipping between them during lunchtime last week, this was the sum total of information gleaned: there are two US presidential candidates; they have produced campaign ads; people have made video parodies and posted them on the internet; a US TV news host appeared on a US TV chatshow last night; and someone said something controversial (read ignorant) on a different TV show the day before.

In the meantime, one of the most sought-after war criminals (more…)

I have always suspected that we citizens are not too bright or very well informed about a lot of things. In the back of my mind, I suspected that this ignorance had something to do with the dismal state of affairs in this country and that our politicians were getting along without our input. Supposedly, democracy still depends on a well informed electorate to function well or at all. To find out more and what we can do about it, I recommend you read “Just How Stupid Are We?” by Rick Shenkman.

by Ken Nicholson

We had another murder in Alamogordo yesterday. The Alamogordo Daily News covered the story with a photograph of the victim and another of a blood spattered suspect. The reaction of some people in Otero County was displeasure directed against ADN for printing the photos. The following is my reply:

Yes, it is unpleasant to view death and so much more pleasant to sweep reality under the carpet. The US media is all too happy to pander to our tender sensibilities by not publishing news that is “too real” and that could possibly spoil our appetite for shopping. (more…)

Published on Sunday, May 4, 2008 by PBS.org

by Bill Moyers

I once asked a reporter back from Vietnam, “Who’s telling the truth over there?” “Everyone, he said. “Everyone sees what’s happening through the lens of their own experience.” That’s how people see Jeremiah Wright. In my conversation with him on this broadcast a week ago and in his dramatic public appearances since, he revealed himself to be far more complex than the sound bites that propelled him onto the public stage. Over 2000 of you have written me about him, and your opinions vary widely. Some sting: “Jeremiah Wright is nothing more than a race-hustling, American hating radical,” one viewer wrote. A “nut case,” said another. Others were far more were sympathetic to him.

Many of you have asked for some rational explanation for Wright’s transition from reasonable conversation to shocking anger at the National Press Club. A psychologist might pull back some of the layers and see this complicated man more clearly, but I’m not a psychologist. Many black preachers I’ve known - scholarly, smart, and gentle in person - uncorked fire and brimstone in the pulpit. Of course I’ve known many white preachers like that, too. (more…)

In Defense of Rev. Jeremiah Wright & the Best of Prophetic Tradition in the Black Church

See also letter from Kansas City AME Bishop

Social Action Commission
African Methodist Episcopal Church
Los Angeles, CA

Several months ago, early in the Democratic race for the nomination to run for president, conservative radio pundits began attacking Senator Barak Obama by playing sound bites of sermons by his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. These right wing extremist shrilly declared that Rev. Wright’s prophetic preaching style speaking truth to power and calling white racism by name was in fact “reverse racism”. At a time when Senator Obama’s run seemed in the words of former President Bill Clinton a “fairy tail,” few news media outside of the right wing so-called conservative extremist media gave significant attention to these sound bites. Then a little over a week ago, less than six weeks before the last major primary in Pennsylvania, and as Senator Obama’s campaign has developed a commanding and seemingly insurmountable lead in both popular votes and delegates against Senator Hillary Rodham-Clinton, major news media have refocused on Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Trinity United Church of Christ and Senator Obama’s membership at Trinity. (more…)