The Good Side of Breitbart

Better Than Average Conversation

I've told you redundantly of my writing in the "Comments" sections of various news sites.


Since I'm of the liberal persuasion, my opinions in the rightwing comments get hearty disagreements, about half thoughtful and half insulting. My favorite of those was "Die in boiling pig shit, commie." Probably a bot.
So today, I wrote a comment in Breitbart about Senator McCain's senior moment at the Comey hearing. You know I stand up for my fellow olde farts. I was pretty un-political in this.

seniorjunior (scooter duff) • 13 hours ago

Hey, fellow old folks, stand up for Sen McCain! We all have a "senior moment" now and then, but that's just a little turbulence on top of our deep rivers of experience and judgement. All those young farts waxing superior are so far behind in actually knowing what's up will change their minds as they mature... if they last that long.•

CHyatt responds right away. I've moved on and don't see the response for four hours.
CHyatt seniorjunior (scooter duff) • 13 hours ago

Being a senior is not the problem, being corrupt is. Condoning a lie, pushing a lie is corruption. Most idiots in the United States have zero clue what "Deep State" means. It means unequal justice for all, with certain groups having special interest over others. And this is not a white mans issue. There is corruption to the core in our Government. The press, which should be the defenders of truth (above all) are traitors to their trade and to the public they report to.

I respond with one of my "observations."
seniorjunior (scooter duff) CHyatt • 9 hours ago

CH, Over and over, I see evidence of the "two universe" condition we Americans (and much of the rest of the world) are in. You see one reality - and it's totally real to you- and I see another - ditto. For instance, what lie is being condoned? We both see lies, but probably disagree on what they are. I spent my whole career around "the press," and the people I worked with (hundreds!) were some of the most diligent, honest, hard working types I ever knew. Again, if we discussed which truth you see them not defending, I'd probably disagree. How we merge these two universes and get back to talking productively with one another is the challenge of the century.
•
Edit Reply Share 

CH then hits a home run. 

CHyatt seniorjunior (scooter duff) • 4 hours ago

Well then, we both lose. And in a big way. I have believed since the Vietnam war that we are being lied to. No disrespect, but I find it preposterous that there is no universal truth. I've always said that a lie will always be a lie even when presented as the truth, however the truth will never be more than the truth even if it is presented as a lie.

I could not disagree with you more about the press. Their role as I see it is to present facts. How many times in recent history have we had stories broken that were not vetted before peoples lives were ruined, only to find out that what was reported by the press was indeed inaccurate. Did any of the mainstream media show the Gentle Giant assaulting the store owner.....nope. That is omission of facts and if you are not disturbed by that, I don't know what to say. Bill Clinton even tried telling the American People he did not have sexual relations with those women. The manipulation and parsing of words like he did is unconscionable.

You are correct the divide is deep. And until we can ALL HAVE THE SAME facts from which to base our decisions on we are indeed being lied to. And what is disgusting to me is that us humans seem to think all of this is OK as long as my side wins. We in my opinion are screwed.

An intelligent, non-belligerent conversation! So naturally, I open up and tell him a little personal stuff. It's about how I deal with the hurricane of information we live in these days.

seniorjunior (scooter duff) CHyatt • 2 minutes ago

CH, thoughtful response. Thank you. I suspect we share some strong opinions. For instance I am as passionate to know the actual truth as you sound like you are. I also hate stuff like left-out facts or pictures that misrepresent the actuality. I believe that's why people value open, transparent, honest investigative reporting. And follow-through! People love comprehensive follow through/ follow up reporting. I did market research on radio, tv and newspaper news for nearly 30 years and that's what people told us with solid consistency, whatever their politics - we didn't ask in those days - I saw zero sign of any left/right split on the value of truth, objectivity and completeness.
In these days of brilliantly manufactured misinformation and sophisticated selling techniques for it, coming from ALL sides, I am more and more wary of those news sources which are clearly partisan. Fox, of course, and prime time on MSNBC... DailyCaller and Huffington Post. And of course the really crazy ones. There is little doubt there is a filter in the news flow to fit the respective ideologies. And that's OK, because most of us know what we are watching. But I don't trust them for the total truth.
The news source I trust is ME. I'm retired, love to read, love history, science and politics, so I read "all sides" a bunch and decide what makes sense and I can believe. So there.

(Then I wrote) I like this dialogue we have had, so I am going to "feature" it in a blog post. It will take me a couple hours or less. So if you want to see it, punch in seniorjunior.blogspot.com

CHyatt could be the Chicago Hyatt as far as I know, but I like him.

• • •