Some Words Are Here

Another day, another impeachable offense. This is getting dull.

We’ve had 2-1/2 years of this, anyway. In the pre-Trump era, people didn’t care for it when their president lied. Presidents lie all the time; we all lie, we’re humans. Most of these are in the category of disingenuous statements, fudging the truth, little white lies, that sort of thing. Just an attempt by normal people to manipulate the world into being a little more consistent with our expectations or wishes.

We hold our leaders to high standards, though, and so they get into trouble when they don’t tell the truth. With Trump, he lies every day. His staff knows it, comment on it, try to ignore it. Any of these days—or most of them, anyway, not wanting to go back and document every one of those 5-6 untruths per day—this would be grounds for someone, somewhere in the House of Representatives to begin talking impeachment.

But, whatever. You know this or else you don’t believe it, and I can’t help you. Moving on. Have a nice day.

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Bernie Sanders had a heart attack the other night, although it seems to have been minor. They’re not calling it a heart attack yet (the campaign, I mean), although it seems pretty likely.

Coronary artery disease isn’t unusual, obviously, and certainly not for a 78-year-old man. I wish him well. I have no problems with Bernie; I’ve been watching and listening to him for at least 30 years, and his consistency is remarkable.

I just never thought he was presidential material, and of course he’s not. He’s a gadfly, a nuisance, a public scold, a voice of a political conscience, if that’s your particular conscience. His legislative record is dismal, and he’s been there forever.

He’s useful, and an importance voice to listen to. He’s not gonna be president, and he shouldn’t be. Joe Biden shouldn’t be either. The average age of presidents upon entering office is 55. The average lifespan for them is 73 years. There are plenty of exceptions. It’s still an important consideration, for me.

Our last two presidents before Trump were near-compulsive exercisers, and we can still see the wear on their before-and-after pictures. It’s a hard job, a younger person’s job.

If we’re going to get an older president, and almost certainly we’ll be looking at someone around 70, it’s probably better if it’s a woman, given the differences, although it’s an individual thing. Not my call, anyway.

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I’d never try to persuade someone about this. I can’t help but be tempted, but generally I’m not all that interested. I don’t really understand how people can sacrifice truth for some vague idea of political satisfaction, but apparently they do.

There’s a fun game to play when it comes to truth, particularly journalistic truth. Let’s say a reporter gets something wrong, seriously wrong. Either they do it on purpose, or else they get played or just do sloppy work, and they’re wrong. If it’s serious enough, watch what happens.

If they get fired, the organization is practicing journalism. If they get a primetime show, it’s entertainment. Easy.

And in today’s environment, it’s easy to find the lies. A story breaks, another journalist pushes back, stories are written, facts are bandied about. It’s a game, and it takes work, but the truth isn’t that hard to find if we’re willing to try.

So I’m comfortable with finding the truth, and that I’ve found it so far. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m interested, but it doesn’t seem to be productive in terms of doing what it is I do. I can’t write about it much, because it’s changing too fast.

I might just write about something else, then. I just need to reach a point where I can turn off the news faucet.

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Katie Couric has restarted her podcast, now called NextQuestion, and she is practicing old-fashioned journalism (it appears, after one episode). I like Katie a lot.

The current episode is about 40 minutes, and it’s about pornography and young people. It’s a little horrifying but important listening, particularly if you have kids in the home. When my children were of this age, at least from what I understood at the time, online pornography required some tricks and strategies to access. There was always some out there, but the big stuff needed a credit card.

So, not anymore, apparently. As I said, some of this is frightening, particularly when we think about the culture that’s being created. Young people are getting their information about sex from performances that resemble reality only in basic biology. More than scary, but worth a listen.

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Finally, I haven’t decided what to do about the Beacon paywalls and my column. I don’t know if this is affecting anyone I know; it’s hard to get worked up about this, my weekly offering, something I’ve done for 18 years now. I rarely feel the urge to promote or share a specific piece, although I write for a reason and that requires readers.

I understand the paywall. I support local journalism. I’m not sure it helps to be invisible.

And look. Over 800 words. I can write again.