If I May Be So Presumptuous...

as to offer an explanation of another's post, and for the name calling it generated, then I would say that he was saying that any type of media outrage that gets reported will be used as justification for terrorist actions. I take as an inferrence that the media should take a close look at what it does, report fairly were there are abuses to explain, and to refrain from reporting on mere rumors that lack what we in the scientific community refer to as evidence. Additionally, those who are of a political bent opposite that of the sitting president should take a long hard look at what they are choosing to report and factor in the negative consequences on the grand scale with relation to the strength of the corroboration.

Many people go into journalism with stars (namely Woodward and Bernstein) in their eyes and dreams of changing the world. In today's world, they have the power. Time to consider that the power comes with some responsibility for the changes their words create.

Ultimate responsibility rests with the terrorists. Just writing that would make me thoroughly un-PC and disrectful of multi-cultural values, and I embrace those labels. Those philosophies include racist presumptions that I reject catagorically. The primary racism is that foreign cultures are incapable of being held to the moral standards to which we hold ourselves. The second racism is the terrorists are incapable of forming their own views and acting pro-actively upon them. The deepest aspect of their philosophy is that of world-wide Islam, non-believers and their philosophies be damned.

If you are of a different opinion, that the terrorists are only acting in reaction to what the West does, then it is all the more important that words be measured for the impact they will have. I don't particularly believe that, and so I don't automatically jump on the bash the media bandwagon. Putting myself in the other side's shoes, believing that I have the power to impact the world, I would have to look beyond my intent of writing the story (often, evidently, to shine a negative light upon the current administration) and to see the collateral damage I am causing. Words are weapons, and with today's technology, there are far from surgical.