Flipping Channels

I want to be a well-rounded person.  I want a balanced perspective.  I want to give opposing sides an equal hearing.  I want to know the “rest of the story” or the other version of the story if there is one.  That’s who I want to be and who I strive to be.  At the same time I want to be a rational person who deals with reality, not fantasy. I need untainted and verifiable proof for what is being reported. So, for example, I am more likely to read the New Yorker, the New York Times  and the Washington Post, than I am the Chicago Tribune, The Enquirer, The Washington Times, and the New York Post.   I am more likely to read Michael Hayden’s The Assault on Intelligence, or Michael Faul’s  From Cold War to Hot Peace, and Messing with the Enemy by Clint Watt, rather than the forthcoming pro-Trump books by Sean Spicer, Anthony Scaramucci, and Jeanine Pirro.  (Her book is titled: Liars, Leakers and Liberals).  I watch NBC, CBS, MSNBC, CNN and ABC more often than I watch Fox News, but I am always flipping channels—in search of reality and truth.

Last night I was flipping channels.  While all the major news networks were dealing almost exclusively with the Cohen and Manafort news, Tucker Carlson (who replaced Bill O’Reilly) on Fox News was working his audience up with the story of an “illegal alien” (I despise that terminology), “The Monster Just Down the Road,” who (allegedly—though Carlson never used that word)  killed a young woman in Iowa.  He did not mention nor would he accept (from a guest) the fact that many murders occur in this country that are not perpetrated by undocumented immigrants.  I flipped channels and went to Fox News on Monday night, too.  Carlson reported that Joel Arrona-Lara was intentionally “propagandized” by the left and the media, who depicted him as a “doting father,” who was “stripped” from his family as his wife went into labor.  Tucker, who formerly hosted MSNBC’s Tucker and co-hosted CNN’s Crossfire, seems to have a real problem with immigrants being innocent until proven guilty and as “doting fathers.”  He also seems to consider other news sources as somehow “left” and therefore, “fake.”

I suppose I’ll continue flipping channels, but, in the future,  I will probably not flip to Fox News very often. The reason: the dehumanizing of immigrants and of those who happen to be opposed to their news! Fox News has moved from No. 1  (2015) to No.3 in total viewers recently.  I would admonish Fox News viewers to begin flipping channels in search of fact and truth.