Truth, Balance & Justice

The announcement earlier this week by the Pulitzer Prize Committee sent a vital message to the security services of the United States. With the Washington Post and Guardian US both receiving awards for their coverage of the NSA Secrets and Boston Bombing the gauntlet has been thrown down, clearly indicating that a free press will not be deterred by the facade of “national security” or any of the many agencies to hide the truth from the American people. If anything, they have made it clear that the ever increasing violations of our privacy rights will be met with the ever increasingly watchful eye of a free press to insure there is a balance between our right to know and the governments assumed right to hide information from us.

This has far surpassed issues of WIcki Leaks, NSA disclosures or the many other disclosures that causes the government to decry such activities. (don’t for those Pentagon Papers & Watergate investigation of last century) It is now clearly focused on the mission of the press to protect us from ourselves and a government that increasingly wants us to trust them while they routinely violate the law and the very constitution for which they are bound to obey. Our CIA now conducts activities within the boarders of the United States and our FBI does the same outside of the boarders. Both in conflict to their original missions and authorities. Our president says that our privacy shall be protected because our sensitive data is no longer held by the government but by private companies who contract with the government. Certainly they think us children that we cannot understand this slight of hand, and a reasonable explanation for the need of a FISA Court remains unfulfilled.

Over the course of history, a free press has served us well. Whether it is covering the brutality and accidents of war, a corrupt government that’s exposure was found in the Pentagon Papers, the misconduct of so many different government officials over the years, down to the basic dirty cop that gets caught with his hand in the till, it has always been in our best interest for us to know so we can judge for ourselves. That is, in fact why the proclamation starts with “We the People …. “. Despite the efforts of corporations to seize power through an unregulated vote, we have traveled that road before and through the power of our pocketbooks and our pencils at the polling places, we have again and again taken it right back. Our only crime was in failing to remember the last time and the time before that … and more the fact that we failed to teach our children the “what & why” so it could never happen again.

The intelligence agencies, the men of secrets, the men of war and so many others will continue to tell us again and again that it is all in interest of national secrecy and that we can trust them to guard the peace and protect the nation, but without a strong regiment of checks and balances, we have learned it is folly to believe them. We are a nation of educated people, mature enough to determine for ourselves what is real, what is valuable, and what needs to be protected. Never in the history of this nation has the government every even attempted to create a system by which any citizen in good standing could inquire about any private or secret matter & the government be obligated to answer.

It all starts with us. Each and every one of us. Until we learn to ignore the sound bites, PAC commercials, talk radio (& TV) demons; each with the intent of swaying our opinion without causing us to think, we will remain forever ignorant of the facts. Beware of those that would try to suppress institutions like our Public Broadcast System and National Public Radio, calling them radical and right wing. Take some time, your own time, and listen to what is being said. It will lead you to the uncomfortable truth; from which you can make your own mind.