Petraeus Complex

                With the U.S. Postal Service facing bankruptcy, a potential “fiscal cliff” forcing Congress to move quickly or face dire national consequences, and a sudden surge of fighting in the Gaza Strip, it’s no surprise that the news story that has been dominating headlines for the past two weeks has been a sex scandal.  Time and time again, Americans have shown that despite what major events may be happening around us, nothing enthralls us like a sex scandal.  There is just something the private affairs between two consenting adults that titillates us so much that we are willing to sit through weeks and weeks of over-coverage and over-analysis of events transpired, regardless of how trivial the matter is.  Granted, it is somewhat of an issue when the politician is engaging in illegal sexual affairs, such as with Congressman Mark Foley (underage boys) and former Governor Eliot Spitzer (prostitutes), but when the relationship is legal, between consenting adults, and has zero influence on the job the politician performs, it should be a non-issue.  While the affairs of people with political careers, such as General Petraeus, Bill Clinton, and Mark Sanford were all extra-marital, the offense was a domestic issue, and should not have made national news.  In no way did these men’s transgressions influence the way they perform their job.  At virtually no other job could a person face termination because they cheated on their wife.

                Yet some allege that the director of the CIA having an affair does compromise our nation’s security.  The only support of this is two months ago, when Paula Broadwell (Petraeus’ mistress) mentioned during a speech at Denver University that the Benghazi attack was believed to be perpetrated as an attempt to free several Libyan prisoners being held by theC.I.A.  This story has not been confirmed by any other sources and the CIA denied her claims. 

                That is the only situation in which some believe Ms. Broadwell may have gained sensitive knowledge, and even President Obama made a statement last week that there was “no evidence” that any classified information was disclosed that could compromise national security.  Yet despite the lack of any negative effect on the nation or Petraeus’ performance as director of the CIA, he was still forced to step down, and Obama still had to devote significant time and focus away from dealing with Congress on the impending “fiscal cliff”.  With so many critical decisions and discussions to be made on the econonoy with such a sharp deadline, the last thing we need is more distractions.  And yet another distraction is exactly what we wanted – the Petraeus ‘scandal’ has dominated political conversations on the news, political talk shows, editorial pages, and the blogosphere.  It seems to be the only news story people are talking about.  I guess if we want people to start paying attention to foreign affairs and the economy, we need to find a way to tie sex into it.

Politically Incorrect

     After reading fellow classmate Amber Quinn's recent blog about a situation in Arizona last week, I am almost ashamed at how I find this article as amusing as she does.  While it is appalling - a woman ran over her husband and father of her unborn child simply because he did not vote - I first heard the story on morning radio, where the DJs were cracking jokes about the story the entire time.  While the individual situation is upsetting ( the man is currently in critical condition and his wife is facing hard jail time) the truly terrible part is what this country is coming to.  Politics in America has been reduced to a contentious and divisive screaming match where political discourse is no longer an opportunity to share ideas but an excuse to behave selfish and erratic.
     During the election I read an article about how many people (myself included) were having to block and even unfriend people on Facebook for their constant political posts.  I even heard of people refusing to speak to certain family members based on their political standpoint.  During the months of September and October political bickering reached such a fervent boiling point that it consumed nearly every conversation on the airwaves and our personal lives.  Suddenly every exchange of dialogue I encountered was such a heated disagreeable debate that I opted to avoid conversations altogether.
       Things did not get much better after the election.  Once again Facebook was lit up with hateful messages, the spiteful conversations took place between sore losers and gloating winners, and each half of the country blamed the other half for ruining this nation.  In at least one case, someone tried to murder their own spouse.  Over an election.
     Frankly, I don't see enough difference between Mr. Obama and Mr. Romney to make that big of a deal over anything.  Sometimes I feel all of this political hullabaloo is just an excuse for some people to act immature and irrational.  Politics gives people a scapegoat to blame their problems on, an enemy to project their anger towards, and a justification for them to be angry.  By serving as a vent for people's personal problems, politics has a way of bringing out the worst in us.

The Bias-Sphere

     One of my favorite protest signs I saw during the Occupy Movement (hey remember that?) last year read “My Comedy Channel” next to the Fox News logo, and “My News Channel” by Comedy Central’s logo.  The sign is referencing Fox News’ reputation as being an untrustworthy and often deceitful news source, while many people have turned to satirical programs such as “The Daily Show” and “Colbert Report” for their information.  Though the news programs on Comedy Central are meant to be humorous, and often admittedly lean to the lefter side of politics, many still find it preferable to Fox News, which is constantly being reprimanded by PolitiFact and other fact-checking outfits for its biased and often misleading presentation of news.  Yet ever since Public Policy Polling has been conducting a survey asking which news source people trust the most (and watch the most), Fox News has consistently come in at number 1.

                However, among the majority of news grazers who prefer Fox News, nearly 80% self-identified as Republicans.  The second most trusted and watched news outlet was MSNBC, which has often been accused of having a more liberal political lean.  Not surprisingly, many of the viewers who trusted MSNBC the most are Democrats.  CNN, which has often been lauded for its accurate and unbiased reporting, was considerably less watched, and considered less trustworthy among viewers.

                There was a time when the most accurate and fair news source would be the more preferential choice.  Now, however, people don’t care about truth and accuracy as much as they want to listen to news that coincides with what they believe.  People only want to hear what they want to hear, and as the news sources play into this, peoples’ source of information has become more polarized than politics itself.

                With the influx of the internet, verifying the accuracy of a news event has become even more difficult.  With a nearly endless supply of news sources out there, each with their own agenda, it has become almost impossible to receive a news story without any bias.  Never was this more apparent than the most recent election.  Despite being a relatively close race, both  candidates were predicted to win by landslides, depending on which news source you used.  Fox News had all but called the victory for Romney months ago, whereas major news sources such as Huffington Post and MSNBC had forecalled Obama coming in with an easy re-election.

                People’s intake of current events should come from reliable and unbiased sources.  As their information becomes increasingly one-sided, their views on issues will also become more strongly aligned to a particular viewpoint.  While Americans become deeper and deeper entrenched into divisive political camps, they grow farther and farther away from finding middle ground.  Being unwilling to compromise and unable to form a moderate opinion on any issue, many political decisions will end in stalemate. 

                This most recent election was one of the most vicious and negative contests in American history.  Bitter arguments raged between voters, neither side willing to see things from their opponents’ point of view.  As news media continues to sensationalize and polarize their reporting, this country will sink farther and farther away from getting things done.