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Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Bennington Banner Column Nov. 2010

How About that Wristwatch

“You can’t handle the truth” – A Few Good Men

We live in fast times that are getting faster every day. Maybe I’m getting older, but I don’t think that’s entirely it. As time passes it does feel as though it picks up speed along the way. It doesn’t slow down much thanks to technology that has become lightning quick.

If you’ve been around long enough to remember characters like Dick Tracy who had a special wristwatch where he could actually call and talk to other people in the police force, you know what I’m talking about. Back in the 50’s and 60’s the idea of talking to anybody far away on anything other than on a telephone tightly secured to the wall in your home (and most likely the ONLY telephone in your home) was absurd. It was the stuff of science fiction and only believed possible by geeks who were reading those hideous comic books that your parents (and presumably your teachers) wanted banned from the face of the earth.

In the time that it takes to raise a couple of kids we now carry little rectangular devices in colorful cases that allow us to call our kids living miles away. The kids of today are living the science fiction of yesterday, and it seems like that happened over night.

Now we know how Buck Rogers might have felt after falling into a coal mine, remaining in suspended animation for over 400 years and waking up in a futuristic world; a world in which information now travels at warp speed.

If a policeman’s son in China ran over a peasant with his automobile and killed the peasant girl chances are that my generation would never had heard of the story. When this happened a week or so ago it was flashing around the world in a matter of seconds. The Chinese government did its best to suppress the story to no avail. Technology of today has given us incredible access to real-time data. With this access comes the responsibility to make sure that the story flying around a chunk of dirt 8000 miles in diameter is accurate. Because the length of time in takes for information to get from the other side of the globe to your telephone is now only a matter of seconds, the opportunity arises for mischief.

Look at what happened recently when our president went on a scheduled international trip 10-day trip to India, Indonesia, China and Korea, with a side visit to Spain. Most Americans think it’s a good idea for their president to reach out to other nations and have face to face communications (verses talking to them through a wristwatch). Apparently, not those Americans whose goal it is to see our president fail.

As soon as Obama took to the skies “news” stories began appearing immediately that Obama’s overseas trip; a trip similar in nature to every other president in history was costing taxpayers $200 million per day; more than the Iraqi or Afghanistan War.

The fact that this story was false did not deter Rep. Michele Bachmann; R-Minnesota, FOX News, Rush Limbaugh and the nation’s right wing crazies from circulating it. Even some of the mainstream media folks got caught up in fervor. Hey, why not? It might help to increase viewers/readers. Had it not been for CNN’s Anderson Cooper the story would probably still have legs (and most likely does for those who still want to believe a false story is true).


With a little investigation Cooper learned that the original cost numbers came from an anonymous quote. The anonymous quote was then picked up by The Drudge Report; a right-wing publication and Rep. Bachmann ran with it.

In Vermont, during the recent elections, we saw the same thing happen. There is a conservative, right-wing website known as The Vermont Tiger. They reported an unsubstantiated and unconfirmed story of a meeting that had taken place in a Senator’s store in Colchester. The anonymous quotes were that Sen. Shumlin, a candidate for governor, had reversed a long held position on the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.

The report was then picked up by Corry Bliss, Lt. Gov. Dubie’s campaign manager, who shopped it to local TV stations and off to the races went the opposition. The news circulated around the state and within minutes the Shumlin campaign was put on the defensive. The responsible journalists in Vermont (and thankfully there are many) refused to run the Vt. Tiger story, because it could not be substantiated. Only one person would speak on the record and he said the story being pushed was false.

Turns out Vermonters, unlike the rest of the country, are not easily fooled. Could be because our kids are highly educated. Smart people are harder to fool. Smart people check out a story before they run with it. Smart people generally prevail, but not always. It’s up to you to decide what to believe.

Maybe we need to pay more attention to the geeks out there; the ones who are reading those hideous comic books. They still have comic books, don’t they?

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