Our news reporting has been reduced to nothing but sound bites. I was reading something about the Depression and about how Roosevelt's "fireside chats" really inspired the nation and drew people together and if you read the text of Roosevelt's speeches they were elegant and nuanced in a way that at least half of the country today would not even be able to understand -- and yet I'm sure we have far more formally educated people in America now than we did in the 1930s. It's just that we've lost the ability to absorb anything that isn't a slogan. So "death panels" capture the American consciousness while sensible, well thought-out discussion on healthcare reform flies right over everyone's head.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2009-08-19 02:23 am (UTC)