Our nation is foundering in intellectual dishonesty. It comes in many forms. It is politicians that decry our huge federal debt even as they pass earmarks for politically popular pork. It is media whose reporters do nothing more than copy and quote reports from other sources. It is aggressive special interests that twist remarks taken out of context to achieve a political goal. This is the culture of politics today, and it is killing our country. But it can only destroy us if we as citizens accept at face value that which we read, see and hear, and thereby allow someone else to do our thinking for us.
Our founders gave us more power than any citizens in history. They believed, as I believe, that our nation and its governance should be controlled by her citizens. But effective control requires making good decisions, and good decisions require good information.
In a world dominated by sound bites, image-making and ulterior motives, our freedom depends more than ever before on us performing
