Well, I have no idea if SHAME is the primary obligation. But I notice NO attempt to make any sense of any of these votes to the people who entrusted them with power. Is it because there IS no reasonable explanation? Is it that they don't want to leave a quotable record? It just AMAZES me that the more technology we have for reaching the public, the less the people in government seem to want to DO it! We are told that we are providing "valuable input". Well, those are glittering generalities, folks. Sez who?
I don't even see the MINORITY arguing against whatever reasons the majority uses for justifying its votes. I can understand how that might be missing from the Strib. First, it has its advertising revenue to worry about. Second, its inches of print don't make the money they used to, and now that it is part of a Sacramento CA empire, our petty squabbles here in Minneapolis don't reach up and shake the ownership like they used to.
Buy, hey, there are innumerable public news outlets now. The Strib may have the greatest readership of any SINGLE outlet, but it doesn't REACH as far as the combined readership of the other channels. So why not email press releases to the other outlets and rely on them to get the reasoning out? Surely PR people have to be up on this stuff, even if the Establishment is in bed with the commercial media.
As to fear of the future, all they have to do is proof-read and ask themselves "Would I be comfortable with this hanging around as a quote." Which is what they have to do with their comments on camera and in the papers.
Jim Mork Cooper
"What 9/11 has done is to pull together the diverse and sometimes contradictory military and economic strands of this 'no rivals' policy into one seamless approach. This war on terrorism looks more like a war for the preservation of US imperial power. That is why countries like France, Germany, Russia and China - which have a stake in the dilution of US power globally - are at the forefront of international opposition to the impending invasion of Iraq." --Times of India
"We hold these truths to be self-evident....that governments are formed, deriving their just powers by the consent of the governed" Declaration of Independence
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