The Return

Welcome back, me!

And perhaps this is what happens when you get an email from a woman praising you for doing something you are not really doing.

But to say I have gone without thoughts over these months would be a lie. I have, more than anything, been struggling with the concept that which we call the blog. The Weblog; these moving and continuous flows of information that seem so fresh, new, modern, the new wave, that the kid in me that still writes notes by hand fights back with a vengeance.

As a medium it depends on its less than steller claim to truth; it is the most subjective form of 'news' that we can get to. It is interspersed with feelings, and thoughts, opinions and commentary, it is presented in ways that are less than rigorous, but worse, the blog is meant to be questioned. I am supposed to write something of this sort. Oh how cyclical thinking, what crap.

I do not like the blog. But then why am I writing this. Because my friends got me started on another blog. The premise not too far from this one, which by itself makes me excited to renew interest. Honest, well thought out opinions sent onto these airwaves to be debated without the haughty attitude of the spectator editorial page, or the abrasive world of popular blogs.

And so why write? Why make these rhetorical questions? Haha. How cylical once-again. It is tough to write on this. I mean, it is a false confessional of many sorts. But if this is so bad, so false, fake and abrasive, writing in a way that dispells this (or contradicts it in someway) provides some joy, right? Someone needs to push the envelope of these blogs and comment on broad topics without the indifference of some, while admitting one's own inability to truly research the facts. Haha, the nice way to put what is going on in this and other blogs.

And so where does this come about. A great op-ed piece by Ted Koppel in the Times about the great state of television news. It has a prescient description of the television world, the decay of our culture in general and the state of our future. His retirement from ABC Nightline was a great loss for the television world. But, to be a bit of a devil's advocate, isn't there something innately wrong with all this complaining, mine and Koppel's.

Perhaps simpler words and more action would suffice; my mom would be proud of me for sticking in my head the old adage "practice what you preach." But need we just do that. The culture that prefers to complain, argue, disagree, be antagonistic, derisive to the point that we have...accomplished nothing. Even now, continuing to do nothing. The irony of such action: a call to action is still but a hopeless waste of energy.

Good news awaits the rise of a good newsman (someone who can foil the traps of publicity and marketing). And too we wait for good blogging, or at least I do, that someone like Mr. Wagner can continue to impress me. I just hope that perhaps we can make this a bigger deal, and maybe start a wave...forward.

(because progress doesn't have philosophical problems, haha, but we will try not to get into those issues and stay within the american lexicon of an annointed nation, harrowing for something good --- what's good? good blogging)