Obama scrambling to rebrand unpopular bill Re: “The White House’s phony case for its health plan,” March 16
ACORN rebranded itself after facing a deathblow to its public image. Obama and company are now doing the exact same thing to the health care bill. And because the Democrats are rebranding, the GOP needs to update its arguments against it.
After the GOP successfully labeled the health care bill as a government takeover, the president has been trying to rebrand it as moderate by touting the positives of the bill, such as requiring insurance companies to cover those with pre-existing conditions.
But what good is that if everyone is required to buy insurance? After the mad dash to get everyone insured, that “popular” provision will be moot.
Thomas McAnderson
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Bloggers uncover more facts than mainstream media Re: “Yikes! The tale of the runaway Prius,” editorial, March 15
There is no such thing as an unbiased news source. The advent of 24-hour-news channels has taken what used to be a noble career and turned it into the yellow journalism of today.
In a world were the number of viewers is more valuable than the number of facts, journalists have been replaced with political commentators. The sad reality is that this is not common knowledge.
Many individuals such as myself now turn to the specialized blogs that dot the journalistic landscape. Even though most of these bloggers are very new, they often offer far more detail and facts that the mainstream media because they have one thing in common: They don’t care how many viewers they get or whose toes they step on to get the facts.
They may still be biased, but at least they are willing to admit it.
Mike Soh
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Safety concerns should trump transparency Re: “State, local officials should embrace transparency,” March 15 While I admire the efforts to make government more “transparent” for the good of the people, I question whether doing such a thing, especially now, is a good idea. Before we begin demanding that the government make most (if not all) of its knowledge public, we should first question what should be made public.
The Internet is available to everyone, including those who want to do us harm. While releasing a budget for road repairs won’t put us in harm’s way, releasing a defense budget report might.
Transparency is a noble effort, but great caution needs to be taken.
Naomi Dwight
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