What do these two have in common?





A panda and an odd looking girl - what possibly could these two individuals have in common? A good question in many weeks, but not in this one.

Both the panda and girl were repatriated this week. And, to my mind, it wasn't just a coincidence.

This week in Washington, before all the snow hit (it really is all about the timing), Tai Shen a multi-year alien resident of Washington's National Zoo left his American home for his native China. After living in the US for the entirety of his life, China formally requested that the panda be returned to China. China's official reasoning was the need for the pandas to increase the population of the rare and endangered species in its native land.

The odd-looking girl was not specifically called home to breed, but not unlike the panda, was recalled home this week. After 4 and a half years in the US - well Boston - I too was repatriated to my homeland of Canada.

While I do not regret a second of my time in Boston, I also came to realize in the last few months I was there that Boston and I needed to break up. We were clearly done with each other and had no future. There were times I loved Boston and never thought I'd leave it. Although I never really hated it, recent times had proved trying on multiple levels. I was done with Boston and it was done with me. Our love affair over, there was but one option - to go back to my original love Toronto.

This blog was created to contrast and compare the two towns, but really my love affair with Toronto never ended. Could I be frustrated with Toronto? Oh yes, I could! But here's the thing, Toronto never really cheated on me. Boston, at the end, began to feel like it was running around behind my back with some other Modern Lover (who could continually promise its love to the city, the 128 when its cold outside and Stop and Shop). So it made sense to break up. It just wasn't meant to be.

Again like Tai Shen, my little panda friend, I think too there was something to this whole being foreign thing that factored into my decision. For all its promised commodious living, being the local 'resident alien' isn't all it could be. I moved to Boston in the Post-911 era, a tenuous time in American I knew. However, in my time there I saw what was a legitimate concern about threats to the US from external entities become all-out hysteria. My trip home over Christmas (in the post underwear bomber era) only made that too clear. To be hassled is one thing to actively engage in racial profiling based on ethnicity is another.

The US is a great place and one I love. Yet, it is also a place with no sense of priorities in terms of how to deal with foreigners or foreign entities. I knew about US isolationism, but had no understanding of what that was actually like until I lived there. The US is a patchwork of poorly thought out immigration policies, trade pacts and foreign 'intelligence'. All of this contrived out of fear, love, hate and no real idea of what outcomes should be sought. Without strategically thinking out all of these, the US's international supremacy is bound to falter. If I was done with Boston, I have to admit I was also done with America. I loved it, but just couldn't support it any longer.

So Tai Shen and I will move back to our respected countries to try it elsewhere by ourselves. Like the thousands of foreigners who have worked in the US and leave every year we will take our knowledge and ambition with us and offer that to our homeland.

America - Boston - Thanks. You gave me a lot. Now I'm out. I'll talk to you later. Good luck with everything.

Patriotism or Mid-Life Crisis -Either Way It's Not Pretty

Why I choose to blog when my parents are in town, I do not know. Perhaps it's their re-instated Canadianess that surrounds me here in the US. Needless to say I spent this July 1st at work and July 4th watching a 'Fireworks Spectacular' on the Charles. Yes, I celebrated Independence this year surrounded by the parental units - tons o' fun. :-)

But, of course, for the occasion in Canada it had to be celebrated with yet another "OMG We are Awesome!" cover story from Maclean's. This year the magazine proclaims Canad to be Simply the Best. The article goes on to highlight how Canadians have the best possible lives compared with many others in the world - in terms of infant mortality rates, yearly individual incomes, life expectancy, and so on.

And yet, isn't this a story we've heard before. To be honest, isn't this a story we hear every year at this time? And can't you smell the desperateness in the article? It's the same desperateness we hear every year at this time. The (and let's be honest) "Look Canadians - We ARE as Good as Americans!" Look Canada we are good, not THE best (doesn't anyone at the magazine read Coyne's copy before it's printed).

AND, Do Canadians really need to hear this yet again? And, more importantly, if we do need to hear it - why? Don't we just believe it by now? What, in fact, does this article say about us if it is something we need to hear year after year?

So where has Canada's self esteem gone, long, long time ago? Here is my theory - Canada is going through a mid-life crisis of sorts. I mean think about it - we are 147 years in to this experiment in nationhood. By modern democratic standards, that's about the halfway point.

We also have many of the symptoms. Here is how Wikipedia defines a mid-life crisis:
" ...describe[s] a period of dramatic self-doubt that is felt by some individuals in the 'middle years' of life, as a result of sensing the passing of youth and the imminence of old age."

See isn't that the problem - we are absolutely terrified of being passe? We're not the new kids on the block. We don't create global crises. We have the general reputation of being boring - proof positive of which is the election of Steven Harper, perhaps the most boring leader in the Western World.

Now, lemme tell you 'bout the Americans. Yes, they think they live in the 'best country in the world' - this is true. And how, you may ask, do they manage to keep up this ideal in light of yearly Maclean's covers extolling the virtues of the Canadian state? Well most importantly they don't worry about what everyone else thinks. Seriously. To me it is a complete benefit not to have to worry about what everyone else thinks of you. Because if you're not obsessed with worrying about being the best, you are relatively free to create your own course of what the best entails. The US's huge advantage is its willingness to move forward with little consideration for what is happening on the sidelines or at the back of the pack.

Now this does create more than a little bravado, but also results. Honestly if when I make the argument about Canadians' lack of ingenuity in technology, I hear someone whine "well what about RIM?" Yeah, yeah OK RIM - congratulations for recognizing the one exception. That is one to America's like 1 million instances.

So Canada, I encourage you, deal with your mid-life crisis. The good news is that these sort of crises can lead to...Change. Yep, the willingness to change can often refocus the individual and move them out of their crises.

So Canada let's change. Now.

Religion and Ethnicity? What of it?

Events of the past few weeks have caused me a crisis of faith. I know. Shocking isn't it.

The thing is my experiences have been so diverse, well, it is hard not to think of these sorts of things.

So picture it - Toronto on a Sunday afternoon. It is a beautiful day. The sun is shinning and it is starting to get summery warm. You drive downtown for the afternoon to go shopping, have lunch with a friend and maybe even head off for an afternoon at a local museum or are off to the movies.

Then you, of course, toward the end of the day decide it's about time to head home. You head toward the Gardiner. But you are told that the Gardiner, the highway artery between home and the big city, is closed. "Is there an accident?" you think.

Well no but there are a lot of protesters. "About the Tories?" "Over Stephen Harper's policies?"

No, the protesters are upset about the Tamils. "...Tamils?" Yes, in Sri Lanka.

Toronto is the only city on earth that can be shut down by a protest initiated by a known terrorist group, as recognized by the Canadian and American governments. The Tamil Tigers have fought for their own separate state in northern Sri Lanka for over 30 years, but have recently surrendered and seen their militant political leader killed by the Sri Lankan military. Toronto has, in the weeks leading up to the surrender, experienced a myriad of protest clogging our streets, the provincial government and our highways. Only in Toronto.

Now flash forward to Boston this past Saturday. I had offered to volunteer for a mere 5 hours as part of a corporate volunteer program - it was a great opportunity to give back. Until I learned where my corporate volunteering would take place. Catholic Christian Charities part of the Archdiocese of Boston.

Really? A corporate organization is going to make me volunteer for a religious organization? Moreover, a religious organization that has been marred in turbulence since accusations of child abuse became publicly known only a few years ago? This in the country espousing the separation of church and state? Only in Boston.

So what do these two seemingly contradictory events, in two different towns have in common anyway?

In reality they have much more in common, but it is what separates them that makes it interesting. You see, although part of the Boston mainstream now, there was a time when the Catholic church (even in Boston) was looked down upon as the religious institution of the Irish and the Italians - to all protestant accounts "the heathens of the state." On paper the US may have been about separating church and state, but the reality was that Washington and New York were run by the protestants, with a few Jews on the side. One only need hear of the awe at JFK being elected as the first Catholic President in the 1960s to understand the rank and order of where the Catholics fell, even in Boston.

By today's standards, one might more easily see the connections with the Tamils. Although not an inherently religious organization, like the Catholics of Massachusetts, they too are a hyper marginalized organization as the Catholics once were. Hyper, of course, because of the fear and dread around their actions, their fundraising (at home and abroad) and the militancy of their organization. One only need think of the actions of Fenians at the turn of the last century to think that they too, like the Tamils, would likely have appeared on lists of terrorist groups.

But, flashing forward to today does make the difference. In Toronto, it was a known terrorist organization that was willingly allowed to take over our streets. There was no back fighting, largely no arrests and certainly no clubbing, shooting or other defensive police action. The Tamils willingly took a weakened city, one where few have the guts to speak out against anything. Torontonians love the status quo. A city weakened by the largess of what they faced, the knowledge that these were Canadian citizens for the most part and that this was a heightened "political" situation with the cameras following the every action of the protesters.

In Boston, spending a day working for the Catholic church was considered no biggie for pretty much the same reasons: the largeness of the organization, the sense that it is at its heart an American organization (not one controlled from Rome), and it is a "political" organization as well with the cameras turned on it since the accusation of the early 2000s - one that is in the constant "do gooders" mode. The Catholic church in Boston has become yet another grand old dame of the town. Bostonians love clinging to their strongholds - all the things that set them apart from...well...everybody.

And yet. My religious charity work was forced upon me, a non-Catholic, without a second thought. The actions of the Tamil protesters was thrown in the face of Toronto with many a second thought, hysteria and not a few angry drivers.

Who is more right? Hard to tell. Who is more wrong? Even more difficult to differentiate.

One can only wonder to think that in 100 years from now if some corporate organization in Boston is marched off to volunteer for a day with the Tamil relief organization. Or if the Irish will once again take to the streets of Toronto in protest, because being the good monarchists that we are, they wish for a united Irish state one free of Britain and Canada does not seem to care about it. Yes, one can only wonder. Isn't it magnificent. Isn't it remarkable.

Boston: Where Waste Diversion Activities Come to Die

So compared to my US work colleagues, I think I had an odd childhood. Evidence of that comes in a variety of ways but chief of which might have been the assembly I was marched down to in grade 3 where the whole school got together in the gym and we all talked about the importance of recycling. I am serious. It was a relatively new thing in Mississauga, and the city decided that the best way to waste diversion was through nagging children in households across the city. And it largely worked.

Now ours was not the first municipality in Canada or even in Ontario to start recycling - that honor goes to the cities of Kitchener/Waterloo. However, in Mississauga, we got lectured about what could be included (newspapers, cans, glass, plastic bottles, cardboard) and the importance of washing cans and bottles, as well as separating the different sorts of recyclables from one another at a very early age.

Now in Boston, well, I'd be impressed if the term recycling was even whispered in school. Seriously, no one recycles in this town.

For example, the following was an email I received recently --
"Hello,
This is a notification that we will no longer have company recycling. The organization that used to come and collect our recycling no longer exists and the available alternatives charge us unreasonable fees to take it away. And as some of you know it can grow to be out of hand very quickly. So, there will no longer be recycling on any of the floors. If you wish to continue to recycle your bottles and cans, you must do so on your own.
Thank you!"
And a cheery thank you to you too.

You heard that right Canadians - in the US doing away with recycling is a cost saving structure. Now I get this, I do. In these tough economic times we should all be trying to save money. But really - recycling?! So we are embracing the savings now for the costs in the future.

Its like Americans see all of those environmental documentaries on TV and watch them just for the cute fluffy animals completely ignoring the tone of impending doom the narrator uses when talking about threats to the homes of those animals. I'm always listening to that part! No one making animal documentaries is doing it for the cute fluffy stuff - it's always about the impending doom!

For goodness sake people - Al Gore! Al Gore! Al Gore!

Since I've lived in Boston it has been an uphill battle to get recycling services not just in the office but also at home. Usually my battle to get recycling done has involved begging local authorities to get blue boxes and fights with room mates who said "Why don't you just throw it out?" To be completely honest for the past 2 years I haven't even bothered.

But I am not alone and my experience appears not to be unique. The latest figures I can find from 2007, show that Boston only diverts a whopping 15% of their trash to be recycled. Now Toronto on the other hand, managed to divert a much more respectable 42% during approximately that same time period. Generally San Francisco is the model city with regard to recycling, because the city is able to divert a remarkable 70% of trash through recycling and composting (green box) programs. Toronto aims to reach this SFO threshold by 2010. We'll see if they get there, but aggressive work with blue, grey and green box waste diversion programs mean they are at least putting their best foot forward.

Then there is Boston. With a Mayor you can hardly make sense of when he speaks, I guess we were aiming high to think that he might be able to articulate the importance of waste diversion to the city. The guy can hardly deal with transportation issues, so what more can you hope for (watch for future issues ridiculing Mayoral platforms here).

I for one would appreciate it if Boston would embrace the 3 Rs - Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Instead the 3Rs they've got going on right now - Reckless, Redundant and Irresponsible.

Boston, The Expedient

An issue has been lingering in the background of this blog, one I haven't taken particular aim at articulating. The issue has been referred to in previous posts but a lack of true attention has been paid to it.

It is the students, colleges and all that the 4 years of undergraduate education can bring with it. Boston does not lack in colleges (again, for the Canadians in the crowd, college = university), in fact they probably suffer from too many of them. This is one of my favorite maps, showing the sheer volume of land that colleges own in the greater Boston area: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Boston_college_town_map.png . The count from Wikipedia about the number of colleges in the area is 50.

Now in a town with that much education going on you'd expect a highly intellectual, in for museums and arts crowd, right? Well, maybe if you are Canadian you would. But, oh my dear Canadians, you make the assumption that this is a University of Toronto/UBC/McGill crowd, because of Harvard right? No, no, no. This is a Queen's on a Saturday night/ chick from Western looking to get drunk, laid and hitched crowd.

The debauchery is remarkable. The stooges even take pride in it and tape the stuff. Now that is nothing to be proud of, but the student-y atmosphere manifests itself in other ways as well. The spirit of the student radiates through the town, taking all of us living here down with it in a sprial of drunkeness that only a Friday night can inspire.

I think Boston is the most expedient of cities because of the colleges. Everyone under-25 here will tell you, like any hardened criminal, about how they are "putting in time." The typical scenario plays out in two possible ways:

• Scenario 1: The Townie - Kids from Boston who stay in Boston for school. The proceed to commit fully to the town. Because they have never been away to anywhere, they have no intention of moving. They have formed early friendships with the people from their hometown and have a few friends, for good measure, from college. They do not need any more friends. They will revel in what they've got in Boston and call it a day.
• Scenario 2: The Stay-Over College Kid - Kids that come to Boston for college and end up staying a few extra years to get some work experience and because their friends are here. This is not a committed group to the town. They may think they are for a while, but slowly upon slowly as their college friends drift away so too do they.

Now the expediency comes in in the attitudes that flow from these two post-student studenty types, and it haunts you especially if you didn't go to college here and instead were parachuted in to this town as some form of adult. The Townies don't need you as friends - they don't care - so you are nothing to them and they generally don't become your friend. The more disturbing of the two is the Stay-Overs. For the Stay-Over Types, they may befriend you - but, hey, they are on their way out, so...

A friend of mine as a great term for it. Boston really is the official home of the "superficial friend." In other words (as another former room mate put it to me) a friend in Boston is a friend for now, because you're here now. It isn't a long term thing. When you are no longer of use to them, they move on.

This can be extremely hard on those parachuted types - trust me.

If Toronto is the city of middle management (honestly everyone is a manager, 30 with a dog, husband, child and picket fence in Burlington), then Boston is the king of Entry Level. In that sense they are worlds apart.

Now, you ask, isn't there other types of people around other than these post-studenty types? Well, yes there are. Here, however, is the sorta sick part - the expedient thing, the student thing, seems to resonate throughout the Boston crowd. Everyone here has embraced the attitude toward the town and all are on a temporary hold over it seems. There are a few exceptions, but they are few. Everyone can be done away with in this town. Everyone is just using Boston to fill in a gap on a resume. Everyone is here for a few years, then, you know...

The attitude actually keeps the townies happy -- they seemingly get their city back every few years. It also hardens them, because they've seen it all. Because they never left.

The city, on the other hand, is in continual renewal. The city does, to a certain degree, get reborn every September with a fresh class of college kids....but on the other hand how good can that much high turnover be for one place? As any Bain consultant will tell you, high turnover ultimately lowers productivity and it certainly isn't good for morale.

And it leads inevitably to more turnover.

Because, hey, you are only here to fill the time with a constant view to the end.

Welcome to your expedient years.

Krugman - Stick to the Day Job!

This is a story about why those who are specialists in economics should not delve into the world of ethics (beyond the personal that is), why those who win the Nobel often have the award go to their heads and become experts in everything, and about a quack who has gone to the dogs.

Bad Krugman - bad, bad!

Is it me or do you think the Nobel committee really messed this one up? Does Paul Krugman, star columnist in the New York Times, really deserve the prize for Economics? If so, why doesn't he write on it? What is going on? Is the NY Times so desperate for readers that editors get up every morning begging Krugman to write and are willing to publishing anything he puts out there even if it is to their own detriment?

I love Op/Ed. I do. But all too many people who are given the power to write it, suck at it. Case in point (as I've pointed out previously) Rosie DiManno - next up seems to be Krugman. Call me one of high standards, but I like a good argument behind opinion especially arguments grounded in reality, legitimacy and thought. Not some mad raving.

At the height of the economic crisis when well explained writing on finance and economics was essential for the public to understand both how this crisis occurred and what could be done about it, Krugman was reduced to a regular weekly column series that should have been called "Pass the Stimulus. Trust me. I won the Nobel in Economics. I know best. Trust Me" with little to no argument to support his theories and opinions.

So this week when a friend of mine posted a FB link exclaiming Krugman's brilliance on this column, well, I nearly barfed. First because of the column, second because I knew someone who actually liked this schlock.

In "Reclaiming America's Soul" (NY Times, April 24/09, A23), Paul Krugman argues that the Obama administration should prosecute those associated with making key decisions at Guantanamo Bay because, well, attention must be paid and Americans love a good tar and feathering.

Well, that isn't exactly what he argues but it ends up feeling something like that.

Krugman actually argues that the Bush administration's actions with regard to GitMo exist as an aberration in the American moral fabric, and that the only means of moral retribution is prosecution whatever the (financial or moral) expense.

It's a noble idea. Unfortunately you can shoot holes through the concept more accurately than Dick Cheney can misfire a gun on a hunting trip shooting a friend (aka. it's not really that hard).

Now, I am not arguing that the actions of the Bush administration were just, fair or good. I am arguing that they were remarkably smart - knifing but smart.

Let's take a couple of perspectives on this.

Morality and Politics
Krugman states: "...America is more than a collection of policies. We are, or at least we used to be, a nation of moral ideas..." Incorrect. America was never built on moral ideas. In fact the traditional morals found in religious texts are explicitly separated from the concept of the state by the Constitution ('separation of church and state'). In the place of a state morally founded in religion, there exists a Bill of Rights which are Amendments to the Constitution stating the rights guaranteed to all citizens of the US. And that is the limit - to citizens. Not to vacationers, people wandering through the US and certainly not to foreign assumed terrorists. Are there international laws to protect people in the absence of a moral constitution? Yes, the International Declaration of Human Rights does this. The US is not a signatory.

GitMo as Historical Precedent
Krugman states: "For the fact is that officials in the Bush administration instituted torture as a policy...And during the march to war, most of the political and media establishment looked the other way." A student of history might inform Krugman about the difficulty of prosecution for a multitude of persons who carried out potential acts of torture. I wonder if Krugman is familiar with the cases of Adolf Eichman as well as the Miligram experiments of the 1950s?

During the trials of the Nazi war regime, Adolf Eichman a key SS henchman in the Holocaust argued as his defense that he was a military man simply carrying out orders on behalf of the regime. This defense was roundly rejected around in the world and in the US because, it was argued, an American would know the moral difference between right and wrong. Miligram, a professor at Harvard, conducted experiments showing in fact that Americans could be as immoral as everyone else. Experiment participants were sternly instructed to continue to electrocute subjects despite their pleas to stop and even to levels that cause death --- few American participants stopped.

So prosecution may not be so easy - really many of those actually doing the dirty work were only fulfilling the duties of their roles. That doesn't mean it was ethical. But neither was the creation and issuing of high risk mortgages, and we aren't going after those guys are we?

Prosecute from the Top
So then do we go for the big guys, the gold standard, the decision makers. Depends and perhaps. Let's start with the middle men decision makers. The unfortunate brilliance of the Bush policy with regard to GitMo was the status of the territory. Although US controlled and with US military installations, the land is not official US territory. Therefore, US laws, such as the Constitution, do not apply. Whether conventions such as the Geneva Convention on prisoners of war, which the US is a signatory to, apply is also questionable because of the legal limbo the territory exists in. So prosecuting those undertaking the acts or authorizing them is difficult, because in a territory free of law it's hard to pin them down for something.

So then why not go right to the top - to Bush or Cheney? Well, here is where democracies encounter interesting ethical dilemmas. As a representative of the people, CEO of the USA, Bush was ultimately accountable to the people, as was Cheney. And as an accountable President and VP, they could have been officially called into question through an official process. That, of course, would have been impeachment. Impeachment would have been a way to call into question the ethics of the administration with regard to the War on Terror and GitMo. The process is well laid out and clear in procedure. Yet, that did not happen.

Which brings me to an ultimate point. The problem with prosecutions is that because none of the checks on government began turning their wheels to stop prison camps at Guantanamo Bay (for example the judiciary did not act), and because the impeachment process was not begun, then the acts of the Bush administration must be reckoned with in a wholly different way. Instead of as a politcal/moral abberation (the Krugman argument) Guantanamo has to be looked at in the perspective as an aberration among the American people, with the people as a willing accomplice.

It was the reaction of a people who were confused and upset and scared about horrible acts of terrorism against them. They were panicked and didn't know what to do. Guantanamo was a means to an end. It was an attempt to capture those who were threats to the US. It was an honest mistake.

Certainly not all Americans felt it justified, but they were the minority to a seeming tyranny of the majority - a majority felt Guantanamo was justified (either through their actions or in actions) and in a democracy what most people (the majority) want is what happens.

What must be done instead is the maintenance of the record and making that record public. The biggest and best thing that can come of this is not repeating it. The only way that can happen is through a reconciliation with the record among the American public. Accepting their collective mistakes is the strongest thing the American public can do. That's not easy either. It's probably easier to undertake the Krugman method of pointing fingers to abosolve one's self of their acts or inacts.

If Krugman had a political science, ethics or history degree he wouldn't, couldn't, have made the ridiculous argument he did. It is the argument of a man looking for a mob - not one excising his right to free speech by putting forward interesting and well thought out arguments as part of the democratic process. I realize the last 8 years weren't easy for Krugman, but his need to make the Bush administration pay for this isn't the best reason to write an Op/Ed piece.

I hope Krugman finds his mob. He'll still be in the minority. And no one will have learned a damn thing for it.

Failures in Print

Although at this hour I can't seem to find the exact reference, I believe it is W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge that begins "Never have I begun a story with more trepidation." Such is my attitude toward, not this story, but this blog entry for a myriad of reasons.

It has been an odd day for me. It is futher even more odd for me to be writing this, due to a run-in with a reporter from one of the newspapers I am about to discuss. Needless to say this run-in was with a hometown girl, one that I've written of before. Let's just say that my prior concerns that she is unable to support an opinion/view in her writing was reiterated to me today in the most offensive of emails I received in response to an email I wrote her expressing concern about a piece she had recently authored. Her email to me and the original piece was offensive - we'll leave it at that.

At first, I wanted to take great strides to separate my experience today with this reporter from this blog. But really it has everything to do with it.

Recently both The Toronto Star and the Boston Globe have found themselves in financial difficulties. The Boston Globe to such an extent that it may have to shut its doors if $20million in concessions from the unions cannot be found according to recent reports. The Toronto Star is likewise in dire straits it seems. In early March it reported a $211 million loss and laid off 46 employees.

This is not unlike the story of newspapers around North America. Media outlets in Canada in both print and broadcast have found themselves in hard times. Rumor has it that CanWest/Southam may fold at any moment (due in part to stock prices that have fallen from $30 per share to meager pennies). In the US papers such as the Rocky Mountain News are closing after operating for 130 years. This is the sad account by the Mountain News of its own execution.

But here's where my day and the future of newspapers collide.

I'll be sad to see the end of the presses, if this does in fact happen. I'm sad too to see the shrinking of the industry if nothing else.

But, lately, there has been an odd convergence of "The Press" and the online media world. Papers somehow started to think less of themselves in my opinion - that by becoming online entities, they would and should participate in the online media landscape. This meant embracing Twitter, blogging and social interactions among their readership. I can understand how some Digital Media Manager at a newspaper thought this was the silver bullet, and got that big promotion.

But something else changed. Standards.

Among a growing number of papers I feel that the de rigeur of reporting is gone. There used to be the sense that the press was an authoritative source. Now it's all about opinions and columns. I will argue that even opinions must be corroborated to be legitimate, but (as I learned today) that is not necessarily the opinions of all the press. Apparently opinions can just be opinions - that's all.

I know I've been getting a sinking sensation of "OK, so you want them to pass the economic stimulus bill because you're a Liberal, but what other reasons support this opinion?" lately every time I read Krugman (today's blog entry is even called "One More Time").

Call me silly or naive, but I hold the paid/professional press to a different standard than your average screaming man on the street. Are professional reporters allowed to have opinions? Yes. But they must be founded in something to be, well, legitimate. That is a professional opinion. Can they have a personal opinion? Yes - but that should remain in their kitchen, living room or the backseat of their car.

In other words, I don't read newspapers to hear about a person's unprofessional opinion about issues. I can get that at my home. I look to press opinions for their expertise to be expressed in their Op-Eds, not their stupidity.

Now with bloggers I know I'm getting the living room opinion (literally in most cases as they tend to work out of their homes. I know I do). I don't expect anything greater from most than a whinny rant. Heck that's what a blog is - an online log/journal of one's life, opinions and ideas.

So when newspapers dipped their toes into the world of blogs and, even worse, poorly thought out personal opinion pieces presented as news - well, they kinda had it coming, didn't they?

Call me morose, but I think newspapers in general are causing their own death. In an attempt to be cool and hip for the kids, they've cannibalized their greatest assets.

Legitimacy. Honesty. Authority.

So we will have a more 'democratic' media, one in which even I through this blog can participate. But it will be less professional. More personal. However, as I've argued above, even without the influences of the blogs we seem to be headed in that direction anyway. Newpapers have forgotten their incrimental value over the blog - the value to the reader in the news itself that only they can deliver.

Long live the blog. Die press, die.