The Time Has Come to Require Licenses for the Practice of Journalism ...

The only thing necessary for EVIL to triumph in our modern technological age is to have a largely unaccountable media intent on delivering biased, propaganda-driven 'news and information' under the guise of true journalism.

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Unless of course people no longer seek truth? Maybe people these days are content merely to be entertained? Then the famous Edmond Burke quote would apply "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is that good men [care to] do nothing."

The conclusion of the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller's report has left a lot of unanswered questions, but  not  lingering questions about President Trump and alleged "collusion/obstruction" as the left-leaning media would have you believe  [Omission is the weapon of choice for fools?].  No rather, these lingering questions center around our intelligence agencies and how they go about the business of conducting the "behind the scenes" business of protecting our nation.  While I am alarmed at the abuses of power at the highest level of our intelligence community leading up to the last Presidential Election, and even post-election, I still strongly believe the bulk of the intelligence community are honest and hardworking people dedicated to the defense of our great nation. That being said, somewhere along the way it appears a group of high ranking intelligence officials lost their way and abused their positions of power for purely partisan ends.  These fringe officials used a non-verified dossier --the origins of which are highly suspicious and may wind up pointing back to the Hillary Clinton campaign and Russia-- in order spy on a presidential candidate and his election campaign in an effort de-legitimize his candidacy and later his Presidency.  In short, a few bad actors literally weaponized the FBI for partisan ends.

Ironically, in decades past it would be the media demanding answers and doing the follow up to get to the bottom of this sort of abuse of power.  The mainstream media has throughout the majority of our American History served in the role of "watchdog" for our government officials, helping to ensure abuses of power never happen in the absence of accountability.  In the rare instance when abuses of power have occurred the media have usually been the first ones to shine a far-reaching bright light upon the perpetrators.  So what do you do when those responsible for helping to ensure accountability in our system are no longer accountable themselves?  At the very least, one would hope the media --and the government investigations!-- would objectively push for a balance of coverage in exposing the other side of the story, namely investigating of the origins of "Trump Dossier" and Clinton ties to Russian influential entities (e.g., Uranium One), but thus we have not seen this balance in coverage. Even a lack of balance in coverage could perhaps have been forgiven?  But what we have witnessed from the left-leaning mainstream media over the course of the past two years is far more egregious:  the mainstream media have overtly colluded with the fringe elements in our intelligence community and even government officials --e.g., Adam Schiff, Maxine Waters, Eric Swalwell-- to push a one-side unsubstantiated narrative based on unproven allegations, and in many instances outright lies, all towards the end of convincing the American public --and the world at large-- that Robert Mueller's investigation could lead to no conclusion short of treason on the part of Donald J. Trump.

Such a scam of epic proportions could never have been foisted upon the American public to the extent that this entire "Russia-Trump Collusion" Hoax has been, without the overt collusion between the media and prominent Democrats --working together with fringe elements in the intelligence community-- to further misinformation.  A whole lot of CNN (and the like) viewers must have been completely bewildered when it was finally announced, on Monday, that the Mueller probe had successfully concluded and that President Trump was NOT going to be charged with either collusion or obstruction.  Given what we have witnessed over the course of the past two years, I think it is evident to most logically thinking, factually-oriented people -- those who possess even a shred of willingness to pursue factual truth-- that the left-leaning mainstream media is no longer interested in the objective pursuit of truth with which to inform the public.  Instead the left-leaning mainstream media now have their own agenda and this agenda is based on a profit-driven (fear) motive and the furthering one political agenda (ideology) over another.  The objective "watchdog" media is now dead, along with the art of true journalism?  Maybe objective truth still lives on at FOX News?  For this is the only network I witnessed attempting to cover all aspects of the 'Russian Collusion' story (i.e., both sides of the story) in a responsible, objective manner.  Then again, there is still C-Span where you can witness firsthand some of the inner-workings of our government and then draw your own conclusions, sans interpretation by others.

While I remain confident in the ability of the intelligence community to "clean house" --although I do most sincerely feel for the people whose lives were destroyed and savings decimated as they tried to defend themselves, something should be done to help these collusion-innocent individuals recover some of their losses-- I do not possess a similar optimism for our American mainstream media.  The left-leaning mainstream media's incessant coverage and prolific speculation on the "Russian collusion" narrative these past two years --given the conclusions drawn with the closing of the Mueller investigation-- has been proven to be beyond the antithesis of anything remotely resembling true journalism.  Surely something has to be done to hold the media accountable moving forward given the volumes of misinformation, if not outright lies, we have witnessed pouring forth from the mainstream media over the course of these past two years?  And I haven't even started in on the media's "sins of omission" in covering any of the positive things President Trump and his administration were able to accomplish in spite of the ongoing shadow cast by the Mueller investigation and rampant media speculation.  Don't you kind of miss the days when omission in journalism used to be sin?

Quite frankly, the only way I can think to introduce some accountability back into the system is to require a license in order to practice journalism [I guess, the FCC would be the entity providing oversight for such licensing requirements?].  Where a clear distinction would be made between journalism and opinion/editorial content.  Yes, sadly I think the time has finally come where we need to begin licensing the profession of Journalism, just like any other  professional degree/job (e.g., lawyers, medical practitioners, hairdresser, mechanics), complete with a code of ethics and clearly articulated standards to which practitioners are held accountable.  Then when any licensed journalist willfully violates this code of accountability they will lose their license to practice further.  Taking it a step further, news channels should have to clearly indicate --via a little icon/logo in the lower left or right  hand corner of the screen-- whether they are a "news" show or an "opinion" show, such that viewers would be able to more clearly understand the information they are being given (i.e., verifiable facts vs. opinions). Where news shows will be required to verify their sources and information before going public or at least to state when sources are deemed necessarily confidential.  It would also be nice to have a complete list of verifiable sources included in the closing credits of any given show so viewers can do their own follow-up, should they so desire.  In this way viewers would be able to detect for themselves when a network/individual show might be giving out questionable information if much of their content was designated "necessary confidential." *

So bottom line, speak up now or forever hold your peace???  Because many prominent Democrats still aren't done trying to discredit President Trump and his administration just yet and you can bet that the biased propaganda arm of the mainstream media will most assuredly back them up.  These knuckleheads want to waste even more congressional time and more taxpayer dollars chasing after purely partisan ends???  I say, ENOUGH ALREADY!!!  How about you???  I mean just think on the things we could have done with a whopping $$$30 million dollars --estimated cost of the Mueller investigation-- and a focus on enacting meaningful legislation that actually benefited "we the people" as opposed to this incessant focus on "Russia, Russia" and discrediting President Donald J. Trump, his family and loyal support staff.  What a terrible precedence this whole narrative of "collusion/obstruction" sets for undermining the legitimacy of any Presidency moving forward.  If you don't like a given President, you can simply hamstring them and their administration with endless investigations, running out the clock until the next election cycle.  How is that in any way representative of  the will of "We the People"?  Hint:  It's NOT!  And the fact this has happened --is continuing to happen-- should make every non-elitist American outraged.  Why? Because next time around it could be your choice for President whose duly elected legitimacy is challenged.  More importantly no President can effectively set about fulfilling the duties of the Office of the President of the United States when they are mired down in ongoing, unjustified investigations.  We must act now, and decisively, if we are ever to put this 'genie' of a wholly unaccountable media  back into its bottle!  As for the 'resistance' politicians, well actions will end up speaking louder than their words should they choose to continue down the path of 'resistance', a.k.a. doing nothing truly meaningful on behalf of "We the People."

P.S.  So sorry for so many typos! I am trying to type with a wrist bandage around my entire right hand. 

* 1/26/2019 late p.m.  It occurs to me that market capitalists will argue that if these media networks are found to be corrupt and untrustworthy then no one will watch them anymore and the market will self correct, ultimately putting them out of business.  And in point of fact, CNN's ratings took a real nosedive in the aftermath of the Mueller Report release, so I would agree with this "market correction" theory in the short term.  Were we operating even a decade ago, I might support this theory in the longer term, but the problem is times have changed.  We now have two warring political ideologies and one side truly believes they are in a fight for our very existence --notice how often the term "existential threat" is used in day to day conversation these days--  and this side is backed up by billionaires (e.g., Tom Styer) who are on board with this newer extreme of political ideologies and they have the capital to back it up.  Moreover, they need a biased media to spread their 'truth' to an unsuspecting public, so that they can maintain power and control over 'the stupid people' for the greater good.  Bottom line these media outlets, much like the banks on Wall Street, are simply too big --bigly backed-- to fail.

2/10/2019 The really bad migraines have returned again.  It may be a few weeks before I can write coherently once again.  Until then, be informed, be well and try to find your own path to happiness ... Joy is waiting right around that corner.  ~PJP