Items in: Public Policy

Items in this category address how, in a pluralistic society, we think about, analyze options for, discuss, evaluate, and ultimately set public policy. This category is fundamentally about process and working together, although rarely we may also advocate for certain public policy stances.

Context and summary Toward the end of February, 2021, a major US-national media entity published a short interview of a US senator (fewer than 1500 words). Interviews can be news done well, and there were good parts of the interview in question, yet it stumbled into three major errors that fail as news: The interviewer, whom I’ll refer to as J, failed to take the interview where J — and even […]

Real Fake News, No. 1

Public Discourse
As one style of Real Fake News, "use the interviewee as a prop" offers several ways for media folk to make it seem the interviewee is saying things that they're not, to push an agenda, and to avoid real issues by introducing off-topic, vague, and sensational content. Here we break down a recent media report.
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“This is the time to heal in America,” Joe Biden said in his election victory speech. I thought it was an obvious sort of “who could disagree with that?” kind of statement, but it was fawned over by commentators nonetheless. (Actually, there are some that might well disagree about healing because they think the USA needs a cultural revolution of a sort, but that’s a conversation for another day.) He […]

Post-Election Healing: Get Your Heart Transplant Now

Public Discourse
National healing requires much more than vague ideas to "be nice." The depth of pain caused by both sides demands a greater weight of action for relational reconciliation. Here are ideas for how to start, based on the principles behind Truth and Reconciliation commissions.
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