Distracted

I've been pretty distracted by the news lately.  That's why I haven't been posting.  Well, that and the fact that it's been a rather busy fall.  I only have so much online time and I've been using it to bang my head against a wall in the discussion sections of a newspaper or two. 

I don't know why I do that.  Most of the people who post to those things are cranky, ideological jackasses.  They don't want to actually talk about the issues, they want to argue about them, score points, win the fight.  Most of them don't know what the heck they're talking about.  They speak in logical fallacies and quote opinion pieces as though they were news.  They're utterly convinced that they're absolutely right about things that they know very little about. 

I'm cranky, too.  These folks are turning me into a cynic, and I don't like it at all.  I think of this quote - "A cynic is just a man who found out when he was about ten that there wasn't any Santa Claus, and he's still upset." - James Gould Cozzens.  That's not the person I want to be.

So I'm going to stay away from the comments sections and try to regain my faith in humanity.  If I feel strongly about an issue I'll write to my elected representatives rather than bang my head on the wall on some discussion board. 


FT