Maher: Campaign dirty tricks

Howard, I have found that anyone who gets their "news" from limited sources is doomed to be truly uninformed. I make sure I watch a counter part for every news source I view. For Maher I counter with O'Reilly, NBC vs. CNN, Stewart and Colbert vs. Hannity and Colms, N.Y. Times vs. WSJ and so on and so on.... I try to do my best to use get as much information as possible knowing the truth lies in the middle. I also try to do my best to go on shows websites to get their sources and verify them myself. This very time consuming and takes a lot of DVR space and late nights online but I get very discouraged whenever I encounter someone just spouting inaccuracies. I don't care if it's someone from my party or the opposition. "Kool-aid drinkers" are as dangerous as (as Dan put it) "Kooks". I try to do my best to put on both sets of shoes. Of course I'm not saying that I'm always successful at seeing all sides of an issue but it's amazing what you do learn by making an honest attempt at it.

I think most of us agree that change is good and always welcome. I have yet to speak with anyone that wants things to remain the same. The question is should change be a moderate or drastic thing. If you're too moderate will things actually change, or change quick enough to head-off catastrophic failures. If change is too radical and happens too quick it might do massive damage in a short time that may take years to repair. People grow impatient if change is slow to come, yet people don't like radip change either. If change is drastic and quick, did people really give it a chance? How do we really know if it failed. Walking that thin line is extremely difficult. Someone must be cautious yet eager, react quickly with conviction because reacting too slowly might be misinturpreted as still having doubts. Everyone needs to look at both sides of an issue and check the history books. I find history an amazing tool. Not many situations fall in the "this has never happened" catagory. We need to be more aware of what G. Santayana said, "Those who failed to learn from history are doomed to repeat it".