Right to Opine

Wonder why some of us refuse to watch CNN? Hacks like Christiane Amanpour, who deliberately misstate the facts in order to push a liberal agenda. Here, for example, she insists that the water torture of the Khmer Rouge—which resulted in thousands of murders—is identical to the waterboarding employed by the CIA under Bush (starts around 4:15). Regardless of where you stand on waterboarding, the methods of the CIA and the Khmer Rouge aren’t even similar (except in their use of water) much less identical. She may be correct in abhorring waterboarding, but that doesn’t justify the quite intentional falsification she employs. She’s entitled to her own opinion. She’s not entitled to her own facts. That’s simply propaganda, not journalism.

A common misconception on the left is its arrogant and elitist notion that if only conservatives were better educated they’d be more liberal.

• Marx studied law in Bonn and Berlin.
• Lenin had a degree in law (his father was an official in the Russian education system).
• Stalin attended Tiflis Theological Seminary and was later a private tutor/instructor.
• Mao Zedong went to Beijing University.
• Ho Chi Minh was educated in France and was, at one time, a teacher.
• Pol Pot was a graduate of the École Française d’Électronique et d’Informatique (French School of Electronics and Computer Science) in Paris.

On the other hand:

• George W Bush and Clarence Thomas graduated from Yale.
• Thomas Sowell is an economics fellow at Stanford.
• Bill O’Reilly holds degrees from Boston University and Harvard.
• Charles Krauthammer holds degrees from both Harvard and Oxford.
• Michelle Malkin went to Oberlin (a rather left-wing college).
• Bobby Jindal went to Brown University and Oxford (Rhodes Scholar).
• Newt Gingrich got his PhD in history from Tulane and was a college history prof for almost a decade before entering politics.

The difference isn’t education. It’s values.