Bejing protest - Mediated Communication Assignment

While sitting in a model home in Stone Cliff, where I practice real estate, I had a short conversation with an associate of mine who, while talking of some recent travels to the wall of China, mentioned current pro-democracy protests.  I was taken aback because I, being the newshound that I am, generally learn about such things before anyone else.  After the conversation, I quickly pulled up a news article from Reuters.   Reuters is, in my opinion, less biased than other sites that claim to be news outlets, however as I read the article and tried to be critical, I noticed a few things.

                If I were neutral in the fact that I favored neither a communist or democratic government, I would have at least mentioned why the current communist government had placed in the restrictions to the upcoming elections.  In its second paragraph, the article paints the police as ruthless in the next the protesters are singing songs and chanting slogans.  Rationally, I can’t think why police would charge peaceful protests and the article failed to mention if there was destruction of property or other issues of violence by the protesters.  In such large groups there are seldom times when they are free of violent instigators. 

                I have opinions on Chinese censorship, but from a neutral position it seems odd that an article would not state reasons for police aggression.  Contrasting this article to the recent protests in Ferguson, a Reuters article indicated that the police used tear gas and stun grenades but the article quickly pointed out that the reaction by the police was a response to violent action from the protestors.  Reuters and those who it employees are largely from countries with high emphasis on democracy and freedom of the press.  This fact certainly could influence the truth that if they were to publish such a story in China, it would be immediately censored.  In other words free press is the enemy of Chinese government, does it make sense for the enemy to try to do a neutral reporting on something occurring in that country that could ultimately benefit the press itself? 

                I personally believe the Chinese government be way over restrictive and believe that although the protests must have some aggressive elements in them, the police response is over reactive.  I think it’s interesting however to see this kind of argument from another angle even if subscribe to a different point of view.

Climate Change - Stop the Spending

The United States is spending more and more on climate change regulations.  With the debate still raging between different parties and groups, halting the spending on regulations and allowing more 3rd party research to take place would allow leveled debate and permit the US public to arrive at a democratic consensus (a vote).  With the United States own accountability office reporting that we have spent well over 110 billion dollars in the last ten years on climate change it is time that the spending is stopped.

Larry Bell, a contributor with Forbes Magazine, wrote an article and stated within that we should “Consider that current policies are costing hundreds of billions we can’t afford along with millions of lost employment opportunities; all based extensively on a bogus, politically manufactured climate crisis devoid of any supportable scientific evidence.”  The fact that such a claim exists merits the need for a debate.  Is climate change spending really in the public interest?

This particular item, public interest, has always been a politically volatile phrase.  President Obama in Executive Order 13563, mandated that while agencies institute regulations, they “must protect public health, welfare, safety, and our environment while promoting economic growth, innovation, competitiveness, and job creation....It must allow for public participation and an open exchange of ideas.  It must promote predictability and reduce uncertainty.”  With 61% of the US public polling skeptic or still in the middle, this is hardly an indication that the public is participating or has an open exchange of ideas with those implementing these policies.

With outrageous statements like some from climate change proponent, Al Gore, saying that there was a 75% chance that the polar ice caps could be ice free by 2014.  There is now clear evidence that some of these scares are nothing but scares.  With the northern polar ice cap at its minimum extent for 2014 of 5.02 million square kilometers  and with the southern ice cap with a record breaking 20 million square kilometers, it is clear that there are some discrepancies in the claims that hurried our nation into implementing very cost full policies.

The reason we must stop these policies is to protect our country from future debt.  If these policies are necessary, they should be established as factual needs after some carefully scrutinized hypothesis and results.  If these were medical lab experiments and the predictions made by some of the pharmacist and chemists turned out to be drastically off, would we start distributing the pill?  Of course not!  The fact that there is still a large portion of Americans unsure if climate change exists, the fact that many predictions are failing, and the fact that we are spending billions of dollars based on these claims, merits the need for a pause in the implementation of policy and spending.  If there is, in fact, a climate change danger, we are certainly jumping the gun.