I'm a news freak. I drive people crazy because the news is on my television even if I'm not watching. My 2-½ year old son can identify "Wolf" and "Cokie" just as easy as he knows who "Elmo" is. I just bought a new stereo and it's barely been broken in. I have CDs that I bought a year ago but I haven't heard them yet. It's because I have more important things to hear. I haven't heard those things yet, but they must be coming soon. I'm positive. I grew up on Walter Cronkite and I'm waiting for those immortal words, "…and that's the way it is." I just know it'll happen soon so don't anybody touch that dial! Somebody please tell me the way it is!

Then reality sets in. That annoying little voice that keeps telling me I'm wasting my time not to mention my cable fee. "Watch a 'Frasier' re-run" it says. "You'll laugh….you'll feel better and best of all…….you won't miss anything." I'm beginning to hate that voice. Probably because I'm starting to realize that voice is right.

I mean, what am I waiting to hear? Do I really think CNN is finally gonna fess up and say Bush stole the election? Will MSNBC actually get around to telling me just how dangerous and completely loony tunes John Ashcroft is? Will FNN actually do a documentary paralleling the domestic actions of our court appointed administration with the early years of the Third Reich? Will Mike Wallace really look into the unusually large amounts of short stocks sold just prior to September 11th? Will 20/20 do a story about the discrepancies surrounding the crash of flight #93? With all the conservative talking heads out there desperately trying to blame Clinton for all this, will somebody do a story on Bush Inc. prohibiting pursuing Osama bin Laden months before the attacks?

Aw, who am I trying to kid?

It's difficult living in a conservative area in a democratic state. Talking to friends and co-workers about the real untold story as far as what's happening to our country right now is like screaming on deaf ears. New York State is full of conservative "pot-holes" and, lucky me, I live in one of them. We have a newspaper with a monopoly on the "information" the people get. Like many small to medium towns in America we are deprived of real journalism. We have no NY or LA Times nor do we have anything close to the Washington Post. And even those publications have changed recently.

Binghamton, N.Y. is blessed with one journalist not afraid to speak up against the corporate owners. I recently called this man to thank him for an article he did on Ashcroft's reckless behavior and made mention that it must feel to him like he's a "lonely voice in the darkness." He couldn't have agreed more. I wonder how many others feel like they're alone in all this chaos? This propaganda?

And yet, when we speak out, people look at us as if we don't love our country. Just what am I waiting for the mainstream media to do, I wonder? Tell the truth? I cannot shake the feeling of being a marionette every time watch any news broadcast. Or commercial, for that matter. Whether it be the NYSE, the travel bureau of America, various insurance companies…whatever, they're all waving flags in my face while they play majestic music, show a couple of pictures of smiling kids and some groups of firemen at Ground Zero, play on my sympathies just before they stick me with whatever they're trying to sell. Patriotism, American Style.

Good Lord, even the Post Office has got one up and running! I started cracking up when I put their commercial together with the warnings the postmaster general issued a few weeks ago. If you do that, the commercial should go something like; (start heartfelt music and pictures of smiling American postal workers here...oh, and don't forget the flags!!)…."Neither snow nor rain nor dark of night…shall keep us from our appointed rounds….to bring you mail that you should probably open in your garage with a pair of barbecue tongs……."

Is anybody else feeling like this? We've been told to live our lives, go back to business, and fly the friendly skies (even though we've been warned that we will be shot down should the plane do anything "funny.") Meanwhile, we have Tom Ridge issuing "alerts" based upon "credible" but "inconclusive" intelligence. Don't worry, folks, just a little warning to let you know you're not safe which should keep you all worrying while the administration secretly chips off one more of your civil liberties while you spy on your neighbor. Just another day in Bush's America.

So I turn the TV back on and wait. C-Span shows me spineless Democrats rolling over for fear of being labeled "unpatriotic." CNN shows me "Behind the Veil" for the 1000th time just to make sure I hate the Taliban. MSNBC continues to employ snotty little anchors that berate anybody who would dare speak against the appointed administration. Fox parades Geraldo like the paid for trophy he's become while doing everything short of raising the nazi flag. I don't know, maybe I should just watch "Frasier" reruns. The so-called Liberal Media isn't going to report on Halliburton or Mazen Al-Najjar or the proposed Northwood Operation or anything resembling the truth about what's really happening to all our flag stands for.

I mean, if Bush says that "we will make no distinction between the terrorists and those who harbor or finance them", then what about Oliver North who armed Iran ? Or North's boss Ronald Reagan? Or the patriarch of a quaint little place in Kennebunkport, Maine? After all, Bush Sr. was not only 'in the loop' of Iran-Contra, but he also covertly armed and financed Saddam Hussein's military right up to the Kuwaiti invasion. And we now know that the Bushes and the bin Laden family have long-standing business ties, most recently through Bush Sr's employer—the Carlyle Group. Why aren't the media reporting on the hypocrisy of Bush Jr's logic on the War on Terrorists?

Oh, that's right…..that would be "unpatriotic." Well, in light of that reason, allow me to enlighten the so-called patriots. "Why, of course the people don't want war ... But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger."--Hermann Goering, Nazi leader, at the Nuremberg Trials after World War II.

"And that's the way it is." Right now.

Scary, huh?