Take your internet with a Pinch of Salt

Greetings,

The free online dictionary defines the phrase "take something with a pinch of salt (British & Australian, American & Australian)
if you take what someone says with a pinch of salt, you do not completely believe it. You have to take everything she says with a pinch of salt. She has a tendency to exaggerate. It's interesting to read the reports in the newspapers, but I tend to take them with a grain of salt. "

http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/take+with+a+pinch+of+salt

I remember seeing an interview of young Muslim girls at a madrassah who stated as fact some obvious fallacy about western culture. The reporter asked her how she know this "fact" to which she replied that she had read it on the internet.

If it's on the internet it must be true? How can anyone believe that? How can anyone believe anything anymore? Well, to a discerning reader, one who has keen insight, reading falshoods online is part of the amusement and interest of the internet. To quote the song, "We all laughed at Christopher Columbus..." there once was a time when everybody believed that the world was flat and was at the center of the universe. How silly you looked, and risked so much, if you said you believed the world was round, or worse still, that the earth went around the sun.

Well does a photograph prove those thousand unbelieveable words? Yes and no.... I mean anyone can open up photoshop and doctor a photograph. Indeed the world's media are not above that sort of lie. I remember one photograph of Tony Blair which, it was later proved, had been modified to show a larger gap between him and someone else, implying some sort of rift between the two people. Subtle visual evidence used to "prove" the journalist's point of view.

Nor do these less-than-honest journalists have to physically modify photographs. If you take enough photographs of some poor politician you are bound to catch them with their mouths open, or yawning, or even picking their noses. So when the left leaning media want to denigrate these public figures.... you guessed it, another photograph of George W. picking his nose or whatever. You can't imagine the photo editor at the New York Times publishing a photo of George W smiling when they're criticising him.

So what if the world is flat? What if two and two make five? It must be true, I read it on the internet.....

Have a pinch of salt from me... after all I read the other day some guy has won the world lying championship five times running, or so he says.

Cheers.

Greetings,

Pretty little landing site on the shores of Seneca Lake, near Ovid, NY.

A gentleman fell off the dump truck. Well, actually the wire between the telephone poles knocked him off.

We took him to hospital where he's doing well.

Cheers.

Barking at Seagulls - It's a Dog's Life

Greetings,
How humdrum life would be if there were no seagulls to bark at - Rudi and Sterling's favourite boating activity.


And then home because it's dark. (Note how beautifully visible the swim float is in the dark!)


Cheers

Conesus Lake

Greetings,

Oh how pretty, how hot and humid today, how can I possibly afford it? I can't.... but it's a good sacrifice.

Benazir Bhutto - Former PM of Pakistan - in talks with Pervez Musharraf

Listening to BBC World Service on my new XM satellite radio tonight (in my first new car since 1978) I was somewhat delighted to hear that Bhutto is hoping to return to Pakistan.

Why am I delighted? Well, for one thing Pakistan has to be encouraged and maintained as an ally in the fight against terrorism. Her strategic importance to the region, both geographically and politically, make her about as important a nation as any. A wish for a return to democracy has to be foremost in the mind of all clear thinking commentators.

I look forward to reading some editorials and watching some news later tonight to see if the talks have totally stalled or whether, as the BBC suggested, there are few obstacles in the path towards the end of Benazir Bhutto's exile.

Watch this space.

Read the news item...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6974083.stm