Fool me once, shame on you...fool me twice shame on me...fool me three times...shame on the media?

If America of today continues down the path it is heading it won't be long before everything will be free. Just look around you this election year and count how many things are being given away. Free prescription drugs, free child care, free health insurance, etc, etc. The path of least resistance is where we are going as fast as we can. The problem with this is that nothing is for free. We are paying for these things with our independence and dignity. The cost are being born by the avarice and greed of a government without any effective checks on it's growth and obsession with making and keeping it's people dependent.

The politicians of today are catering to people's base desires of something for nothing and fewer and fewer people are aware of or care about the dangers involved in this. This country has grown in economic complexities and cultural diversity since it's inception, yet one thing hasn't changed, that is, our freedoms are always fragile and must be guarded tenaciously.

The preservation of our freedom is contingent upon an equal administration of law, even and especially against those who would run for political office with a platform of our "collective best interests" as their first priority. For example, in our current administration the word "is" has been parsed to mean whatever it had to mean at the time to enable the president to escape the rule of law that he swore to uphold. How can it be seen as in our best interest  if the same standard of law when applied in other areas of society would dangerously compromise the rule of law? The president's definition of sex was similarly mutated into an exculpatory rendering on his part to allow his "political viability" to remain intact. Again, overlay this approach on contract law, patent and trademark protections, labor negotiations or other legal safeguards and the results would be a degradation of the functionality of our economy and the systemic abrogation of societal cohesion.

 Additionally,  he promised to cut taxes for the middle class as well as announced that the era of big government was over. Yet,  government continues to grow unabated and the middle class never were delivered the tax cut as promised. During his campaigns, his communitarian façade was for the itching ears of the simple minded who elected him as they believed his words. Also, the media sounded no alarms to show that America was lied to. These examples present a background of the way this administration circumvents accountability. They are listed here in part to point out that in regards to the media, this president and his administration (of which Al Gore is a part) are not held to the complete rule and standard of law, nor are they held to the same standard that Republicans are. Just ask Republicans Dan Quayle or then former vice-president George Bush, who for example, was never in a SR-71 supposedly flying a secret mission to have the Carter era, Iranian hostages freed for the political gain of President Reagan, about fair and impartial media coverage.

Former speaker of the house Tom Foley thought,  that despite there being no evidence to support these allegations, he must show his care for the "rule of law" because  the "mere appearance of impropriety" (his standard) was sufficient for the investigation of Bush. The media went along with this and looked in vain for any evidence to bring Bush down. So it is today. The media loves the "rats" of George W. Bush's campaign while hating the "moles" of Al Gore's campaign.

This brings us to the relationship between the media's weak enforcement of investigative journalistic standards regarding Al Gore's repetitive lies about his invention of the internet, he and his wife's place in the inspiration of the novel Love Story, the lullaby of his mother from a song not written until he was twenty seven years old or the creation of the strategic petroleum reserve to name a few. It is clearly the case of preferential treatment being shown for Al Gore by the media so damage to his campaign will be muted and these bold faced lies can be swept under the rug of non-coverage. If George W. Bush told even one lie of this nature we would have seen the coverage of it non stop, day and night, for weeks. He would be turned into the next Dan Quayle. Let us make an association regarding Al Gore and his lies. Ask yourself, like Bill Bradley asked, if Al Gore lies so regularly as a candidate, how can we trust him as president? If he says he will provide prescription drugs, "save" Medicare, retire the debt, create good jobs, eliminate poverty, improve our military, "save" the environment, give tax cuts to the "right" people, etc, etc... can we believe him? Or as we stated earlier, does it depend on what "is" "is"?

 Do we dare look to the main stream press for honest standards of journalistic integrity when they report on each candidate and where they stand on the issues? The answer clearly is that no thinking person dare trust the media or Al Gore with giving us the truth or with preserving our freedom. Liberty is ours if we value it. Liberty and justice are for all or they won't be here for long.