Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for February 07, 2021

“… and bring Eric Sevareid back with you, Mr. Cronkite.”

And that’s the way it was.

The new Pandora myth .

After panel 4, it all goes downhill. And here we are.

Or just bring back the news instead of opinion sharing!

I would settle for a return of the fairness doctrine.

And back then, we thought the internet would help spread information.

btw, I see Rat is copying Pig’s writing style.

Freedom without a conscience is not good.

Cronkite can’t come back; he’s been dead for 12 years. His grandson Walter Cronkite IV, on the other hand, might help as he’s on CBS.

Most people are certain they know what the truth is. The problem is we have too many certain people in the world.

Does that include all the other people who’ve commented here?

Again Mr Pastis exposes the reality of our current system of news gathering and communication. One can hope that the situation will improve but it doesnt feel like it. Read more comics!

Something I’ve figured out about humans, is that some of us can’t handle the harsh realities of life. So we delude ourselves with drugs, religion, and other things. I’ll take what’s real. Bring up the lights.

Al Gore was a genie? Who knew?

Be the change you want to see.

Not everyone can handle the truth.

The truth is merely a lie that hasn’t been found out yet!

Ya know, that perverse genie looks suspiciously like Cartoon-Boy. Besides, I was never such a “believer” in pompous St. Walter the Truthsayer anyway.

Let’s blame it all on Pastis (thereby giving Algore a break)!

The magic lamp is yellow with black jagged stripes. Good grief!

It would be nice to have a reliable and trustworthy face on the news at night like Cronkite or Brokaw, or Peter Jennings or Ted Koppel but I would rather Dan Rather stay retired though of the 5 gentleman mentioned he would be the one to fit most comfortably into one of the partisan media outlets due to his ego and feisty temperament.

“More censorship ! Let the government tell me what is the thruth !” …. And those people call themselves Americans.

No more news! Everything is sarcastic, like the Babylon Bee. That way, no one treats anything they read as gospel.

Except there ARE checks and gatekeepers and everyone CAN’T say whatever they want.

Walter Cronkite began the downward spiral of the media where no opposing ideas were allowed. Just study his coverage of the Vietnam War and you will understand.

Walter Cronkite lied about the Tet Offensive in 1968. He called it a US loss, but it was actually a great victory and the Vietcong were destroyed as a fighting force. It began the change of US public opinion and our leaving the war and not supporting the South Vietnamese. Millions were displaced, and Pol Pot was allowed free reign in Cambodia to commit genocide. It was set off by Walter Cronkite. The media lied then like they lied now. Google Walter Duranty to go back a little further to learn about the “unbiased” media and their inability to tell the truth.

When Cronkite did an editorial declaring Vietnam a failure, no doubt some thought he was a traitor. But presumably their numbers were fewer, and they couldn’t go tweet about it.

The way to combat lies is with truth. The way to combat truth is with bans.

Everyone notice that only leftists impose bans and regulators?

Which assumes that gatekeepers are telling the truth.

This entire line of argument leads to the conclusion that freedom of speech and the press are bad. this sort of argument has gone on since vernacular Bibles were printed which enabled people to read scripture without the clergy’s gatekeeping.

I tire of this “the news can’t be trusted anymore.” There have ALWAYS been opinions about everything. And ANYBODY who believes any of the following needs their heads examined: 1. the earth is flat, the sky is a big blue bowl put over the flat earth to stop believers from seeing god. 2. a venezuelan operative routed an electronic disruption to exactly six machines in six states ( or four, depending on whom you “read”) to flip EXACTLY 11, 300+ votes from dt to Biden. 3. that two of the most horrendous school shootings in the last 20 years were photo ops. 4. The CA wildfires were started by space lasers owned by Jews.

So much for free speech. Just spout leftist talking points.

Darn you social media! Your evilness knows no bounds.

And the rest is history.

And now you know …the rest of the story.We miss you Paul Harvey.

And toothpaste won’t go back in the tube either…

And here goes Cartoon Boy bitching about social media again. I know he’s a Gen-Xer; but as much as he bitches about social media and smartphones, you’d think he was a Baby Boomer or something.

Yep! Bitter sweet! I never did throw away my pad and pen!

Fits well with today’s Non Sequitur https://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2021/02/07

If only we had some sort of Minister of Truth or Truth Czar. Yes, that’s what we need. A gov’t employee that tells us only the things he wants us to know…. Nothing can go wrong, can it?

I would rather let the crazies speak, so we can see how crazy they are. Once you start suppressing voices, they go underground and become even more dangerous. Censorship is rarely a good thing.

Sponsored by the CCP.

If we implement power-over-IP we can send electric shocks over the Internet. Pavlov rules.

Without any checks or gatekeepers? Somebody hasn’t been paying attention to Facebook and twitter lately.

I thought that some megarich computercrat sold his soul to Satan and this was the result….

What? A world where anyone can say what they want? What sort of nightmare is that?!?!

Giant Space Lasers, anyone?

When news was presented by a ‘reader’ we were a bit better off. The elimination of the ‘reader’ and its replacement by a ‘commentator’ (sometimes common-tater…but that’s a different kettle of worms) sounded the death knell for an informed population. We are definitely in Samuel Clemens’ scenario where a person who doesn’t read the newspaper is uninformed and the person who DOES read the newspaper is misinformed. (I think I’ve shown great restraint here where Profanity is the crutch of the inarticulate….)

What a crock. Yeah, what we need are “gatekeepers.” Appointed by whom? The government? Good, and then what they allow will change every 4-8 years and THAT will make everything better. Gatekeepers for intellectual property are never a good thing because you’re always surrendering your freedom to the whim of another. Liberals always think THEY will be the gatekeepers and never consider that the pendulum swings both ways.

That’s how a seemingly good idea can have disastrous second order consequences.

I, too, miss Walter The Cronkite.

Kind of like the monkey’s paw story. (Don’t imagine the past was better. I think Past generations were less willing to be gullible. And had their priorities straight. And didn’t feel they had to know everything.)

Are you kidding? Walter Cronkite invented “fake news”. My friend called him “Walter the Red” back in the 70’s. Then came Dan Rather who embellished the news to make himself look more heroic for being there to report it. Impartial news reporting left us more than 70 years ago.

Yes, MUCH better to have only enlightened people be allowed to express their own opinions, and silence anyone who has a different opinion.

Another comment from one of the stupids.

Cronkite was as guilty of slanted and untrue reporting as others of his time. He just had a presence and reputation that let him get away with it.

Whatever is invented liars, crooks, stupids, and mental defectives will find a way to pervert it from its positive intended uses.

I would settle for liberals that weren’t imbeciles.

Walter Cronkite and Art Linkletter! Hmmm. That genie looks suspiciously like Stephan Pastis!

I have to smile at the naive belief that then news has ever given the whole truth instead of one take on it. The real world and its events are too complex for that.

How did the first two panels ever get by the Censors ? !!!

He was OK, but no Edward R. Murrow - good night and good luck. Joe McCarthy, burn in heck!

I would wish for a world without stupid people. It would solve the population problem as well.

I miss “Uncle Walter”

You forgot “bloggers” who think they are journalists

I’d be happy to settle for Dan Rather given the Charlie Foxtrot we have now…

Woohoo! Let’s ban the first amendment! And the rest of the constitution because it is racist or something!

Guess he never got the genie back in the bottle.

Good night and good luck.

Everyone has always been confused and angry since the dawn of civilization; the internet just made it easier.

It could work, but you know, people; if only we could learn to think for ourselves critically and have a moral backbone. Sigh.

Is that you, Al Gore?

Pastis is a pathetic sap wanting to be spoon-fed information because he’s too lazy to think for himself or simply incapable of it.

Congratulations, such fine examples of today’s strip.

Unlimited free speech is fairness!

“Pandora’s Bottle”? Demon Rum, maybe?

Super bowl anyone? Brady or Mahoms

Soooo true.

The Internet, huh? Not unlike Soylent Green, it’s made of people.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sGArqoF0TpQ

I remember. Walter Cronkite, barely. When President Kennedy was assassinated and when John Glenn walked on the moon. That man was the most trusted man in the world.

And then the box of Pandora was slammed shut, and all that remained in it was hope.

This is not a genie situation. It’s a monkey’s paw.

That little mustache doesn’t look good on Al Gore.

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