Hope you had a Merry Christmas, and have a Happy New Year. (2 weeks w/o internet but with a new job, and 4 kids before Christmas has left me busy.)

Reputation becomes more important, and yours is very high in my book! Keep it up please.

This is my first comment although I have been a reader for a time. I just wanted to note that as the proud owner of a blog, I feel pretty good about Time’s dedication. However, George will is not impressed and makes an arse of himself as he scoffs the idea as unthinkable. Perhaps he would like more recognition for his integrity-shy, journalism.

Hakim Abdullah

This is the first day my blog is functional. Beginning in the morning some time last Friday, my server was hit with a Denial of Service cyber attack. This is what my web host had to say when I tried to find out just what in tar-nation is going on:
Bo…

I noticed a headline article where Pat Buchanan says the same thing. I didn’t read it though.

It’s funny how I agree with him on this and the immigration issue. A former Nixon guy and he appears to be spot on when it comes to some important national issues.

John

nothing perks up a resume like an entry for “time magazine person of the year”, right?

offers should be rolling in anytime now, i reckon.

I am in Austin TX for family Christmas.

I believe Leftists at Time Magazine were beside themselves when they asked “Who was the most imfluential person of 2006?”

The answerer is so obvious it cost the Republicans the election – Iraq.

And who are the major players, either of whom would influence what happens in IraQ the most?

1 George W Bush, who’s policies have lead to teh present situation, and who can change directions for better or worse.

2 Nouri Al Makiki, Iraqui PM. He can change the direction of the war by bravely ordering the crushing of the Shiite and Suni militias, perhaps at his own expense – because he would irritate his powrer base for “doing the right thing”.

Because Al Malaki is a Bush supporter, he (and Bush) are off limits for Time.

But perhaps it’s more a matter of TIME having an intellectual void. It hasn’t been relevant for decades, and this “You” nonsense only serves to help nail the coffin lid tighter.

Yes, there is much more diversity in opinion. Yes, it hands the ability to mass communicate to just your average Joe. Yes, blogging can also pierce through some of the carefully orchestrated lies of the mainstream media.

All these positives are evidence that the monopoly of the MSM is loosening, and it is more difficult to concoct journalistic theatricals and present them as fact.

Or is it?

Along with this new diversified media comes a Greek chorus of the nonsensical and the blatantly false, standing to the side, fully dressed in their black garbs and wailing. Blogs and other online publishing platforms have so increased in number and scope that without a discerning eye or an extensive background in history or political science, a common passer-by surfing the wild seas of the net will have a lot of difficulty in deciphering what’s excrement and what’s not.

I think Peggy Noonan expressed this sentiment best in her Wall Street Journal Op-ed, “Media Anarchy Has Its Downside: We got freedom but lost standards”. Here’s the link if you want to read it. (http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/?id=110009009)

I cannot tell you how many people have come up to me excitedly telling me their newest discovery on the web. The conversation usually runs like this:

“Hey, man. I read somethin’ scandalous on the Internet yesterday.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“D’you know that the British crown still owns America? The reason why we get taxed so much is because we’re paying off the British crown! The United States is really still just another colony of the Brits!”

“Uh… Sir, where did you read this?”

“Off the net.”

“Oh.”

While blogging and online publishing can be very influential and serves the good of the public, the flip side of that coin is that this same medium can be the greatest promulgator of outright falsehoods and half-baked ideas. As Miss Noonan pointed out, there are no standards to veracity or integrity.

I think, what many discerning blog surfer would end up with is a list of a select few blogs managed by individuals (or groups) to whom they could give their trust. The rest would be relegated to curiosities and, for lack of a better word, digital fodder.

I don’t know if all of these unknowns warrant a place in this year’s “Person of the Year”. Even as I participate in this new medium, I am also trying to remain watchful at where all this is leading us.

Undiscovered countries, no doubt…