Travel broadens the mind, so they say. So I am off to the bosom of my family in Aberdeenshire for a family wedding. Can't say I am being very green as far as travel is concerned: Last week Warsaw, this week Aberdeen, next week Japan- via the UAE-, then Zagreb, Tirana, Warsaw again and then the Viljandi Folk festival in Estonia. Lots of CO2 emissions, must remember to buy the carbon bank equivalent to off-set. I wonder, did David Cameron plant a forest for his emissions on his trip to Norway- hmm hmm- possibly not a good idea to dwell on DC's emissions... though it is hardly likely that you would beleive them anyway.
The past decade has seen the rise of so-called "post truth" politics. Instead of mere misrepresentation of facts to serve an argument, political figures began to put forward arguments which denied easily provable facts, and then blustered and browbeat those who pointed out the lie. The political class was able to get away with "post truth" positions because the infrastructure that reported their activity has been suborned directly into the process. In short, the media abandoned long-cherished traditions of objectivity and began a slow slide into undeclared bias and partisanship. The "fourth estate" was always a key piece of how democratic societies worked, since the press, and later the broadcast media could shape opinion by the way they reported on the political process. As a result there has never been a golden age of objective media, but nevertheless individual reporters acquired better or worse reputations for the quality of their reporting and
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