News for News Sake

I have been reading lately...yes, I do read from time to time...and it seems everyone has a comment about newspapers or magazines having a liberal or conservative bent. Whatever, happened to News for News sake. Did this genre die out in the 1940's or something. Why is it that commentators think the average American is an idiot? I am average and I am not an idiot. Newspapers have labels such as The New York Times, or Kansas City Star, Time Magazine or even CNN programs such as AC 360 are labeled as "Liberal". Well, this may be true but give me some credit. I have the ability to interpret what I read.

I am a Democrat by a long family tradition but I possess Conservative values because I am also a Catholic. I hate to mix my religion and my politics. I have stated before that I hate politics and I still do. It is however, a necessary evil in our democratic republic and our times in general. (did you see I mixed the two together Democrat and Republican, I even got a little military terminology in there..general...get it?). Anyway, I digress, Why is it that I cannot read any article without it having a "Conservative" or "Liberal" label attached to it. Why am I also chastised for not having the knowledge to know the difference. I do, I see a viewpoint for what it is. I am not brainwashed by a certain statement exception for the Holy Father, the Pope. What he says goes...

Did you see that? Did you catch on to that? Did you see what I just did there. You were thinking this guys a "Liberal" but then I threw in His Eminence, The Pope. I can be both or in my case, not either, not anything. I take a stand on issues for issue sake. I refuse to be labeled. I vote for and how I want. I read an article and judge for myself its merits and its drawbacks. I am not swayed unless I read something to sway me, something to agree or disagree with. Even on the TV, a commentator who is either "Conservative" or "Liberal", brands their guest speakers in either of the same vane, vain? Admittedly, it is usually a forum for a he said, she said opposition type view. See there...again I have input a sexist slur into my writing...he said, did you catch that...

At any rate, I would just once like to read or listen to news, articles of interest, or even a Martha Stewart "Good thing" without attaching a label to it. I have been labeled throughout my entire life and from school age forward I have let myself be hurt and sometimes held back by labels. I am a LIAR or so you might be told by some. I am GAY, as you might to told by others. ((Of which I am not...but as Jerry Seinfeld so well put it there is nothing wrong with it.) Well actually my faith tells me so but I will not judge those but before God.) I am said over-EMOTIONAL and UnSTABLE by a few still. I am a FOOL and a BASTARD (the latter is true unfortunately). The point I am so uneloquently, trying to make is that labels actually hurt more people than they help. I have many issues that a lot of therapy has tried to untangle because of the labels that someone placed upon me and grew into my flesh like the portrait of Dorian Grey. (Read the book, its a good one). Today, I am none of the things I mentioned, except the Bastard (in the antiquated sense of the word), that is a label that I wear with pride because I wouldn't be who I am without it. I would be someone else that perhaps didn't get a label but Mr. Destiny has yet to rearrange my existence. Perhaps tomorrow I shall wake up to a different life. I fear that life although different would have ultimately been the same because no matter the life the labels are still there. We must create a new way to co-exist without a label. Unfortunately, we might all get Lima beans when we were hoping for chicken soup and what a world that would be....