News.  It's a simple word--and not at all a new one.  The “new” has been with us for more than twelve centuries in English, and was a recognizable Sanskrit word six or seven thousand years ago.   And in its plural form, as “news,” we have     been using it in English since the fifteenth century to refer to tidings, happeningsor occurrences in time.

In our present, most of the news isn't new or news at all.  In the United States,  murder isn't news:  it's an hourly occurrence.  

And at this point in history the United States as a nation has been at war--          actively engaged in killing people--since George H. W. Bush decided to invade     Iraq for oil twenty-five years ago.  The only respite was during Jimmy Carter's
presidency--and Carter tried to start World War III with his attempt to free fifty CIA agents being held (with multiple passports each) by young Iraqis in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.  Carter's invasion would likely have caused a massive
Soviet response.  What saved the world was American technology:  all of            Carter's helicopters crashed in the desert, having sucked too much sand up 

into their engines while they were flying in below anybody's radar.

 In today's world, war isn't news.  Murder--even mass murder--isn't news.  Thirty years ago Detroit television stations quit reporting single homicides on the         nightly “news” programs because there were too many of them.  So they only     reported multiple homicides--otherwise known as mass murders:  they were still “news.”  Now American “news” programs are filled with stories of mass            murders and war-murders--which aren't “news” 

President Obama is horrified by his nation's violence.  Soon he will do somethingabout it.  He might start attacking American murderers with his drones.  Or      maybe suspected American murderers, or American murderers-to-be.  It won't  matter who his drones kill.  The President has experience saying “I'm sorry”      when he kills innocent people.  Maybe drones can be equipped somehow to         express  his apologies even as they explode.

I am not suggesting that we just ignore violence--or not report it.  But it should   be reported as BAD NEWS.  And MORE BAD NEWS.  And for good news, the    President could stop all of his wars, ground all his war-planes and murdering     drones, bring his military home from Germany, from Okinawa, and from his       torture camp at Guantanamo.  And the United States Congress could repeal the second amendment to the United States Constitution, and ban guns.                    

America should take down the Statue of Liberty--and replace it with a dedicationto Freedom and Justice.  Liberty is not a virtue:  it is not a social word.   Liberty  is a self-centered word; it is a libido word, a “what-I-want” word. Freedom and   Justice are both beautiful, good social words.  Freedom is a friendly word--free  and friend have the same Germanic root--and Justice is a word for joining           together.   

 But we have forgotten what those words mean, and what their value is.  We      chant “Kill, Bubba!  Kill!” at football games.  When we get a lot of money we       “make a killing.”  And maybe I say, “Oh, I would kill for a piece of my mother's   fried chicken!”  And athletic teams proudly call themselves “Warriors.”  Violence isn't news.

We could make news--real, good news--if we tried.  And if enough of us tried it,  we could spread our news--and broadcast it the way farmers used to broadcast  seed on their fields or corn for their chickens.

Happy New Year, everybody.  And Good News!!!

                                                                      Bert