Thanks to RockDem for the invite to post on the blog!
This video has been making the rounds today, in which a handful of prez candidates are asked the PC vs. Mac question, as well as about their favorite movies of last year. Some of the answers are kind of funny, and all the candidates come off pretty well. But most interestingly, John McCain acknowledges that he doesn’t know how to use a computer. His wife does whatever he needs done for him.
It brings up an interesting question; in 2008, is computer use and understanding the internet part of the basic set of knowledge we expect from people in positions of prominent public leadership? We expect high school students to graduate with these skills. Any student entering the workforce or college without them would be at a significant disadvantage. The net is past being a fad; can you really understand the modern world without this kind of knowledge?
What do you think?
1 comment:
In a word, no. You can't be a fully informed citizen without a tool to search the internet. As Main Stream news outlets have been turned into corporate profit centers, and independent news services have been consolidated, we are increasingly vulnerable to propaganda - witness the cozy relationship between retired military officer "war analysts" and the Pentagon in the run-up to the Iraq War. They sold us rosy scenarios on Fox/NBC/CBS/ABC/CNN, or they lost their access to Pentagon info.
There is plenty of garbage on the internets but it is also a place where anyone can publish without an editor or a censoring owner. And there are plenty of sources for fact-checking the kind of "conventional wisdom" that have guys like John McCain so confused.
Just this week McCain was asked about privatizing Social Security and said he did not support it and never had, only to be shown his own statements from 2004 when he said, "Without privatization, I don't see how you can possibly, over time, make sure that young Americans are able to receive Social Security benefits."
Hey John, it is a new game - we know when you just make stuff up!
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