We really need to think about bias and negative inferences.

When corporations control the news media, we can infer that they will report in ways not dangerous to corporate interests.

A more specific inference: When people working for non-profits, earning salaries that they could surely improve upon in some other private business, tell us that global warming is a problem, we can probably trust their sincerity. When polluting industries and/or their agents/allies fund research that casts doubt on global warming, we can suspect the work is somehow biased. Why moreso than the non-profits? Profit.

This may seem obvious. But, as mentioned earlier, the corporate media tends to support corporate interests, and thus will often treat both sides of the debate equally. They do this by allowing both sides to allege facts, and failing to deeply analyze these facts. The news must include analysis, or else it is merely reporting on people’s words. Without the analysis, the reader/watcher may draw the inference that a set of claims is true, since they go unexamined in the reporting. I’m not providing empirical evidence, though I assume it exists.

Another dreadful inference: When those in power fail to pursue policies that will provide universal healthcare, provide clean environments, and provide resources to keep people out of poverty and danger, then we can infer that those in power are potentially capable of almost any atrocity (that they can get away with, perhaps) against their own people and foreigners.

This negative inference is something I touched upon in one of the forums, here, if you want to see where it came from. But what I wrote was this:

Ah, you bring up the taboo thought: administration knowledge and/or complicity in Sept. 11.

This was something I considered from the day of the attacks, before there was any evidence that would suggest who did it one way or the other (though the corporate media seemed willing to jump to unfounded conclusions, placing Bin Laden’s face on their screens for a great deal of air time, as well as the infamous and phony celebrating Palestinians).

Then came along people who tried to put the pieces together, some with very compelling cases both for and against administration (and if not administration, then some other domestic source of power) complicity/knowledge.

But what we cannot ignore is that I, and I’m sure others, considered the possibility shortly after we were aware of the attack. This is critical. It tells us that we had facts and beliefs about the sources of power in this country that would at least support this sad conclusion.

What facts could possibly have led someone like myself to suspect this possibility as very real? They would be the facts and beliefs that demonstrate to us a disregard for American lives and non-American lives. Environmental policies. Domestic economic policies. International economic policies. Health care policies. Law and order policies. Perceived motivations for future policy may have also had a role, but I really can’t remember clearly if I was considering that on the day of the attack, though I think I may have been.

Whether in the end any knowledge (that is, knowing knowledge, as opposed to knowledge they don’t realize they have… I support the Rumsfeldian interpretation of the knowledge of institutions) or complicity can be shown is unclear. Unfortunately, much of this unclarity is probably due to the secretive nature of the government and its institutional appendages/accomplices.”

Naturally, I do not draw a conclusion about 9-11, since all the facts aren’t out there, and whoever has all the facts is not willing to report them. But I believe the negative inference is a valid one.

Am I clouded by ideology? I do not put much stock in the word. We are already tax-slaves, and everybody agrees that we should be, else we would have no government. We’re all part-socialists, like it or not. Thus, I don’t think it is such a big step to raise more taxes to fund substantial social welfare programs and promote fairness. Or we could simply reapportion our current spending. Anyway, I never heard a politician of any stature proclaim that some people should not have health insurance, or that some people should be in poverty, or that some people should have to deal with polluted neighborhoods. So if we accept the words of politicians and ignore that they are lying and disingenuous, then we are all agreed.

One last inference: since these disingenuous politicians lie about their beliefs, motivations, ideology, etc., then we can expect them to keep lying about everything else.

Please let me know if I am nuts.