Julie

“When we participate in politics to solve a problem, we’re participating transactionally. But when we participate in politics to express who we are, that’s a signal that politics has become an identity.”
― Ezra Klein, Why We're Polarized

“照某些哲学家说，这是必须的。佛家就说，生就是人生的苦痛的根源。柏拉图也说，肉体是灵魂的监狱。有些道家的人"以生为附赘悬疣，以死为决疴溃痈。"这都是以为，欲得到最高的成就，必须脱离尘罗世网，必须脱离社会，甚至脱离"生"。只有这样，才可以得到最后的解脱。这种哲学，即普通所谓"出世的哲学"。

另有一种哲学，注重社会中的人伦和世务。这种哲学只讲道德价值，不会讲或不愿讲超道德价值。这种哲学，即普通所谓"入世的哲学"。从入世的哲学的观点看，出世的哲学是太理想主义的，无实用的，消极的。从出世的哲学的观点看，入世的哲学太现实主义了，太肤浅了。它也许是积极的，但是就像走错了路的人的快跑：越跑得快，越错得很。”
― 冯友兰Feng Youlan, 中国哲学简史 Brief History of Chinese Philosophy (国民阅读经典)

“The news is supposed to be a mirror held up to the world, but the world is far too vast to fit in our mirror. The fundamental thing the media does all day, every day, is decide what to cover — decide, that is, what is newsworthy.

Here’s the dilemma: to decide what to cover is to become the shaper of the news rather than a mirror held up to the news. It makes journalists actors rather than observers. It annihilates our fundamental conception of ourselves. And yet it’s the most important decision we make. If we decide to give more coverage to Hillary Clinton’s emails than to her policy proposals — which is what we did — then we make her emails more important to the public’s understanding of her character and potential presidency than her policy proposals. In doing so, we shape not just the news but the election, and thus the country.

While I’m critical of the specific decision my industry made in that case, this problem is inescapable. The news media isn’t just an actor in politics. It’s arguably the most powerful actor in politics. It’s the primary intermediary between what politicians do and what the public knows. The way we try to get around this is by conceptually outsourcing the decisions about what we cover to the idea of newsworthiness. If we simply cover what’s newsworthy, then we’re not the ones making those decisions — it’s the neutral, external judgment of news worthiness that bears responsibility. The problem is that no one, anywhere, has a rigorous definition of newsworthiness, much less a definition that they actually follow.”
― Ezra Klein, Why We're Polarized

“So here, then, is the last fifty years of American politics summarized: we became more consistent in the party we vote for not because we came to like our party more—indeed, we’ve come to like the parties we vote for less—but because we came to dislike the opposing party more. Even as hope and change sputter, fear and loathing proceed.”
― Ezra Klein, Why We're Polarized