Friday, December 03, 2021

ACTIVATE THE NEWS

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Some people ask me how I can put up with curating dozens of news stories from multiple outlets day after day, presenting them here and on other platforms without falling into a clinical depression.

After all, the news is almost all bad and it never stops — it just cycles and cycles around the world as if a global newspaper boy were throwing thick folded papers at our front door every few minutes.

If you just let the reports bounce off, unread, they’ll pile up faster than autumn leaves. If you read them carefully, you might be in danger of growing suicidal.

But journalists get used to living by the news cycle. They get high off of a big story. Some people would call that an addiction. If so, withdrawal is hard too — don’t expect many smiles in a newsroom on a slow news day.

But everyone, including journalists, has a choice when it comes to the news. We can remain passive and consume it as if it were a plate of food or we can decide to try and do something about it.

Among the people who scan the curated headlines I present every day are a few friends who recently decided to try and do something about one particular story in my daily news feed.

They are making an effort to help my young Afghan friend/correspondent escape from his country, where he is currently trapped under the oppressive rule of the Taliban.

These friends have worked behind the scenes to explore options for my correspondent to seek asylum somewhere else. It will be a hazardous, arduous process, far from certain to be successful. A lot could go wrong. The risks to him are substantial.

But as of today, a copy of his passport is in the hands of a pro-bono immigration attorney in the West and a small network of friends are standing by to help. Stay tuned in the coming weeks to find out how this story ends.

FRIDAY’S HEADLINES:

FRIDAY’s LYRICS:

“Running Kind”

By Merle Haggard

I was born the runnin' kind

With leavin' always on my mind

Home was never home to me at any time

Every front door found me hopin'

I would find the back door open

There just had to be an exit

For the runnin' kind

Within me there's a prison

Surrounding me alone

As real as any dungeon with its walls of stone

I know runnin's not the answer

Yeah, but runnin's been my nature

And a part of me

That keeps me movin' on

I was born the runnin' kind

With leavin' always on my mind

Home was never home to me at any time

Every front door found me hopin'

I would find the back door open

There just had to be an exit

For the runnin' kind

I was born the runnin' kind

With leavin' always on my mind

Home was never home to me at any time

Every front door found me hopin'

I would find the back door open

There just had to be an exit

For the runnin' kind

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