Propaganda is persuading people to make up their minds while withholding some of the facts from them.

Internet news cycles are by the minute, and any fool can take a headline from the Associated Press and send it out as news.

Propaganda is persuading people to make up their minds while withholding some of the facts from them.

In journalism it is simpler to sound off than it is to find out. It is more elegant to pontificate than it is to sweat.

What I'm driving at is let's not lose sight in our excitement of the democratization of the media that some things are bad, false and ugly - and no amount of electronic gloss will make them true, beautiful and accurate.

I think there's a lot of benefit in letting people vent. When I was on the Manchester Evening News, we got 500 letters a day, and part of my job as editor was to edit them. And I thought that was one of the best things in the newspaper, and it was instituted by an editor known as Big Tom, who said 'this is the voice of the people.' And he was quite right.

Actions are always more complex and nuanced than they seem. We have to be willing to wrestle with paradox in pursuing understanding.