Once upon a time – in a region of the galaxy far, far away – there existed a great barrier to freedom known as The Iron Curtain. 

It was protected from outside intrusions and ideological incursions by a muscular military, a stockpile of nukes and – perhaps most importantly – the Two Towers of propaganda and misinformation. These metaphorical edifices, the bastions of the status quo and deception, were called Pravda and Tass.  

In reality, Pravda and Tass were the two state-run newspapers of the once-great Russian empire known as The Soviet Union. They were the uncontested purveyors of Communist propaganda which told people what to think, how to think, when to think!

Eventually, there arose a counter-insurgency effort by the United States and western European nations to provide a competing information source in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe so that the minds of those privy to only one way of life, one perspective could be exposed to an alternate universe of freedom and prosperity. 

his noble effort to bring light and truth into the lives of those whose information sources were designed to keep them in darkness and chains was known as Radio Free Europe.  At that time, it was their one possible exposure to an alternate, more positive paradigm of reality.

The Soviet Union and Iron Curtain are gone, despite the best efforts of Vladimir Putin and his oligarchs to restore it to its former level of greatness. But Pravda and Tass still very much exist, though they are known today by different names: The New York Times and The Washington Post. These two colossi of Rhodes, combined with the plethora of electronic media (CNN, MS-NBC, ABC, CBS, NBC) that orbit like satellites around these once-institutional rocks of reliability, have desecrated the good name of journalistic integrity and become laughing stocks of “Fake News” to those who really know the facts. 

They have become transparent, unapologetic arms of the Democrat Party and Liberal ideology. Their news musings not only often represent a distortion of reality but employ blatant propaganda worthy of Joseph Goebbels, Tokyo Rose and Rachael Maddow to denigrate and invalidate its political opponents.

Fortunately, Radio Free Europe is also alive and well in the United States.  It’s called FOX News and Fox Business Network. They represent themselves as “Fair, Balanced and Unafraid.” 

These are the same outlets that Barack Obama would have snuffed out because they dared to challenge his far-Left paradigm.  Obama was a big advocate for his own version of Pravda and Tass.  He would have snuffed out vehicles that promoted free thinking because he knew that only mindless sheep could possibly buy into his vision of the World.

Here’s my message to Millenials: If you’re getting your news solely from social media, The NY Times, Washington Post, CNN, MS-NBC, ABC, CBS and NBC,  YOU’RE NOT GETTING THE NEWS! If you’ve never watched Bret Baier on FOX at 6 p.m. eastern time or Maria Bartiromo on FBN from 6 to 9 a.m. you are not getting the whole story.  Do you really want your view of the world and opinions to be based on the often-false input of one side? If so, you will be no better off than the millions of people who lived within the Iron Curtain and had no choice but to accept Big Brother’s vision of the world.

P.S. I originally submitted this piece to the monopoly newspaper outlet known as The Lexington-Herald Leader. I waited a few weeks and was disappointed that my opinion piece never appeared in either Letters to the Editor or the Opinion page.  I left several e-mails and telephone messages with the editorial staff, only to be ignored. 

Besides having a heavy left-wing editorial policy, the Herald-Leader has tripled its subscription price over the past 18 months, with a concomitant decrease in quality.  The paper is clearly winding down its financially disastrous print business by catering more and more to the younger generations of digital consumers.  In the process, they are overcharging “older,” more mature readers who still value pouring their heads over a readable vehicle in the mornings.  Perhaps we should all stop our subscriptions?

Steve Nussbaum,

President

NUSSBAUM Long-Term Care Planning & Insurance

Nicholasville, Ky