“Do not let the  
behavior of others  
destroy your  
inner peace.”  
Dalai Lama

For many years, local and national news stations have attempted to hook viewers by referring to what is to be covered in the broadcast as BREAKING NEWS. I’ve finally reached the point where I am convinced that the news is no longer breaking. It’s broken.

To watch newscasts today, it’s no wonder that most young people, and I’m sure a good number of older folks, consider the world we live in to be dangerous. For years, I asked my students if they believed the world was basically good with a presence of evil, or basically evil with a presence of good. Overwhelmingly, and increasingly, more of these young women and men were convinced that the world is basically evil, with an occasional presence of good. When asked why they felt this way, most cited the television news reports as the source of their opinion.

I used to be a TV news junkie. I always wanted to know what was happening in the world — locally, nationally, and internationally. I thought it was a mark of a mature adult to be informed about such things. It’s taken a while, but I’ve finally decided that I no longer have the need, nor the desire, to hear what television journalists have to say.

When I travel around the Santa Clara Valley and the greater San Francisco Bay Area, more often than not I encounter good people who, from what I can tell, are respectable, law-abiding citizens who have a general concern for the common good. Sitting in my car at a red light of a busy intersection, I am most often amazed and impressed by the high percentage of drivers who follow the rules of the road. Only rarely do I witness entitled drivers ignoring our driving laws to suit themselves.

Walking down a neighborhood street, visiting a local coffee shop, shopping at a grocery store, or refilling the tank of my car at a gas station — all of these experiences allow me to encounter men and women of all ages and ethnicities who, from what I can see, are genuinely good people. This is quite a contrast from news reports which seem to suggest that danger awaits around every corner and that no one can be trusted.

I do still have a desire to know what the weather will be in the coming days and weeks. And with predictions of a potentially disastrous “Super El Niño” in our future, I’m curious to see how that plays out in the Bay Area and across the country. For this reason, I’m grateful for The Weather Channel and local weather reporting.

As for the rest of the evening news,… Click!