I have opinions, lots of them, on all sorts of things, from why Brazilian industrialization is lagging behind its predicted standards to how the game went last Saturday. I like talking, debating, and expressing these opinions, and this is why columnists always confound me. The fact there is a market for people to state their opinions, whereby you have no recourse or action but to take it in, has always struck me as odd. I have always wondered if people adopt the opinions themselves, thus surrendering part of their thinking to another, or if they do so to test their own thoughts on the matter against someone who, at least in theory, is seasoned. The latter I can at least partially understand, for in theory these are wise people, but the former seems undue surrender to me.

To extend this to a discussion of news generally, opinion pieces are pure interpretation. While they may contain facts, their purpose is not to provide those facts but opinions and analyses. This, I believe, places them squarely outside the definition of news, but that does not make them worthless. Analysis can serve as a textbook and whetstone, allowing people to see how analysis is done, see conclusions others draw, and finally to test their opinions against it and thus become sharper and more aware of a wider variety of thoughts. While one’s opinion must remain one’s own unless they wish to surrender sovereignty to some figure, whether politician or prophet or columnist, the opinions of a person who never contacts opposing thoughts becomes inbred in its ignorance.

As to the actual columns here, they’re interesting and right of center, but in general that seems a relatively safe position. Perhaps that is why they are popular, through mass appeal. After all, mildly conservative opinions are less likely to offend than mildly liberal ones, for while mild liberal ones call for small changes mildly conservative ones usually call for none. This is perhaps best exemplified in “The Principle at Stake at Notre Dame” where she basically avoids condemning abortion despite leaning that direction, and even in the end states she supports, to some degree, the current form it is in. I do not mean to say this is gutless, strong moderates have their own temptations to fight and their own deeply held belief, but it makes me wonder if we’re a right of center nation.