I will admit it....I am the only true Libertarian in a very opinionated family of Republicans. As you can imagine, this has become a very precarious position for me to be in. In their opinion, I should not only have my head examined, I should be tarred and feathered, ridden out of town on a rail, and am basically the black sheep of the family. A total disgrace to the family name, ha ha!

So, to be totally fair, since they all watch Fox News channel and NOTHING else, I decided to start watching CNN just to make them more mad at me. When I announced to them what I was doing, there was a total uproar in the family. By the way, "freedom of speech" is not always allowed around here...I think my civil rights have been violated, but I'm not too sure what to do about it. So I tried telling them all that for at least the next four years, and possibly the next eight years, I would not be discussing politics with any of them, no matter how they tried to get to me or what they said. Boy, did they ever try to break me! They almost got to me a few times, but I would mumble something about "weapons of mass destruction" and they would hush-for a little while. Then I came up with a wonderful idea.

I decided to start watching both Fox News AND CNN and just see what the big deal was. When they would call me and ask me what I was doing, I would tell them I was watching Glenn Beck or Bill O'Reilly. Talk about confusion! They had no clue what to say to me then! I finally told them I was conducting an experiment. I was comparing the two news and political channels, just to see what the difference was, and why they were on my case so much about the new administration.

After I had been switching between the two channels for about a month, I realized that basically, they were both saying the same thing! The main difference I could tell was that Fox's people said it louder, faster and angrier. Oh, and CNN's Anderson Cooper was alot cuter than Fox's Glenn Beck... (sorry Glenn) There were some differences in context usually, like how each channel would take the same topic and put their own spin on it, making it sound either really good for us, or really bad for us. I also realized that most of the things they debated back and forth either hadn't actually become a fact yet, or were subject to change at any time. The whole thing for the most part was deciding whose opinion you agreed with and related to, and whose you didn't. And the world was not going to come to an end anytime soon as a result of some new policy, but if it did, it wouldn't matter anymore anyway!

I do think there is alot more yelling on Fox. No one lets anyone else complete a sentence! Watching Fox is like watching a room full of people on Ritalin and watching CNN is like watching a room full of people on Valium. Of course, all of this is just my humble opinion and not worth two cents, so I don't think they care too much what I think, ha ha! The important thing is that now I can tell my family that I have an open mind, that I watch BOTH channels, and actually agree with some of the things said on each of them. They in turn absolutely refuse to even think of clicking the remote over to CNN. Nope, not them, not even for a second! That would be a betrayal!!!

Finally, the family gave up on me. They couldn't harrass me anymore, because in their eyes, I had sort of crossed over to the "right" side, literally! I had become a "backsliding Democrat" to them, and they could handle that just fine, haha! Plus, how could they pick on me, when I was watching the same channel they did and usually more than they were. They tried me out a few times, saying that "so and so" on Fox had said "such and such" and I would have watched the same thing and tell them that "no, what they said was...." and launch into a whole description of the conversation they were referring to. Well, that shut them up, and I have finally achieved peace among the family once again. Now, I better go-It's time for Anderson Cooper 360 to come on!