"News that's not known, or not known enough." Helen & Harry Highwater's cranky weblog of news and opinion.
Helen & Harry, and Mr. P the cat, offer you a big howdy. If this is your first visit (or your fiftieth or five-hundredth) we're happy you're here. I'm Helen, and this is my husband Harry. Pleased to meet ya.
We think of this website as part of our apartment -- it's not just our home page, it's our home. And you can stop by any time you like. You're invited to mingle, or just find a comfy spot on our cyber sofa and relax.
Over in the corner, some people are having a conversation, and if you have something to add, please don't be shy. Once in a while someone klangs a fork on their glass and has something to say. And of course, we're all following the news, wondering how bad it's got to get before people start saying NO.
Since 1999, we've been collecting "unknown news" from credible sources. We're amateur journalists, working on this homemade website instead of a big-time newspaper. You don't have to pay 50¢, you don't get lingerie ads, there's no sports section, and we can't match the mainstream media's in-depth coverage of Lindsay Lohan's antics or Michael Jackson's nose.
Instead we cover a different beat: News that affects people's lives, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. Pull up a chair and read all about it.
Unlike professional journalists, we won't pretend we have no opinions. Our slipper-wearin', coffee-drinkin' opinion is that America's so-called 'leaders' -- both Democrats and Republicans --
have provided no leadership at all. Either that or they're "leading" us somewhere no-one sane would want to go.
So take a look around, have some cheese puffs, shake some hands, make a few new friends. Stay as long as you like, and feel free to come back any time you need a little shared sanity in a crazy world. Bring a friend next time -- we have plenty of chairs!
If you're ever in a typative mood, we like 'listening'
We started this website out of frustration: We didn't know many people in the real world who were awake, so we crossed our fingers and opened our front door, so to speak, by putting the news (the way we see it) on-line. And once we did, some fascinating people walked in and helped us make the website better ... and those people invited a few more people ... and now, though we never expected it, a lot of people visit our apartment every day.
We really should vacuum the carpet more often.
But if you can stand the mess, please, come on in. Keep your feet off the couch and don't spit out the window, but other than that just make yourself at home. We welcome Democrats and Republicans, independents and codependents, libertarians and communists, anyone who believes in liberty and justice for all.
Like the URL says, this website is about unknown news.
We present a once-weekly wrap-up of news that was underplayed, ignored, or simply lost in the non-stop news cycle. Our news comes only from mainstream, professional journalists or (rarely) other sources we trust entirely, with no nuttiness and no interest in the same news you see everywhere else.
What we believe
We believe in liberty and justice for all, so of course, we oppose many US government policies. This doesn't mean we're anti-American, redneck scum, pinko commies, militia members, or terrorist-sympathizers. It means we believe in freedom, as more than merely a cliché.
We believe you have the right to live your own life as you choose, and others have the equal right to live their lives as they choose. It's not complicated.
We believe freedom leads to peace, progress, and prosperity, while its opposite -- oppression -- leads to war, terrorism, poverty, and misery.
We believe it's preposterously stupid to hate people because of their appearance, their race or nationality, their religion or lack of religion, how they have sex with other consenting adults, etc. There are far more apropos reasons to hate most people.
We believe in questioning ourselves, our assumptions, each other -- and we especially believe in questioning authority (the more authority, the more questions). We believe obedience is a fine quality in dogs and young children, but not in adults.
Like America's right-wingers, we believe in
individual responsibility,
hard work to get ahead,
and stern punishment for serious crimes.
We believe big government should not be blindly trusted.
But unlike most right-wing leaders, we mean it.
Like America's left-wingers, we believe in
equal treatment under law,
war as a last (not first) resort,
and sensible stewardship of natural resources.
We believe big business should not be blindly trusted.
But unlike most left-wing leaders, we mean it.
Like libertarians, we believe it's wrong and reprehensible to arrest people for what they think, believe, look like, wear, eat, smoke, drink, inhale, inject, or otherwise do to themselves.
But unlike many libertarians, we're not obsessed with the gold standard, we don't believe incorporation is humanity's highest achievement, and we don't believe everything in life comes down to dollars and cents. We've read and enjoyed Ayn Rand's novels, but we understand that they're works of fiction.
We're skeptical, and we're sick of so-called 'journalists' who aren't skeptical at all.
A reader asks, what are our solutions?
We propose no solutions except common sense, which is never common. We like the principles of democracy, and the ideals broadly described as 'American'. The US Constitution is a fine and workable framework for solutions, when it's actually read and thoughtfully understood by intelligent statesmen and women. So, no manifestos from us. We don't dream that big, and if there's one thing the world doesn't need it's yet another manifesto.
Our suggestion is: think.
A fact-based instead of faith-based approach leads to solutions for most of the recurring issues of our time, from abortion to global climate change, pollution to universal health care, careful but real regulation of industry and economy, hunger, war, terror, human rights for humans not for corporations, science not religious doctrine in public schools, equal protection and prosecution under law, etc. Approach problems without glorifying stupidity, without demonizing intelligence, and answers usually come into focus.
These pages are published by Harry and Helen Highwater, happily married low-income nom de plumes and rabble-rousers from Madison, Wisconsin (with a few friends scattered around the world helping out).
We try to spotlight news that hasn't gotten enough (or appropriate) attention in American media, along with our opinions and yours.
We bang our keyboards against the wall, because it doesn't hurt as much as banging our heads.
We assume our readers are well-informed before they click here, so we focus on news that's generally unknown or under-reported. We're generally disinterested in such non-news as reports on what politicians might do, may do, or should do, and we don't usually mention the murders, kidnappings, house fires, auto wrecks, celebrity crap, wacky fluff, and other nonsense that's pushed real news right out of the newscasts.
Disclaimer for dummies: Our front page is free from nudity, but we make no promise on profanity. If your surfing is monitored this site might not be safe for work, and you may be shocked, offended, or in trouble with your boss. A link doesn't imply that we agree with every sentence and every sentiment on every site we link to. We use our noggins, and suggest you use yours.
We always welcome comments from readers, and we're especially interested in hearing and considering different perspectives, so please don't be shy. All we ask is that you conduct yourself sanely and civilly, so consider yourself invited to speak your mind. Our email address and other info is on our contact page.
Please don't email us unless you're sending an original communication that you're not sending to anyone or everyone else. If you add us to your mailing list or chat group without asking us first, or if you send "Dear friend" newsletters, or "link exchange" form letters, or if you send a press release every time you add a post to your blog, you're a spammer and we'll soon block your emails. Also, as a matter of security, we don't open emails from strangers which include attachments or have any kind of programming imbedded, and we recommend a similar policy for others. If you're sending us an email, please send it in plain text only.
Our RSS feed of Unknown News headlines is updated whenever we update the site. Click the orange button for more information, or just get the feed at http://unknownnews.org/ RSSfeeds/dailyRSS.xml.
(Enormous and eternal thanksto Doug at mistersquirrel.net, for setting up our RSS feed.)
Our privacy policy has a page of its own, but the short and sweet version is: We're in favor of privacy. We make no effort to track or identify anything about visitors to our website. We never share, trade, or sell email addresses. We never send spam. We never send email, except in response to readers' queries. We never send (or open) attachments of any kind, and we delete un-opened any emails received with attachments.
Anything sent to Unknown News may be published. If you don't want it published, say so plainly. When we publish incoming emails, we edit out the sender's last name and email address — if we slip up (or if you want your full name and email address published) please let us know. Of course, if your email is unambiguously intended only to annoy, insult, or threaten us, we'll publish it with all the details and leave it on-line forever.
