By Kenneth Dellovo

“Every idea and every feeling, pushed to an extreme, becomes its opposite.” — Richard Dyer

Unfortunately, I never read as much as I’d like to. I’ve finished five books over 100 pages in my life; four of them from the Harry Potter collection. But, that doesn’t portray my thirst to read — I browse countless articles a day from publications around the world and it shows during late night political discussions.

For instance, before the war, when contracts were being awarded to Halliburton and CACI, my Saved by the Bell generation friends and I were so smart to realize something was askew. We couldn’t have an anti-war discussion without raising the issue of occupation in Iraq with the side agenda of securing the world’s oil vault. We thought beyond the “WMD” and were not blissful through ignorance. A year later we realize CACI’s mission is to privately interrogate (check their Web site) a lucrative plan from the smart women and men who run this country. They exploited a loophole in an international document called the Geneva Conventions, which the United States manufactured to protect humans from war crimes around the world.

The document, at the moment, doesn’t include private contractors, whether they hit Iraqis with Humvees or abuse them in prison cells. But, what about the oil? I’ll come back to that.

How about Disney’s “non-partisan” decision to reject Michael Moore’s new provocumentary “Fahrenheit 9/11” from its distribution? Disney knew they’d reject its distribution before they started production on it, I mean, before Miramax began production. Miramax is Disney’s sub-production company for controversial flicks like “Bowling for Columbine” and “Kill Bill Vol. 2,” the highly anticipated follow-up to the mockingly gruesome “Vol.1.”(The soundtrack is phenomenal by the way.)

Speaking of Disney, if there’s anything controversial about the Mickey Mouse Co., it’s certainly not Michael Eisner’s executive decisions, but the phallic structure on the VHS cover of their “part of your” blatantly Puritan, under the covers and behind closed doors, “sexual world,” Little Mermaid movie. Not to mention what’s in Aladdin. We all know it’s there, but my mother chooses not to see it.

Anyway, moving to local matters, how about the Boston Red Sox? You can’t miss them; they’re the biggest story in the land. Granted I’ve never lived in another city, but nowhere else can you hop on a bus, sit across from three racially diverse, 60-year-old women and hear them acknowledge Manny’s newfound U.S. citizenship. That’ s insane. And the saturation of Red Sox coverage is unavoidable. At the bare minimum the Boston Globe has a front-page headline about the Red Sox five times a week. And witty columns, by their witty writers, lead to witty readers picking up the paper. Too bad journalistic ethics declare they’re not allowed to invest in the Red Sox. They could make bank. Ha.

Just like the Boston Globe admits its financial connection to the Boston Red Sox, the Department of Defense did release information months ago about the abuses in Iraq. But, that doesn’t make it okay. How can you blame news agencies for burying the story or readers for overlooking them? Our own people were being killed.

But, that story is past us now. No longer are we debating whether or not mature citizens should see photographs of our honorable dead, but whether or not we’re mature enough to handle the graphic sexual content of the Iraqi abuse. I wonder if it’s any worse than the results of a Google image search for the word “mature?”

I’ve bounced from subject to subject, but that’s my resounding point. There’s so much information today to distract us that it’s growing increasingly difficult to remain focused (ADD). Just like in that late night round of drinks and politics with your friends — everyone is so passionate and has so much to say. But, unfortunately, you rarely have a specific discussion that doesn’t end in pointing and opinions being forced upon others. The liberals sit there and take it all in, while the rest stress their points. The winner is most likely the one who best finds the hole in another’s argument.

The information age is seriously striving towards an age of mass confusion.

— Kenneth Dellovo is a junior journalism major.