As the old cliche goes, “Everybody has an opinion.” From an Amazonian tribe’s differing ideas on how to get rid of a ghost — brought to us on Sunday nights via The Travel Channel’s “Living with the Machigenga” — to Iowan’s differing ideas regarding whether a Cyclone or a Hawkeye makes a better mascot, this statement rings true across the globe.

It is likely no truer, however, than in America. Sure, opinions used to be somewhat thoughtful, dignified things. There was a time when people’s opinions on some topics, for example politics and religion, were to be voiced only in the privacy of one’s own home or at the local speakeasy. In public or at the dinner table when visiting your girlfriend’s folks for the first time? Not in your wildest dreams.

But this time is long over. Thanks largely to YouTube and blogging — two innovations that one might consider the Internet’s godsends or devilsends, depending on whom you ask — virtually any American can mass communicate his or her opinions.

Regarding my interest, political opinions are easier to find on the Internet than a stalk of corn in Iowa. So how can we escape them and get just the facts, you ask?

Well, your answer might be the news, but then you’d be wrong. Even if you tune in to that good old-fashioned network news — shying from the hardcore liberal opinions of The Daily Show or the hardcore conservative opinions of The O’Reilly Factor — everything is an opinion to an extent. Facts exist, but every little piece of coverage that you see represents an opinion.   

From the news anchor to the network’s CEO, opinions manifest themselves in what is included on the news agenda, how much time is committed to it, and how it’s covered. There simply is no pure objectivity out there — news organizations just don’t want to admit it. 

So, read my opinion column, and — thanks to the Daily’s Web site — let me know yours.

Because I have an opinion — and the resolve to actually admit it.

Do you?

Steve Adams is a graduate student in journalism and mass communication from Annapolis, Maryland.