The people who won't stop talking about the haircut that they claim people won't stop talking about.
Yet more of why Glenn Greenwald is the best political/media blogger writing today:
"[In an article, Politico Chief Political Correspondant Roger] Simon marvels at how enduring the story [of John Edwards' infamous $400 haircut] is -- as though there is some phenomenon keeping the story alive independent of the fact that the gossipy, tiny-minded, substance-free "political journalists" plaguing our nation -- from Roger Simon and Maureen Dowd to Adam Nagourney and Mickey Kaus and Matt Drudge -- have not stopped talking about "the story." It's tantamount to someone who keeps chewing their food and spitting it across the room and then marvelling at how filthy things are and writing columns bewilderingly examining how and why the floor is covered with crusted food and what that signifies."Wonderful. Reminds me of Howard Kurtz, on the CNN media show "Reliable Sources", holding panel after bewildered, headscratching panel on why the Anna Nicole Smith saga was eating our televisions, while CNN and Kurtz's own show became all Anna Nicole Smith, all the time for several weeks.
Labels: politics
posted by ronnie at
2:47 p.m.
6 Comments:
don't get me started on this....how about the newspapers that report spin as if it were hard news?
or how about MSNBC and the rest who are now advertising their news shows in online magazines with young readership? great balls o' fire! it's getting harder and harder to find a news source that hasn't been corrupted by karl rove & friends.
you do know that you can send emails to maureen dowd and that ilk at the NYTimes? and you can spout off on huffington post. let 'em know how you feel.
we live in scary times.
The Daily Show recently did a piece mocking the media for their self-absorption following the Virginia Tech shooting--TV coverage about how sensitive the TV coverage had been, etc. I think part of the problem is that reporter/journalist/correspondents aren't content to observe the story anymore; they want to be part of it. When Anderson Cooper went to New Orleans, the story became "Anderson Cooper is in New Orleans." Katie Couric is a bigger celebrity than almost anyone she interviews. (Most) kids don't become TV reporters because they want to be journalists driven to tap the potential of sound and images to tell compelling stories; they do it because they're good looking and want to be on television. It all seems pretty backwards and wrong-headed to me.
Not sure I agree with Xtreme English on all points. I don't think *everything* bad in the world is Bush's fault and and this problem far predates him. I peg it to the increasingly fratured and specialized world of cable, with 500 stations with airtime to fill. I'm also not sure why MSNBC trying to reach a young audience is bad. If you can get kids interested in news, any news, that's OK by me.
Not sure I agree with Xtreme English on all points. I don't think *everything* bad in the world is Bush's fault and and this problem far predates him.
Oh, surely there's some way we can pin it on him?
I will note that the shock of 9/11, coupled with an administration that has been without parallel in its capacity to spin items (if you're not for the war you're for the terrorists, Saddam had WMD, if you want to get out of the mess in Iraq you don't 'support the troops'), led to an unprededented period over the last several years of reporters parroting White House talking points as fact, rather than investigating how much of their truth is truth and how much is 'truthiness'.
I peg it to the increasingly fratured and specialized world of cable, with 500 stations with airtime to fill.
That is clearly why we get so much overplay of stories truly unimportant beyond the circle of people immediately affected (Laci Peterson, Britney Spears shaving her head, Don Imus, Anna Nicole Smith). I guess the gnawing question is, how is it that most cable news outlets seem to be aware of this now and even report on it, and yet can't seem to stop doing it?
ronnie
< I guess the gnawing question is, how is it that most cable news outlets seem to be aware of this now and even report on it, and yet can't seem to stop doing it? >
You silly! We watch.
You silly! We watch.
DAY-am.
ronnie
brian:
you don't agree with me on all points??? how can this be? quel dommage!!
i agree that not EVERYTHING bad in the world comes from Bush, but face it, a lot of it HAS happened since he was put in the white house.
and the vile thing with the press started with Nixon, when GUESS WHO was cutting his teeth on dirty tricks in Nixon's campaign office...Karl Rove!
honorable, truthful news for young viewers and readers, yes. MSNBC and that ilk, no.
I used to work for a prominent company doing marketing research and consulting for the broadcast industry, including newspapers. We had two precepts: "The perception of the truth is often more important than the truth itself," and "Perception becomes reality in its consequences."
Karl Rove knows the truth of these two statements front and back.
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