The News Media Fails the Electorate

As I've bemoaned about previously, the Writer's Strike has left me making some odd TV/entertainment choices.

Tonight, for the first time in a long time, I watched an entire local news broadcast, which I followed with an entire national news broadcast. And, following that I just listened to two podcast episodes from MSNBC shows.

A fair chunk of the local news was about the '08 campaign, a large chunk of the national news was about the campaign, and the show segments that MSNBC turned into podcast episodes were entirely about the campaign.

But none of it provided any real substance about any issues. There was a lot of horse racing: Who's winning in the polls? and How can Huckabee possibly win if his "war chest" is so small? and Can Hillary come across as personable? and Can Obama come across as experienced? and Does Huckabee really think Romney is a Christian?.

The closest any of all the above coverage came to talking about policies the candidates hold was the local news did a piece that superficially talked about universal healthcare.

I don't want to claim that experience, beliefs, and likability should play no part in how someone votes. They are all characteristics that will play a part in how well a candidate will one day govern. But they are second-class characteristics. What should take center stage in a free democratic republic is issues. Explain where the candidates stand. Let them explain why they stand the way they do. Let the American people hear their explanations and decide if they agree or not.

Maybe the American public - or those that watch the news anyway - simply don't care about the issues, and the news is putting out what sells ads. But I can't help thinking that the national news media is simply lazy, and showing the latest polls and debating the trivial lets them believe they're "covering the election" without actually having to do any work.

Reason Assault'd

Having just posted some praise for the premise of the "The Assault on Reason" and then checking some news sites and blogs I regularly read, the irony was just too thick to ignore...

The Assault on Reason:

At first I thought the exhaustive, nonstop coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial was just an unfortunate excess—an unwelcome departure from the normal good sense and judgment of our television news media. Now we know that it was merely an early example of a new pattern of serial obsessions that periodically take over the airwaves for weeks at a time: the Michael Jackson trial and the Robert Blake trial, the Laci Peterson tragedy and the Chandra Levy tragedy, Britney and KFed, Lindsay and Paris and Nicole.

The "news" line up I encountered:

• How about a little context in the Hilton Case? (Q and O)
  
• Breaking: Paris going back to jail; Update: Shep Smith snark video added! Update: More Shep snark! (Hot Air)
  
• Video: Geraldo kinda sorta calls Michelle a Nazi (Hot Air) ... half way through the embedded video of the relevant Bill O'Reilly interview, for no good reason, O'Reilly brings up the Paris thing with Michelle Malkin...
  
• Should Scooter or Paris serve the longer sentence? (Chicago Times) Recommended to me by Google News (!?)
  

At least I'm not the only getting getting sick of this kind of thing....

More Indulgence - This Time With Peeps

It's like "YouTube day" here at Kah Zoohl List...

Some more political, but, light-hearted entertainment: HamNation: The Week in Peeps (Reprise). A great re-cap of the week.

Sailors' Statement In Full

The U.S. media seems more interested in covering the O'Reilly - Geraldo thing than this, so in case you (like I) missed this: the Telegraph has made the U.K. Sailor's statement in full available - "Sailors' statement in full".

Some key excepts (emphasis mine):

We were equipped with Xeres true navigational equipment and hand held GPS for backup. The helicopter in support provided continuous navigational confirmation and we were also linked to HMS Cornwall who were monitoring our exact position at all times. Let me make it absolutely clear, irrespective of what has been said in the past, when we were detained by the IRG we were inside internationally recognised Iraqi territorial waters and I can clearly state we were 1.7 nautical miles from Iranian waters.

—

When we tried to leave, they prevented us by blocking us in. By now it was becoming increasingly clear that they had arrived with a planned intent.

Some of the Iranian sailors were becoming deliberately aggressive and unstable. They rammed our boat and trained their heavy machine guns, RPGs and weapons on us.

Another six boats were closing in on us. We realised that our efforts to reason with these people were not making any headway.

—

We were flown to Teheran and transported to a prison where the atmosphere changed completely. We were blindfolded, our hands were bound and we were forced up against a wall. Throughout our ordeal we faced constant psychological pressure.

Later we were stripped and then dressed in pyjamas. The next few nights were spent in stone cells, approximately 8ft by 6ft, sleeping on piles of blankets. All of us were kept in isolation.

In light of all of this, I ask: Where's the outrage!? - Where are the consequences for the Iranian regime!?

Once again, Iran does something outrageous to the West and gets away scott-free. Even all the blogs who lobbed heaps of criticism on the United States for supposed U.S. violations of the Geneva Conventions have been deafeningly silent on Iran's violations in this case.

The dramatic amount of outrage feigned by Capitol Hill over the U.S Attorney firings (political appointees being dismissed for political reasons?! (gasp!)) makes their relative silence on this embarrassing. The press release web page of my state's senior senator, Chuck Schumer, is filled with announcements about the attorney firings, pork he is bringing back to the New York, and even the Buffalo Bills, but has no mention about Iran's illegal behavior on this.

Disgraceful.

I'll Take the Blogosphere Over MSM News Any Day

I don’t do fair and balanced, Cindy ... never have, and never claimed to. This is a blog, not an "objective" news source. It’s time you got a clue.

- Bruce McQuain, QandO.

Both political blogs and mainstream media news have spin. The difference is political blogs are upfront and don't try to hide it so readers don't have to work nearly as hard to filter it out.