On Katrina
Rumsfeld once quipped that cable news outlets have quite a task before them, how to fill 3 hours worth of news in a 24 hour period. Octavio Paz said that "we are condemned to kill time, thus we die bit by bit."
Well, somebody please take me now because I'm sick of the incessant Katrina coverage. I need to purge. Shit, I am purging, but it's a dry sort incontinence. Nothing's coming out because nothing went in. It's like eating popcorn before lunch. Your tastebuds are sated, one goes through the motion of hole-shoving, but you're still hungry afterwards.
Perhaps that is the most sinister aspect of tv coverage and the audience it draws--and why I hate it so much. It's emotional pornography or a kind of dry frottage between the audience and the networks. The networks make beaucoup cash from the advertising dollars, and the audience gets to feel something that day-something.
I don't feel any more informed today than say a week ago. All I have are images in my head, powerful to be sure, of distraught black faces, the brackish waters, the unimaginable suffering. Yet I can't do anything else with those images but react to them in some primal way.
Beyond some basic facts, I don't remember anything anybody said that registered intellectually. No substantive analysis, no grand exposition on natural disasters and its human victims. Just endless images and bullshit talk to tug at the heartstrings. I don't give a shit about ideology, but FOX News is the reigning champ. O'Reilly's the master, of course. From his "Talking Points Memo" segment over the years, Slate culled a few of his headlines: "More Danger From the ACLU"; "Grim Picture on Illegal Immigration"; "Undermining the War on Terror, Part 97"; "Using Doctors To Hide Sex Crimes in Illegal Abortions"; "The Univ. of Hawaii Should Be Ashamed"; "Too Many in the U.S. Media are Anti-Military." I'm sure in the days ahead Oreilly will have equally provocative headlines on Katrina.
It wasn't always like that. There really used to be serious news on tv. No. I'm serious. The days of Murrow, Brinkley, Cronkite.
C-SPAN's the exception. Which brings me to Mary Landrieu's comment on the senate floor today. She misses Cronkite too, but laments the fact that his replacement is Geraldo Rivera.
Ouch.
I have got to marry that woman.
Well, somebody please take me now because I'm sick of the incessant Katrina coverage. I need to purge. Shit, I am purging, but it's a dry sort incontinence. Nothing's coming out because nothing went in. It's like eating popcorn before lunch. Your tastebuds are sated, one goes through the motion of hole-shoving, but you're still hungry afterwards.
Perhaps that is the most sinister aspect of tv coverage and the audience it draws--and why I hate it so much. It's emotional pornography or a kind of dry frottage between the audience and the networks. The networks make beaucoup cash from the advertising dollars, and the audience gets to feel something that day-something.
I don't feel any more informed today than say a week ago. All I have are images in my head, powerful to be sure, of distraught black faces, the brackish waters, the unimaginable suffering. Yet I can't do anything else with those images but react to them in some primal way.
Beyond some basic facts, I don't remember anything anybody said that registered intellectually. No substantive analysis, no grand exposition on natural disasters and its human victims. Just endless images and bullshit talk to tug at the heartstrings. I don't give a shit about ideology, but FOX News is the reigning champ. O'Reilly's the master, of course. From his "Talking Points Memo" segment over the years, Slate culled a few of his headlines: "More Danger From the ACLU"; "Grim Picture on Illegal Immigration"; "Undermining the War on Terror, Part 97"; "Using Doctors To Hide Sex Crimes in Illegal Abortions"; "The Univ. of Hawaii Should Be Ashamed"; "Too Many in the U.S. Media are Anti-Military." I'm sure in the days ahead Oreilly will have equally provocative headlines on Katrina.
It wasn't always like that. There really used to be serious news on tv. No. I'm serious. The days of Murrow, Brinkley, Cronkite.
C-SPAN's the exception. Which brings me to Mary Landrieu's comment on the senate floor today. She misses Cronkite too, but laments the fact that his replacement is Geraldo Rivera.
Ouch.
I have got to marry that woman.
posted by Patou | 10:20 AM
1 Comments:
Too late now, you can't marry her anymore.
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