Just the Facts...

I'm a pretty straightforward person, I like things to be told to me quickly and to the point. So when it comes to watching the news, I pretty much want to know what happened, and that's it. I don't need any "analysis", "spin", "viewer reaction", or anything like that. And this is why I can't stand the news media.

First of all, there's the feeling that we need to know what celebrities are doing all the time, and that sometimes this is bigger than the major events of the day. I really wonder if the network news heads actually cringe when REAL news breaks out because it means they have to get off their butts and COVER something. Of course, it has to be a pretty major event for that to happen, and what some networks consider to be a "pretty major event" is subjective. Consider for example, that when former President Gerald Ford passed away last week, CBS didn't even bother to interrupt programming to break the story.

There's a time and place for stuff like Brad & Angelina, or TomKat, or who Britney flashed this week... shows like "Entertainment Tonight", "Abcess Hollywood", errr... I mean "Access Hollywood", "Extra", stuff like that. If I'm tuning in to watch the news, that's what I want... the effing NEWS.

I usually just read the newspaper instead of turning on the TV for news, but newspapers aren't even immune. In order to keep their readership (cuz unfortunately there are people who have to have their celebrity gossip to survive), they plaster the celebrity news on page 2 or page 6 or somewhere up front in the front section so you can get it to it right away. I usually skip it...

Then there's the question of whether or not there is bias in the media. It's pretty simple... there IS, always has been; as long as there have been newspapers, there has been slant. There was the age of "yellow journalism", where the William Randolph Hearsts and Joseph Pulitzers of the world tried to not only print the current events, but cause them as well. For a long time, the New York Post was the "Democrat" paper in New York, but since News Corp. bought it some time ago, it's now pretty slanted to the right, but the New York Times is slanted to the left, so there's your balance. Sure we hear about the pretense of objectivity all the time, but the fact is people can report the facts all they want, there's always going to be the matter of syntax and semantics and how you write it, and human nature just takes over. I'm not complaining about this, but you should know it's there before you go whining about how such and such newspaper always criticizes the president or always gives him a pass.

What bothers me is when a newspaper shoves their slant right down your throat. Back when I was in Chambersburg, I occasionally got the Sunday Washington Post and for a while I read the Baltimore Sun to get the "big-city" perspective on things. I stopped because I couldn't stand certain things they did... like putting an news "analysis" piece on the front page above the fold like it's the top news story of the day. Pretty easy for someone who's reading quickly to miss that part and think that what the commentator wants you to think happened is what actually happened. And occasionally, they wouldn't even tell you it was an analysis piece, it would be made up to look just like a news story. I still don't trust anything that the Sub-Standard, errr, Post-Standard prints that is written by someone from the New York Times or Washington Post; I immediately presume there's a slant to it.

Speaking of which, there's a reason we call it the Sub-Standard. Do you think you guys could actually PAY ATTENTION to the headlines you write sometimes? A week ago, the front page story on the execution of Saddam Hussein ended a few pages later under the headline "US Judge Denies Request to Stop Execution." NOWHERE in the story did it mention this fact... due to space issues, they probably chopped that part out. That's fine, but when you do that, you might want to fix the freakin' headline to reflect the content of your now-edited article! Here's another recent headline, and you can make up your own joke for this one, it was about the protests over the NYPD shooting of an innocent man leaving his bachelor party... "Fifth Avenue Filled With Police Shooting Protesters"

But getting back to bias... we always hear people complaining about Fox News Channel, saying it leans heavily to the right. Compared to CNN, yes it does... but that's because CNN leans to the left. Consider the coverage when the Democrats assumed control of the Congress this week. The coverage was headed by CNN's most unashamedly liberal anchor, Jack Cafferty, whose normal functions include an hourly segment featuring e-mails from viewers whose political views sit just to the left of Abbie Hoffman, and also a regular feature called "War on the Middle Class", which talks about the many ways that corporations are destroying America. Need more proof? As I was doing my 10 minutes on the treadmill the other day, I was watching a segment about our disputes with Iran, under the headline, "What Foreign Policy?" Now THAT'S slant!

All in all, it's pretty tough to actually know what's going on so you have to pick your spots and ALWAYS consider the source. Like I said, if it's the NY Times or Washington Post or CNN, it's going to be slanted to the left. If it's the New York Post or Fox News Channel, it's going to be slanted to the right. And it's worse online... if it's Salon.com, it's going to be slanted WAY to the left, and if it's Newsmax.com, it's going to be slanted WAY to the right. With so much filler and so much, well, crap to deal with, it's no wonder people's attention span for the news is smaller than most other things, so they only read the first few paragraphs of a story or tune in for a few seconds on TV. It doesn't have to be this way, but until somebody comes up with a better way, I guess we're stuck with it. I just hope it doesn't take another major world event like 9-11 to make the media come to their senses again.