CommenTerry

The Media’s Boy-Who-Cried-Wolf Problem

I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t a pay a whole lot of attention to the media’s “breaking news” or “this just in” stories. That’s because the news services have a tendency to overhype even the most trivial of news stories. To them, almost anything seems to qualify as breaking news. They are like the boy who cried wolf. They scream so often that, even when they are reporting a very serious story, they don’t get my attention at first. Their reporting reminds of those now-ubiquitous car alarms. Most of us have now heard them so often that we don’t bother to look up when we hear one – even if someone’s car is actually being broken into.

When the reports of the first airplane hitting the World Trade Center on 9/11 started coming in, I just assumed it was no big deal. I thought it was probably just a single-engine plane that had wondered off course and hit the building. Yes, the news media was trying to tell us how serious the situation was, but I bet I was not the only one who didn’t take the whole thing all that seriously at the outset. I mean they had made much less severe situations seem just as grave in the past. It wasn’t until most of us saw the images on TV that we knew the hype was justified in this case.

Until members of the media start reserving their hype for the stuff that actually merits it, they will continue to be plagued by their boy-who-cried-wolf problem.

Dying to Bring Us the News

The recent death of a female American journalist in Syria while working for British newspaper made me think. Actually, it made me wonder why anyone would want to risk their life just to bring us the news. I can understand why someone would risk their life to save the lives of others or to protect them from danger.

But I just don’t see how maintaining the free flow of information is worth anyone’s life. I’m sorry, but I can’t comprehend such a concept. I can’t get the scales to balance in mind. I would never be so dedicated to anything short of protecting life and limb that I would be willing to lay down my life for it. Obviously, some people are. I have yet determine whether it’s because they are extremely stupid, exceptionally courageous, and or perhaps a little of both.

Myth of the 24-Hour News Cycle

I’ve often heard people refer to the so-called “24-hour news cycle” and I used to believe such a thing actually existed. After all, look at all of the 24-hour cable news channels we have now, such as CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Headline News, etc. But here’s the problem – even though there are news channels like these that broadcast 24 hours a day, nearly all of the stuff they carry from 1:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m. is just rehashed or repeated stuff from the evening and night before. In other words, there is nothing fresh and new being broadcast during those wee hours of the morning. The only exception would be when a very important news event breaks. Of course, if you’ve ever been up late at night because you couldn’t sleep and tuned your TV to one of those news channels, you already know this, don’t you?

Alex Castellanos: CNN’s Resident Gingrich Hater

Has anyone else noticed the fact that Alex Castellanos, CNN’s resident Republican commentator and political analyst, never has anything good to say about Newt Gingrich? No matter what Gingrich says or does, Castellanos spins it as a negative. To Castellanos, Gingrich can do no right, and his GOP opponents can do no wrong. Even when Gingrich won South Carolina’s primary, Castellanos gave him no credit.

I wonder what Gingrich ever did to Castellanos to tick him off so much. Did Gingrich bully him when he was a kid? Did he insult his mother? Did he steal his girlfriend? What exactly is the reason for his unconcealed animosity towards Gingrich? I’d really like to know. And why don’t any of Castellanos’ CNN cohorts ever call him on his obvious bias? Perhaps they are somewhat biased as well.

The Media’s Unbalanced Coverage of Christianity

The media always loves to report any kind of scandal involving a church and/or a pastor. They seem to get a great deal of satisfaction out of it. However, they almost never report anything positive about Christianity. For example, you’ll never see a news report about a church conducting a revival in which many people are saved and many others rededicate their lives to Jesus Christ. Have you ever asked yourself why they never report that kind of stuff?

Smarmy Chris Matthews Chasing This Viewer Away

MSNBC commentator Chris Matthews, who hosts Hardball, has become almost unwatchable lately. He has now developed a habit of leading off his show with smarmy remarks about one GOP presidential candidate or the other. He and his guests apparently get a hoot out of belittling these candidates, trying to demonstrate how stupid, bigoted, mean, arrogant, and unthoughtful they are.

The only two of those candidates he finds even remotely acceptable are Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman. He (along with most of his colleagues at MSNBC) already “knows” that Romney is going to be nominee. Even though he’s a flip-flopper, Romney will win because Huntsman is too moderate for those “narrow-minded” Republican primary and caucus voters, and all the remaining candidates are … well … “not presidential timber.”

I used to watch Matthews to get serious information about the presidential race. Now I can’t watch him for more than a few minutes before turning elsewhere.

Media Baffled by Cain’s Political Incorrectness

The mainstream media just couldn’t understand Herman Cain’s web ad in which his campaign manager lights up a cigarette. One commentator said he didn’t know what to make of it. Another called it “truly bizarre.” These people are such slaves to political correctness that they are completely baffled anytime they encounter something that doesn’t conform to it.

Since the advent of political correctness, things that used to be viewed as completely normal are now seen as weird, and vice versa. For example, if Cain had instead created ad featuring a transgendered, drug-addicted atheist, the media would have applauded him. But some people have not bought into that garbage, and Herman Cain is one of them. Three cheers for Mr. Cain, as he continues to stump the media experts.

Who Cares about Solyndra or Fast and Furious?

Many in the right-wing media seem to be enthralled with the investigations of Solyndra and Fast and Furious scandals. They have been devoting large amounts of their reporting time to them. However, the average viewer (voter) doesn’t care about either one. They are concerned about real issues such as the economy, jobs, and the war in Afghanistan. They also want more information on what the budget super-committee is doing right now. Fox News and company need to stop wasting time on stuff that doesn’t matter to most people.

Sniffing Until They Smell the Stink

At times, the news media tends to create problems that didn’t originally exist. They pry and pry and pry until they find something – then they make an international incident out of an issue that no one really cared about before. If you continue stiffing long enough and hard enough, you’re going to find something that stinks, whether not it actually matters to anyone.

A prime example is the media’s reporting about a nuclear power plant in Virginia following the recent 5.8 magnitude earthquake. They are determined to find some kind of damage that was done to that plant by the quake, even though they have consistently found everything to be just fine. But they know that if they keep digging, they are going to find something. And then there’s going to be hell to pay, even if it consists only of a crack in some insignificant bolt.

The Media Is Constantly Amazed by the Commonplace

Ever notice how members of the American media seem constantly amazed by fairly common events? This is especially true when it comes to the rebuilding of infrastructure after it is has been damaged or destroyed by some natural or manmade event. A prime example is the damage done to Joplin, Missouri by a tornado earlier this year. That city has since recovered enough so that school could begin on time, and has made great progress toward rebuilding.

Why are media people so astounded by this? Don’t they follow history? There has not been one instance of a U.S. city being partially or completely destroyed and not being rebuilt. Yet every time a city rebuilds, the media seems to have forgotten about all of those that have gone before and accomplished the same thing. Their amazement never ceases to amaze me.