Catastrophe and the Network News

Let us accept that complaining about Katrina coverage will certainly ruffle a few feathers. A whole lotta people were killed, injured, displaced, distressed, and generally screwed by nature's irritable bowel syndrome, the hurricane, and that righteously sucks, fo sho. But for the rest of the country we need to know that things are moving on.

No one is suggesting that we, as a nation of watchers and consumers, simply forget about the damage and suffering in the Gulf Coast region, but we do need to be able to turn on the news and see something other than an over made-up, rolled up pressed shirted, pretty boy in a network news hat standing in front of a level strip mall telling us how Bubba Winfield is still picking up the pieces of his civil war gun replica store.

Message to CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, FoxNews, and whoever else is broadcasting these days: "We Get It! Lot's of stuff got knocked over. How about giving us some timely news about how the country is dealing with it. Ooh, and maybe what's going on in the rest of the world. We'd read the New York Times for our news, but we're tired of being told how crappy America is and how much it needs Big Government to straighten everything out."

The Times sucks like the Ravens and television news isn't far behind. Are people really comfortable getting their news from headlines? A question that merits some exploration. But not today. Today we will just have to be satisfied with complaining.

The Empire is giving up on television news sources. From now on it's Google News and The Onion. And, of course, the Internet Movie Database.