The coverage of the
Katrina disaster was an eye opener. Watching it on CNN you might of thought the
world as we know it was coming to an end. After seeing the disaster in Thailand
with the tidal wave and the loss of hundreds of thousands of humans one began to
believe watching Katrina on CNN, that this was even worse! In reality about 1600 lives were
lost - a true disaster and a very sad and expensive situation. And because
of the detailed coverage provided by CNN it was all brought into our living
rooms and suddenly it was all very real and horrifying. However, it
was not on the same scale as other
recent disasters on the
planet involving tens or even hundreds of thousands of lost lives. As a
result, the entire nation all 300,000,000+ of them panicked. To bring this
back to reality in two weeks of normal carnage on the US highway system there
are more deaths than happened as a result of Hurricane Katrina. CNN built up the
story to such a pitch that the average American actually thought their
government services had collapsed and all was lost. There was widespread panic
and the event was a classic example of how the media can become the
message.
Another eye opener is how CNN covers
hurricanes. Somebody over
there has discovered there are grades of hurricanes the category 5 or cat 5
being the worst. So what that means is that the "Cat 5 Storm! "is the best
as far
as news goes. You can actually see excitement and anticipation in the announcers
as they talk about the "Cat 5 Storm! " and when the storm fades so does the
excitement and even interest. There is no story there only a strange form of disappointment
-that the storm is not a cat 5. Its very strange!
CNN focuses on absolutely stupid stories like the one about
Paris Hilton going to jail or the one about the American Astronaut in the love
triangle and diapers or even the one about Brittany Spears having a breakdown
and shaving her head and not wearing underwear. Give me a break! Surely there
are more important things going on in a country of over 300,000,000 people than
Brit's underwear! Is it just the medium or is it CNN?
There is the morbid curiosity they seem to exploit that is
on the level of a slow five year old and they keep on going back and back to
the same stupid stories. With all the important things going on in the world CNN
floods the United States airwaves with garbage and their citizens are robbed of
a balanced understanding of just what is going on in the world. All world news ends at the
American border. I don't even want to get into the Iraq coverage other that to
say that the best ally of the terrorist has been CNN. And I am certainly not
claiming that CNN workers are not patriots because they are but their actions
have actually helped the Terrorist cause because the terrorist depends on the
media to get their word out.
Way too much
bullshit! When the war was started CNN glibly and stupidly reporting that it was
a great victory when in fact simple things like policing the battle ground
(i.e.
securing warehouses of weapons) were not being done and entire divisions of
enemy troops were not being beaten but instead were going underground to fight
later. When the commanding general indicated a need for over half a million
troops to pacify and control the situation his testimony was given only
momentary coverage when in fact it later proved to be pivotal information which
resulted in tens of thousands of additional casualties. But CNN doesn't
really cover the news -it covers what sells ads and gains viewers. Now
who can we blame for that?
Comparing the on line personalities of CNN with
Canadian anchors
and anchorettes there is no comparison. The Canadians are much better. Embarrassingly
better. And the Canuck girls look a heck of a lot better too. I don't know why
-there are millions of very attractive American women but for some reason not many of
them (with the exception of Maria Bartiromo, Robin Meade and Diane Sawyer and Jessie
Cantrel)- make it to the news room. I know this will raise the blood
pressure of our American friends but think about it. Even our "weather girls
"(we call them
meteorologists) are superior. Want proof -check out weather with Claire Martin
or Colleen Jones or Susan Hay or Johanna Wagstaff, news with Sandie Rinaldo (The
worlds best female anchor!), Marcia McMillan or Heather Hiscox -(CBC Barbie), Kate Wheeler, Susan Bonner ( who I call CBC's Attack
Barbie), Marcie Ian, Jacqueline
Milczarek Carole MacNeil, Pooja
Handa (the "PH Factor" on Global), Susan Hay (again), Beverly
Thomson-(CTV Barbie) , Bridget Anderson,
Jennifer Ward, Catherine Clark -(CPAC Barbie) or (one of my favourites) Cindy Burgess.
Paula Todd on the Verdict is smart attractive and sharp and one can't help
comparing her to Nancy Grace who is is none of the above but tries hard and
yells a lot. For some reason
Canadian girls (i.e. women) are more wholesome looking, more attractive and a hell of a lot
smarter than the nearly but not quite all of the bimbos hired on CNN ( again with the exception of Robin Meade who is
pretty cute and seems like a nice person and has a brain and Maria
Bartiromo who is the smartest reporter on Business in North America well
with the exception of CBC's Danielle Bochove and who
looks great too and that Diane Sawyer
(who works on ABC not CNN) and that Jessie Cantrel on Black20
news who is smart and funny too!) Ok so there are at least four excellent
female anchors on US TV. Ok so its not quite as bad as it seems but
nationalistic pride makes me think our side is much better in that department.
Of course being a stupid man I am making these remarks from a male perspective
and perhaps unfairly leaving out our male anchors who do a good job too but who
frankly aren't as easy to look at as our girls. And probably I shouldn't
have referred to some of them as Barbies but so what. It fits.
CNN seems to
grind through its female anchors fairly quickly. In Canada once you make it to
the anchor position people admire you and you have a job for life because the
longer you are on the more they like you! In the USA it seems to work the
opposite way. The longer you are on there as anchor the more they hate you and
then they fire you! Paula Zahn, Soledad O'Brien, Marina Kolbe, Daryn
Kagan all were axe murdered by CNN execs. Great place to work. Not!
CNN is
particularly troublesome because of the way they make the news. In a country of
over 300,000,000 citizens its obvious that some bad dudes will act out and
some bad things will happen. Its also just as obvious that countless good
things will happen. CNN invariably will take the most obnoxious disgusting
things that happen in the country and give them headline coverage and then
NOT
COVER the good things. They especially love covering murders of pregnant
women, children, dogs and aircraft emergencies. Every time a US soldier gets
killed in Iraq CNN adds them to a total number killed to date and advertises
that like it was another point in a game. Can you imagine for a moment doing
this in ww2. It just wouldn't happen. The news was that the person was killed
NOT that they were the 2500th or 3000th in some sort of perverted CNN poll.
And CNN only grudgingly reports any news from outside the borders of the USA.
Excuse me! There is a whole world out there folks and the USA is just one of
many many nations on it. The sun does not rise and set on the USA. Yes the USA
is an important and powerful nation and lots of good hard working people live
there but there is a whole world out there and CNN basically ignores it. But
again is it CNN's fault, the nature of the medium or are they simply providing
what the viewer wants? It gets a bit complicated.
CNN is doing a great disservice to
the USA by not provided balanced reporting and by inducing into the US
population a completely distorted and inaccurate understanding of reality and
the world they live in. Its terrible really! It balances that off by
giving genuinely good service in crisis situations because they have the
resources to drill down and get the story.
Last point. The CNN logo. I DON'T
WANT TO SAY THEY COPIED IT FROM A CANADIAN COMPANY but here is the log
for Canadian National Railway first introduced in 1960. You decide! Add
another "N" to it and what do you get? Ha!
