Yes, I’m hooked on the news again. I guess there are worse things to be addicted to, but the news is probably worse for my blood pressure than a lot of other things.
I generally check out MSNBC.com every morning. I’m trying to make the switch to Foxnews.com, but I go to MSNBC out of habit. And, their site is by far the prettiest of the news sites. It’s clean and well-organized, the text is usually displayed in an easy-to-read manner, and they have these little public stupidity polls that you can participate in and pick weird answers to mess with the results. Foxnews.com, on the other hand, has this annoying blue background that flashes before the content loads, and it’s just plain ugly. Fox does, however, have more “fair and balanced” reporting. And, they write more of their own stories, rather than just uploading crap from the AP.
Speaking of the Associated Press, today I pulled up my Excite! home page to check the news headlines, and seeing Bush had made his new Supreme Court nomination, I clicked on the msnbc story, and found, of course, an AP upload. This is the opening line: “President Bush, stung by the rejection of his first choice, nominated conservative judge Samuel Alito…”
Hold on for a moment. Stung? By rejection? Who said President Bush was stung? Did someone talk to Laura? Did Bush say somewhere that he was “stung?” Come on, give me a break! This is not news; this is not “the 5 W’s.” This is a total fabrication – but, I think most people are too mindless to notice, and the AP writers know that. Again, they are creating public opinion, by their constant use of these fabrication thrown in to each and every news story they publish. I wonder if the AP would even accept a piece that just stuck to facts. This isn’t news reporting, this is creative writing.
I think it should be mandatory that Logic be taught to everyone at some point in high school so they could better recognize these little games that the AP plays (not that the other news services are any better). There should be a way to hold these people responsible for their fabrications. I guess I just have to start writing to the editor, several times a day, and just bug them to death.
Of course, after one or 2 e-mails, I’d probably be added to a spam list.
Bottom line, I don’t think Bush was too badly “stung” by the Miers thing. Frustrated, probably. But, after 5 years in the White House and 2 Presidential campaigns, I think it takes a bit more than this to “sting” him.
