It seems as if someone in CNN has the idea that The Drudge Report is the internet. But most people don’t go online to get the conspiracy theory of the day. If I’m reading about something online, I look at how it fits into historical context and trends I don’t need another lazy recitation of Reince Priebus talking points. Are things bad? Compared to what? How about comparing that to 5 years ago, last year, the rest of the world? Geeze, why not have that on some tabs on your wall, you know, like the internet.
People’s health insurance got canceled? OK, how about pointing out that eveyone’s policies get canceled routinely as they age and that the government did not outlaw this? Is that so hard? I did it just now, so it’s not that tough. The only reason to not do so is to push a rigid ideological storyline. Why do I want to watch tv to have the same content-free talking point screamed at me month after month when it was probably not even true in the first place? The content does not change, the perspective remains fixed, analysis is provided by the usual partisan screamers. In the case of the health care, where were the people that work in the health insurance industry? At least Rachel Maddow did her doctoral thesis on health care reform. But how does CNN make the concept of the internet fit with a business model based on information that never changes?
And then there’s this:
Frank Taaffe, a self-styled “expert” who appeared on a number of talk programs on CNN and its Headline News subsidiary to offer his views on racially charged criminal trials, has recently emerged as an entrenched figure in the far-right white supremacist movement. While one of his frequent hosts, Nancy Grace, recently grilled him about his views, the network has neither backed away from using Frank Taaffe nor explained why it has done so at all, particularly without making his background clear to viewers.
