I’ve always loved newspapers. When I was a kid, I had a paper route. I always had a couple of extra newspapers in the bundle, just to make sure that I had enough, if one got messed up, and every afternoon, I’d take one of the spares, and read it, pretty much cover to cover. Back then, reading a paper was a great way to learn about the world, the nation, and your own area. Newspapers used to have a couple of really important rules: 1) Don’t allow advertisers to influence your news coverage, and 2) Maintain a wall between hard news and opinion. Section A of the paper was always hard news – stories that provided the facts of the subject, in what we in Journalism class called the “Inverted Pyramid.” The idea was to provide all the salient details up-front, with more and more details further in. In a way, this is the opposite of how you’d write a story – in fiction, you want to create a hook at the beginning, to grab the reader and draw them deeper into the story. Well into the tale, you deliver the details and critical information to the story.
[Read more…] about Lies, Damned Lies, and The Media.
Do you love movies? I used to. Hooray for Hollywood and all that. It used to be our best export – American culture via movies was the original nation-building exercise. Even countries that hate us loved our entertainment. Today, things are different. I’m ashamed of most of the America-bashing, far-Left ideology-spewing, self-absorbed naval gazing, crapalicious dreck coming out of Hollywood nowadays. And I’m not alone. Movie attendance is way, way down in the so-called “Red States,” and the number-one with a car bomb objection raised by Islamic fundamentalist nutjobs is the “decadent” entertainment designed to break down traditional cultures – like theres. I used to enjoy watching the Oscar ceremony, pulling for my favorite movies, directors, actors and actresses. Not anymore. I haven’t watched – or cared about – the Oscars in years. Between Hollywood nominating a bunch of movies I wouldn’t see on a bet (movies that mock my values, like Brokeback Mountain) and nominating a bunch of actors and actresses with little talent, less common sense, willing to loudly bray their opinions about George Bush, the Right, and how everything wrong with the world is Halliburton’s and Chenney’s fault. After a while it gets old.