Jim Kunstler in one of his finest moments
How infantile is American society? Last night’s CBS “Business Update” (in the midst of its “60 Minutes” program) featured three items: 1.) The New Moon teen vampire movie led the weekend box-office receipts; 2.) Cadbury shares hit an all-time high; 3.) Michael Jackson’s rhinestone-studded white glove sold at auction for $350,000. Some in-house CBS-News producer is responsible for this fucking nonsense. How does he or she keep her job? Is there no adult supervision at the network?
Read the whole thing. He has some serious points to make after this wondrous opening rant. Like the country economically and politically is in a Wile E. Coyote moment, briefly suspended in mid-air over the abyss, while the media displays pablum and the government pretends everything is just fine. The sense of unreality is pervasive.
Perhaps they should have debated about the unformed health care bill or talked endlessly about H1N1 instead. That’s what’s been passing for “news” for most of the past 2 weeks around here. Never mind chattering on about a health care bill that’s still not even fully formed is futile, nor it talking about the “risks” of H1N1 when there’s little you can do to avoid getting it, thanks to shortages of the vaccine. (And don’t get me started on the debate about taking the vaccine… :P)
The fact that he’s just noticing this now is telling. I saw this happening nearly a decade ago, and started getting my news from other sources, like DW news, BBC, and FSRN. But now even they are being swayed into covering “current topics” (that are little more than fluff and speculation) more often than they should.
Plus, endless time can be spent attacking the Other Side because they are Wrongheaded and Evil.