Like Generalísimo Francisco Franco, Anna Nicole Smith is still dead. Let's be honest, when you heard Smith died, you did say, "Wow, really? What happened?" Answering that question is what reporters do and the question and its answer are news. Likewise, the fact that that question remains unanswered is also newsworthy. It's just not extremely important. But it is news.
The problem is that we're not seeing a lot of prioritizing among news organizations. When celebrity news is the top story, it should mean it's a slow news day. But the truth is that celebrity news is often the top story because there's celebrity news. Mel Gibson spews a drunken, bigoted tirade and that's the big story. Michael Richards spews a sober, bigoted tirade and it's page one. Anna Nicole Smith dies and it's a long, national nightmare.
God help us if Paris Hilton either dies or gets married. We won't hear anything else for weeks.
Think Progress has a nice comparison of coverage of Anna Nicole Smith and the Walter Reed Medical scandal. It represents one day, last friday. According to them, MSNBC covered Anna Nicole 96 times and Walter Reed 84. CNN did better on balance -- 40 Anna Nicole to 53 Walter Reed. FOX News (surprise, surprise) did a lousy job with 121 Anna Nicole stories to just 10 Walter Reed. While other networks could be said to be offering candy with their coverage, FOX's coverage looks a lot like using Anna Nicole to fill the gaps left by a Walter Reed news blackout...
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Tags: news | politics | media | propaganda | FOX | CNN | MSNBC | conservative | republican | bullshit
Monday, March 05, 2007
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