Why Does Commercial News Suck?

This week, I watched the same piece of information reported on commercial TV and PBS. At 6:30, NBC's Brian Williams went into shocked-and-breathless mode to announce that American life expectancy had hit a whopping 77.9 years. Then at 7:00, I heard Jim Lehrer calmly announce the same fact and put it in context. While this is the highest life expectancy the US has yet achieved, it falls behind 40 other nations. The context changes everything. If you were watching Brian Williams, you'd be popping the champagne corks. If you were watching Jim Lehrer, you'd be contemplating moving to Costa Rica--one of several third world countries with longer life expectancies than the US.

The Brian Williams sound bite--which sounded like a press release from the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell's 1984--would be like Agence France-Presse touting the French economy's 1% growth rate. France's economy has indeed been growing steadily since World War II, but the central issue is why France's growth is so much slower than peer countries like Ireland, Sweden, and the United States. At least in France, for all its problems, they debate the real issues. Here, for lack of information and context, we don't.

Why not? There are a few theories:

1) People love fake news. No, I'm not talking about The Daily Show; I'm talking about FOX. Many Americans want to hear good news, and that's what FOX gives them. Tune in to FOX, and you'll hear, for example, that we're winning in Iraq. And as the older commercial networks try to compete with FOX, which has better ratings, many have slipped into an if-you-can't-beat-'em-join-'em strategy where they try to give people just as much fake news.

2) Self-interested corporate media. This one's a tad conspiratorial for my taste, but here's how it goes. The commercial networks are run by giant corporations which have never been more profitable. They need to keep people feeling either satisfied or powerless so nothing really changes. GE owns NBC. It pays Brian Williams's paycheck. It's also in the healthcare business. I know because I use their dental plan. So if word got out that the US had third world levels of life expectancy while spending far more than even its fellow wealthy countries on healthcare, people might dump the corporate healthcare system that GE's profiting off of (those profit margins are a big reason we pay more than everyone else). So GE's news division's job isn't to keep people informed, but to keep people happy--to "manufacture consent," as Noam Chomsky puts it.

I'm more sympathetic to theory #1 than #2, but I'd love to hear what readers think. And one caveat: pundits love to say it's either A or B--just watch The McLaughlin Group--when, in fact, it can be both. For example, are we in Iraq because of the oil or because of naïve neo-con theories about freedom or because the evangelicals think they're bringing on Armageddon and the Second Coming? I'd say all three. For Cheney, it's about oil; for Bush, it's about Jesus; and for Wolfowitz, it's about neo-conservative ideology. They don't all have to agree on the reasons, they only have to agree on a policy.

So what do you all think?

Comments

[Nativson]

My take on this is a combination of both #1 and #2 scenarios. Self-interested corporate media drives the news, then you have the faux news aficionado the media plays to. Its the same reason politics suck too.

[ChangeNow]

What about theory #3....
Fear. The media learned their lesson when Dan Rather was set up and shot down as an example to anyone who might dare to oppose the administration. Nobody in the media is willing to stick their neck out, because they know the penalties. The rules are clear - no hard questions for the president, always present baseless administration spin as a counterpoint to facts, and never poke around where you don't belong.
It is a nauseating lack of courage, fostered by greed. Back in the old days, the media would have banded together against this assault on the freedom of the press. Now they see it as an opportunity to make more money filling the void where others have fallen.

[Indiana]

You're right about the "nauseating lack of courage" on the part of the media. And it's not only fostered by greed, but also because the media are corporate-owned and they want to make sure a business-friendly government stays in power in this country. This is why you don't often see coverage of the continuing trials and tribulations in New Orleans and in the areas hit by Katrina because the area's slow recovery makes the Bush Administration look bad. And it would take a lot of moral courage for any of the Big 3 networks to start regularly covering news out of Louisiana and Mississippi.

[mykulb]

As John Mayer so clearly put's it in "Waiting for the World to Change":
When you own the news, you can bend it any way you like...
Corporate Amerika IS the problem. We ARE their sheep.
When people stop asking questions, and the public stops answering surveys, the change will come. It will happen via the Internet, be called 'terrorist', and our country will go through a corporate cleansing.­..just as our working class will experience during the upcoming 'housing market adjustment'. That will only hurt middle class Americans, who's house is everything to them.
IMHO...

[BrickSykes]

How about this? The Networks, and CNN, and MSNBC, etc., are not really in the business of spreading clarity, now are they? How could these players sit in the same town and get such very different versions of the same facts? How about if they have been "encouraged" to deliver different versions of the same stories? Why?

The Corporate Robber Barons and the NeoConic Powers that Be Do Not Want Us to Know the SAME News! Why not? Because if we did, we might get to enjoy some unifying force of commonality! As it is, we're delivered widely spun, often conflicting versions of each item. We've all heard that "A House Divided Cannot Stand", right? The System WANTS us to be Confused! They're doing a pretty good job of it, too, aren't they?

Same with Religion, same with Politics, same with Cars, even! The MKUltra folks the Corporations hire know some pretty clever psychology, friends, and our confusion and in-fighting are NO Accident! Chew on That!

Brick

[Raster]

Let me guess. Because they are completely controlled by the bald-headed cigar smokers operating in the dark shadows of the periphery?

[robertlockwoodmills]

Why does commercial news suck? Is that a real question or a rhetorical one?

It sucks because the essence of news reporting is truth, but commercial media outlets aren't interested in truth unless it helps them make money. When truth collides with the selfish interests of investors and advertisers (as with stolen elections in 2000 and 2004), then bad news goes unreported, or worse, it's called conspiracy theorizing.

All media sources are now part of corporate oligarchies, whose first responsibility is to their stockholders and advertisers who supply the money...no­t to acquire truth but to make a profit on their investments.

[olivine]

All I know is- years ago my grandmother paid someone to research her family tree, and my father has the result hanging on his wall...one day I decided to see how old the poor chumps lived to be- say back in the 1300's and 1400''s -AND I WAS SHOCKED!They lived to be in their 70's and 80's!How is this possible, I asked myself, without the American Cancer Society and American Health Care???????? No vaccinations!No mammograms! No colonoscopies! No annual physicals! this whole "We are finally living past age 60 " thing is a sham...any­one surprised?

[joja]

Great blog. I think if more people knew about the big corp/healthcare rip-off connection, and how it relates to our standing among other countries vis a vis longevity, they'd get their pitchforks and man the barricades.

But they don't have a clue, thanks to the very reasons cited in the article. As Bush has stated many times, "Keep 'em happy, keep 'em shopping!" That's his mantra. And the big business MSM is only too happy to endorse the fantasy.

I think it's sad when Americans are forced to purchase a product they don't need or want -- healthcare insurance -- just because some greedy assholes don't want to see their financial portfolios decline.

Insurance is just another form of gambling, people can't afford it so they don't want to buy it, yet lawmakers and politicians force consumers into predicaments where they are mandated to subsidize an industry they don't really want or need.

It has nothing to do with peoples' health or helping them live longer and better lives. It's all about creating busywork jobs in an industry that has been demonstrated by other countries to be fake and redundant.

If the Democratic candidates were smart, they'd hit on the MSM/big healthcare connection and how voters are being played for suckers. People may be slow to catch on, but once they do, look out.

[realpolitic]

I think the anchors and networks feel people want good news. The networks, for example, may feel people are tired of hearing about the violence in Iraq. I think people want to hear more about Iraq and what is happening there, but with context. Often the context is missing. For example, if there is a bombing- who may have done it? and why? and what are the trends in violence in that area? Real news does not have to be false, patriotic dribble as Fox News presents. It can move quickly and at times have a point of view, but it should provide context and background to inform people.

[Wildspirit]

It'sickening to watch the loathesome news, seeing OJ as a top story rather than efforts to get us out of a needless sucking war. I see Vietnam all over again, with a difference: the real threat of nuclear war begun by the U.S. in the Bush administration's quest to spread its version of democracy and twisted ideology throughout the world. Where is that story?

[larryfishkorn]

There's no doubt that the news is mostly copied from news wires, and they, like the channels themselves, are controlled by a small number of managers. The slant is undeniable. When my wife and I came back from Europe, where we heard about everyone over there and their two and three-week vacations and maternity leave. We get back, turn on CNN, and they report that there's "good news" for American workers. We now work more and are more productive than any workforce in the world. Gee, thanks, that's one thing I want, is more time at work, more productivity, and for what? To continue to sink out of the disappearing middle class and into debt and poverty. There's only one class of people who would consider that "good news", and it's not mine.

[Jazzylady26]

White men, with mega bucks, who are all republican conservatives, own most, if not all of the msm, so there is no news in the news but what they want you to hear and see. It's all happy talk with no teeth, and it isn't going to be any other way for the foreseeable future. Right?

[Oregonian37]

I wonder if part of the reason that people don't respond to real news, or the truth on television news...and seem to crave infotainme­nt...is because we can't respond to television news. It is a one-way communication where we don't get to respond or ask questions or give our own views back. We are removed from it because we aren't allowed to be engaged in it, through the television medium. I think that has a great deal to do with why blogs, etc. have become so indispensable as news sources...­because we get to respond to what we hear or read. We get to discuss it with each other and with the "reporters". We get to engage fully in a two-way conversation, as opposed to simply being the object at which bits of information are thrown, as is the case with television news. Just my take on it.

[vernonlee]

Two items:

1) it can't be stated often enough: the product on sale is us, the viewers. Our demographic profile and buying proclivities are what keep the whole ship afloat and the lights on. It's not the show that's sold to the advertisers - it's we viewers who are sold to advertisers via the shows.

2) said advertisers call the shots, obviously - and don't want to have their products sandwiched between news items that disturb the viewer. The rule: first titillate (in teasers and story intros), and then soothe. By the time the commercial rolls around, all viewer anxieties must be allayed.

And one final comment about why it sucks - and its counterparts on Lehrer and Charlie Rose suck too: the overabundance of Q&As with pundits. Cheap to produce - management's dream!. You just sign a contract with some former 2-star general, ex-cabinet officer, former speechwriter, whatever - and whenever news hits that involves said (ahem) expert's raison d'etre, hook them up with a microphone and let 'er rip. No need for research, for prep - just have the blowdried master of ceremonies ask a question here and there and you're good to go. Another 10 minutes done - and on the cheap.

Now cut to commercial.

[InsaneDisabled]

Maybe all network news should adopt the format and attitude of "The Daily Show", which delivers more truth than all of them put together. In this country we're so sheltered the truth must be sugar-coated with humor or we just won't hear it.

But truth isn't the goal of network journalism -- profit is. And either theory you describe would increase profits for somebody. The second is more indirect and harder to track so it's more unlikely, but that doesn't mean it never happens.

[MinerSam]

Yes, but it is more than that. That out of context NBC headline is just a reflection of desparation to get viewers, and a habit of shoddy reporting.

But more than anything the out of context reporting, that has sucked the oxigen from the lungs of an informed electorate, is about GE, DISNEY, NEWCORP etc. wanting the Republicans to keep control. It is about money at the expense of our country.

There has been consistent and out of context disinformation every day and in every way
INCLUDING ** WHERE IT REALLY COUNTS ** ON THE NEWSHOUR.

When the scandle came out involving the biggest Republican fundraiser in history, the Abromoff scandle came to light, the Newshour report it while simultaniously showing footage of Democratic senators!

At least with Fox "news" (which meets with the White House about what to say) you know what you are dealing with, But CNN is much much more dangerous. And there are surges of disinformation in the lead up to every election.

I am not just talking about the tens of billions in free advertising they gave the Swiftboat Liars for the War in Vietnam.

Remember when Democrats were presenting plan after plan after plan for turining this around in Iraq? But all you heard repeated every day by the Tim Russerts of the world was "the
Democrats have no plans"

Today's Meet the Press was an example between reality (John Kerry) and the mindless propaganda of the Republicans (John MacCain)

Prior to the constitution of Iraq being ratified (and the Republican dictatorship was comfortable with itself and with it's leg on the jugular vien of our country) the Democtats were tearng their hair out saying that the Sunniis must be included in the constituti­on.. repots: "the Democrats have no plan"

When Kerry presented legislation for moving COMBAT TROOPS of densely populated areas in Irag, stepping up the training, and using more special forces, CNN Reported: " Kerry plan is to move all troops out of Iraq immediately.

This keeps going and going and going. One day Mr. Bush says it, the next day CNN says it!