CNN stinks

Blood Pressure Medicine:

There is a scene, early in the classic Disney movie Lady and the Tramp, in which Lady brings back the newspaper with the front page torn up. "Have you noticed, Darling," her master says to his wife, "that ever since we have Lady we see less and less of those disturbing headlines?"

Since I've abandoned cable TV -- any TV, actually -- these last two years, I find my sense of anger about things has greatly subsided. I was reminded of why tonight, while dining out at a place showing CNN.

When I arrived, there was a piece on the Moussaoui verdict. Several experts were discussing the verdict, and explaining that the jury had decided against the death penalty because nine of them believed he had been abused as a child.

It's a little more complicated than that, but no time for such things! We have to move on to the next story:

War on the Middle Class!

What? Oh, well, it turns out to be a story about high gasoline prices. Which aren't an economic story because economics is, like, really boring and stuff. So it needs to be a war story. That's a good angle. OK, no more time, quick, on to the next story...

Broken Borders!

What's this story about? I quote the tagline from memory: 'States are being forced to fight the immigration battle alone.'

It's a war! On immigration! No, wait, immigration IS the war! On us! Or, wait, no, because we need to work in a sympathetic portrait of a migrant, so that symbol won't work, but maybe...

No time! We have to move on to the next story! On government corruption!

Good Lord. No wonder people are totally upset with the country.

So, let me see here: the gas price story is not an economic story but the story of a war against the middle class (being waged by whom, exactly?); the illegal immigration story is not a law enforcement story, but the story of a war being fought by the states (and who is the enemy?); but the story of Zacarais Moussaoui, who entered the country as part of a terrorist organization and plotted to kill thousands of innocent people, that's not a war story, no...

...it's just a law story. One that shows the kind heart of the American people, standing up for a poor abused boy from France, and righteously rejecting the cruel and unusual "death penalty."

I will never watch TV News again.