That politicians want to be re-elected seems to me to be both obvious and trivial. I have never expected any different, and perhaps that it why it doesn’t cause me to feel cynical.

This isn’t a ‘new’ thing, or a reason to particularly worry in my opinion. In my expirience, cynicism is more useful for confirming old predjudices then it is for finding out ‘the truth’ about anything. If you decide to view everything through a certain lens, then that is all you will see.

Am I paranoid? I don’t think so. Just careful and very very cynical.

“…I don’t think there are any grand conspiracies, or that most of what is going on is being hidden from us by the illuminati.”

Grand conspiracies - no. Or at most extremely unlikely. Small conspiracies - probably happen all the time. Most fail and are therefore of no consequence.

But, every politician has at least one ulterior motive every time he/she opens mouth - “I gotta get re-elected…”. That as a starting point is good reason to suspect everything that they say.

I think it is useful to have multiple sources of information and to form an opinion based upon them, but I don’t think there are any grand conspiracies, or that most of what is going on is being hidden from us by the illuminati. That is just paranoia.

It strikes my that (given the “apathy” meaning of phlegmatic) that is a good part of the difference between us in our reactions to news and the presentation of news.

I like to know when I am being given a box of pork pies. I wish to “know” that from my own analysis of news rather than because a particular source has told me “it is so”. Sometimes, it is difficult to determine the truth of a matter; at which point the old cynicism kicks in, or past experience might give a lead, or it might be a case of “I am happy to see how this turns out…”.

What really does piss me off is the fact that so many people buy the porkies, buy the mindless pap and the “sponsor-safe” news. I guess that is why I wrote that series on propaganda…

Basically what you are saying is that you don’t like what most people like and that pisses you off.

While I am with you on the first point, I am much more phlegmatic on my response.

Bob, I agree. That truly is the crux of the matter.

I have only ever once lodged a complaint with one of the local tv stations. It involved a 75 second video inserted at the end of the news. The video was an interview with an entertainer, concerning a show that was coming to town. What got up my nose was not anything to do with the entertainer but the fact that a 15 second advertisement was being shown as “news”.

There was another example last night, which I don’t have the energy remaining to complain about. The two main channels here both broadcast a “news and commentary” programme starting at 7 p.m.

Last night I had the “privilege” of seeing the same interview with Tom Parker-Bowles on both channels. The questions were identical (or very closely so) and the answers from T P-B absolutely identical. But the questions were asked by two different people…

Now, there are two things wrong here.

The first is that it is obvious that the video was supplied. By whom is a mystery but seeing that a large part of the interview centred on the recent release of T P-B’s book I can hazard a pretty accurate guess.

The second is that both channels have used the same “news kit” to fill a ten minute slot.

That, I submit, is not news or commentary unless you happen to be an avid reader of womens’ magazine and pulps like “People” or “Wide World Adventure”.

It is the difference between the solid daily newspaper and the tabloids. I would like to think that Granny Herald still qualifies as the former. The latter is the kind of “newspaper” that in the 1950’s was printing as “news” the Court lists for divorces, or the “Page 3 girl”.

… and people wonder why I am such a cynic.

CNN ran a “breaking news” story about who was the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s baby.

I’m sure Probligo and Dave would agree with me that who is the father of Smith’s baby is nowhere near the importance of issues such as Iraq and Virginia Tech.

Yet it seems like the majority of the public laps up celebrity news like that. And since networks like CNN needs to get ratings for the purposes of generating the best advertising revenues possible, CNN’s news focus tends to be what the execs will think gets the best ratings.

CNN isn’t the only one, though. MSNBC, Fox News, and all the rest are the same way… whatever attracts the best ratings to ensure the best advertising revenues possible.

‘Entertainment’ is not in my mind some sort of dirty world.

It is also undeniable that ‘importance’ is in the mind of the beholder. Obviously you think the Iraq hearings are more ‘important’ then Virginia Tech. I expect that many would agree with you, and many others would disagree with you. I am sure also that news executives think more disagree with you then agree with you, and that Virginia Tech is more important, and entertaining, to most people then the Iraq hearings, which is why they were more on the news. What they are trying to sell you by the way, is that you want to watch their program, and hence the commercial advertisments sandwitched within it. It isn’t really a big mystery.

Dave, do you really mean that? Or is it your commentary on just how you see the attitude of MSM and the majority of other people to the news.

For myself the news is, always has been, my window on the world. I can not live in splendid isolation from it. The greater the potential for an event to impact upon me the higher is my interest in that event.

Alongside of that is the importance of knowing whether the picture I am seeing is reality or someone’s “painting on the wall”.

So, when I see Cho on the news for the first time, I have a mild interest. Like you, I wonder “Is he sane?”. When I get to the fifth or sixth viewing I begin to wonder why there is such a saturation broadcast. When I see the same photos being broadcast 10 days after the event, I begin to wonder “What am I being sold here?”

What does concern me most is that news might be chosen for its “entertainment value” rather than for its importance. So, if I line Cho up against the events in the Congressional Hearings on Iraq in the past 36-48 hours I have to ask “Which is more important? Which will get the greater air-time?”

I have on the wall in my office a Non-Sequitur cartoon. It features a tv in a bar…

“Breaking news from Wall St… The stock market has just crashed!

China called in its markers on our debt, sending a shockwave around the world as we collapse in an economic freefall.

We haven’t seen a calamity like this since the Great Depression, and just one question weighs heavily on everyone’s mind at this point…

“How will this affect Paris Hilton?”

Sums it up for me…