Bill Dog's Journal: no entertainment in my information, pls

News sites should have a designated "wacky news" section, that I and others can go to when we want non-serious stories. And then keep the ridiculous out of the regular news. For example, and I see this all the time, in this article there's this paragraph:

Rep. Anthony Weiner said President Bush's "idea of an energy policy is holding hands with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, embracing him with a big smooch."

Dear journalists <choke>, you don't need to include every far-out crazy thing that is said during some event. These are meant as throw-away lines by the crazies who utter them, anyways -- they don't really, actually mean that they think that, they're just frustrated and voicing that by being ridiculous. That frustration is felt is relevant to the story, but the absurd words themselves are not. They're not the point. Stop propagating insanity, it's not cute. Every time Jimmy Carter or Nelson Mandela or Pat Robertson et al. says something stupid is not a reason to go and quote it in print. Unless your aspirations for your medium include it being seen as a major crap conduit. We have pipelines that take crap away from our homes, to the sewers, and then we have you guys and the sewers that are your organizations, who pipe it *to* our homes. Thanks but no thanks, I already have enough crap to put up with in my life. Just keep the serious news serious. Really, that article was passable excepting for that unnecessary paragraph, that just insults everyones' intelligence.

And I don't see this as part of the bias problem, either. Now I *do* wish Lefty shithead journalists <cough> would stop the constant injecting of their political/religious slant into most of what they write, but this is a totally different kind of inappropriateness, and is not related. Granted it was a funny statement, but anyone can think up something wacky to say, about anything. It's not news. Who is this Mr. Weiner to anyone anyways, he's not even famous. I don't need a light-hearted break mid-way into my articles -- I'm a big boy and can read all the way to the end without stopping, no problem. When I'm looking for serious content, it's unwelcome and just detracts from information dissemination, what you're supposed to be in the business of.

You are forgetting

[iminplaya]

They don't exist to provide you information. And it has nothing to do with "liberal", "conservative", "left" or "right". They are there to sell their advertisers product, and ratings are the basis for their ad rates. You can yell all you want about their "politics", but in reality they are entirely apolitical. They are in it for the money. And if funny and "liberalism"(though Rush sells pretty well also) sells, well, we just have to deal with it and filter it out ourselves.

Re:

[Bill Dog]

Regarding your conflating the news orgs (there to make money) with the writers and editors who produce their content (there to promote their (Left-wing) agenda), I believe I've already tried to address that one with you.

So I'll just address your main thesis, that things in their appropriate place and time is unimportant and should be shrugged off. An anarchist's position. But I'm not for anarchy. I don't think it's superior, or even just acceptable. Nor do I accept that it's inevitable. I wasn't suggesting

Re:

[Smackheid]

Regarding your conflating the news orgs (there to make money) with the writers and editors who produce their content (there to promote their (Left-wing) agenda)

You can't possibly be that stupid. Are you really trying to assert that line employees get to dictate any kind of policy? You must be more of a Marxist than I thought...

Re:

[iminplaya]

You don't seem to be understanding my argument here. And I don't know why you went off on this tangent of shutting anybody down. That never crossed my mind. Unless you have some effect on their bottom line, your opinion, to them, is irrelevant. I'll have to assume you never worked at a TV or radio station. Writers and editors are employees. They write and edit what they are told to write and edit by the news director, who takes his orders from the station manager, then the network manager, who takes his ord

Re:

[Bill Dog]

Heh, and govt. regulators in charge of this country's financial systems' oversight are diligent at protecting the public. Stop watching movies and start observing the real world.

Re:

[iminplaya]

Heh, and govt. regulators in charge of this country's financial systems' oversight are diligent at protecting the public.

? I don't get it. How does that relate? Are you trying to say that someone halfway or more down the totem pole has a say in station operations? Who do you believe actually directs programming? You can play this any way you like. It won't upset me in the least. I've been there. I already know who steers the ship. I am only interested on what you base your apparent disagreement, or if you'

Re:

[Bill Dog]

? I don't get it. How does that relate?

You're confusing "how things *should* be, in theory, in a perfect world" with "how things are".

Money makes the world go 'round.

People don't always act in their best interests. Sometimes they can't help it.

Re:

[iminplaya]

You're confusing "how things *should* be, in theory, in a perfect world" with "how things are".

Man, I have no idea what you're talking about. Can you point out where this confusion arises? ...Relating to what I said about who determines how the "news" is presented?

Re:

[Bill Dog]

In a perfect world journalists and their editors would not interject their biases and childishness and destroy the credibility of their news organizations and therefore, generally, their circulation/viewership, and therefore their ad rates. This wouldn't be happening if things really were as simple as your "money makes the world go 'round".

Re:

[iminplaya]

In a perfect world journalists and their editors would not interject their biases and childishness...

They simply cannot without the boss's approval. And the boss rates the story on the kind of numbers he believes it will get. Those are the standing orders. It is based on marketing. You are dreaming up wild conspiracy theories here.

Re:

[Bill Dog]

And the country's financial system cannot get in jeopardy, because federal regulators are charged with oversight, that's their standing orders, it's based on the law. Right? So what came to a head this week, didn't actually happen. Bankrutcies and govt. bailouts right now are all part of some grand, collective hallucination, because it's not really happening. Because it simply cannot, according to thinking like yours.

And I never suggested that I thought the members of the MSM were acting in cahoots.

Hahahaha

[Captain Splendid]

no entertainment in my information, pls

Good luck with that. On another note, why can't you just sit back and enjoy the fruits of deregulation like everybody else?

Also, I second what iminplaya says. In fact: [slashdot.org]

News shows are, yes, shows. They do not make money by providing us useful information. They make money by providing us... to the advertisers. Useful information occurs, but it is up to you to care enough to spot it.

Yes, I just told you you're being lazy.