Really, CNN?

You want to know what’s going on. You want some news. You turn on your television and flip through the channels. MSNBC’s too liberal. Fox News is too conservative. Maybe CNN will have some unbiased content?

So you go there.

A woman’s face flares over your television screen. Her face is pug-like. Her hair teased and moussed into a shiny helmet. You suspect it far outsizes her brain. The woman’s voice blasts through your television’s speakers.

“Breaking news here at CNN. I’ve just gotten word that a verdict has been reached in the Morris County Killer trial.” She’s smiling.

“Yes, folks. You’ll remember the Morris County Killer. A series of unsolved murders in northern New Jersey left the community horrified.” She’s smiling.

“There were, how many was it? 19 y-yeah, I’m getting word from our crack research staff that it was 19 victims, but there were 10 methods of killing. What were they?”

She banters back and forth with the producer chattering into her ear. It sounds like a few friends at a bar recounting last night’s pickup basketball game over a few Blue Moons.

“ – strangling, and one of them was drowned weren’t they? Anyway, we have Terry stationed at the courtroom. What’s going on Terry?”

A new face pops onto your screen. A blond man, pale and gaunt, pants open-mouthed on your television screen. He stands in from of a set of concrete stairs.

“Yeah Marge. An emotionally charged day in the courtroom as Tom Howard, a  prominent member of Chester Township, was pronounced guilty by jury today. I’ve never seen anything like this, the man collapsed against his attorney after realizing that his life might have just been ruined by the felony charge.”

A courtroom sketch of a chubby man, wearing thick glasses and a bushy mustache, passes over the screen.

“And Marge, I had a large parabolic microphone with me that allowed me to capture a few of the private moments between Howard and his close associates. Just after the judge read the jury’s verdict, Howard – a prominent member of the First Methodist Church in Chester – whispered into his attorney’s ear ‘But what will happen to me now?’ It was a truly heartbreaking and dramatic moment. It was an incredible experience to have, Marge.”

Terry’s and Marge’s faces pop up in a dueling split-screen. Marge starts barking.

“That really is something truly tragic, tragic to hear, Terry. That must have been some kind of experience, some kind of very emotional experience.”

“Yes Marge, but the tension reached a new level when, as the bailiff led a handcuffed Tom Howard back to his cell, the former Lead Salesman at Dower & Co. Insurance Company was approached by his long estranged daughter. I, once again, was able to capture the intimate moment with my parabolic.”

A young girl’s voice can be barely heard. Then a man starts speaking.

“I’m very sorry, honey. I’m very sorry that this has happened. I didn’t want this to have happened.”

Terry smiles.

“It’s exactly as you said Marge, just tragic, tragic to see that happen to a family man, a man with a steady career and a long, comfortable life ahead of him. What a terrible day for him, his family and…”

Terry scowls as his voice trails off.

“Are you ok Terry? Has something happened?” Marge waves her hands to someone behind the camera. “Can someone check the feed? Check the feed!”

“No, everything is alright Marge. It’s just that I felt like I was forgetting something. Anyway, what a terrible story, a terrible day for Tom Howard.”

“Well Terry, it must have been pretty emotional for you. I’m sure all of the great and patriotic and peace-loving and not at all bloodthirsty or controversy-hungry Americans would agree with you.” Marge turns towards the camera and shows off her American flag lapel pin. “Anything else to report on, Terry?”

“The courthouse popcorn was a little stale.”

“Great to hear from you. Up next, we will have legal expert Kim Paulus to tell us about the legal ramifications of Tom Howard’s sentencing. Will the former Boy Scout Scoutmaster receive the death penalty?”

Obnoxious trumpets cut Marge off as the network cuts to commercial. A sweeping camera shot gives a bird’s eye view of the studio. On Marge’s desk you see a single piece of paper; written on it is a single sentence.

Milk it for the RATINGS.

The Media's Scandals

I really wish we could transport all the technology, all the 24-hour news agencies, and all the political watchdog organizations back to the 1960’s just to see what would happen. The CIA director having an affair with his biographer pales in comparison to the President of the United States romping around with the most attractive, most fascinating Hollywood actress in the country.

I’m deeply grateful to all of the educators in my life, but none beat out the many loose-lipped history professors prone divulging scandalous digressions I’ve had since entering college. Jack Kennedy seems to be a favorite of these types of teachers, and they find particular enjoyment in telling and retelling a particular risqué scene in which a Secret Service agent desperately tries to delay Jackie Onassis on her walk through the White House lawn while another shouts a coded warning over a hedge, behind which the President frantically searches for his swimming trunks – or at least a towel – while a third agent ushers a panicked trio of nude secretaries through the back gate.

Although a clear embellishment, imagine if Fox News had gotten a hold story about the nation’s 35^th President, or one of the many like it. Would he have been impeached? Or forced to resign? Or, maybe, he would have been only superficially reprimanded, a punishment as motivated by the jealousy of his peers as by any wrongdoing on the adulterer’s part.

Of course, many of these stories did not come to public light until well after the assassination of Kennedy. Overall, his affairs were largely kept under wraps, expect for a particularly sultry “Happy Birthday,” that is.

But I still would like to know what would happen if the constituency of John F. Kennedy knew of his sex scandals in the way we know of Petraeus’s, or Clinton’s, or John Edwards’ or Anthony Weiner’s.

Sure, there would be at least some outrage. Walter Cronkite would give a particularly disapproving newscast on that Wednesday evening, just as Brian Williams had earlier this week. A headline, involving some kind of double entendre, would splash across each of the major newspapers. And some sum of money would be directed towards the mistress(es), to either encourage her to continue or discourage her from speaking.

But would it go this far? The Petraeus scandal has been in the papers for almost a week and I seems to be picking up steam!

Would reporters fifty years ago have dug as deep into the muck as today’s do, just to get a few lines for a scandal sheet story? Would Senators and Representatives be calling for investigational hearings and resignations? Would they be calling for impeachments? Would they be, as many members of the today’s House and Senate are, decrying the fact that those bastards at the FBI left them out of the loop during the course of the investigation and deprived Intelligence Committee members of a few weeks of entertainment?

I don’t think anything would happen differently in the hypothetical than what already happened in history. Maybe, for instance if the New York Times, got a hold of JFK’s affair(s) and printed up a story, there would be outrage. I guess there certainly would. But it wouldn’t last; it wouldn’t go that far, not as far as it seems to now. At least I don’t think.

Why? Is the United States that much moral (or morally outrage-able) society? Do we presently hold up much higher standards of fidelity and integrity and honesty and are more likely to throw rotten vegetables at our leaders when they inevitably stumble underneath them? Although I can easily imagine the archetypal 60’s man Don Draper slapping a philandering JFK on the back, jokingly calling him a dog and sipping on an Old Fashioned, I can’t say that modern America is more “moral” or “rooted in traditional values” or any more like Inis Beag than it was fifty years ago.

Now we must confront the horrible monstrous machine that is The Media. It just chugs along, this media machine. It seeks any fuel it can possible guzzle, and when it can’t find any, the machine must to create fuel for itself, even resorting to ruining the lives of generally upstanding, although admittedly flawed, members of society.

Stories, and the outrage attached to them, are determined by the ratings potential, rather than their actual importance to current events. The heads of these “news” entities know exactly what gets the public’s attention and they don’t have the decency to protect us from it. Maybe the reason nobody in the 60’s heard about Kennedy’s extra-marital activities isn’t because the public didn’t or wouldn’t care. Maybe it’s because leading journalists at the time didn’t feel the pressure to get ratings and page views and mouse clicks and were able to maintain some journalistic integrity over their subject matter.

Petraeus spent at least a good chunk of his time as CIA chief blowing up innocent civilians in Pakistan and we barely heard about that from Anderson Cooper. But now that we find out he’s banging a woman on the side, Petraeus is all we hear about. It’s all anyone talks about.

What would have happened if Petraeus’s affair leaked on the Friday before Election Day, instead of the one after?

No one would know who the president is. And maybe no one would care.