-By Frank Hyland
As many of us who are writers have been told by an Editor, “You’ll never see a headline that says ‘Plane Lands Safely at JFK Airport.’” Another type of story that We The People apparently won’t see much of either is “News You Can Use.”
The Mainstream Tedium’s concentration on some types of stories while ignoring others is commonplace, even predictable. Check out Fox News and much of it tells us of US Rep. Anthony Weiner, accompanied by Charlie Sheen, “bikini bumps,” and the vital question concerning whether your dog watches too much TV. On MSNBC one focus is on a transgender prom queen. MSNBC would rather tell us that Sarah Palin is breaking the law by including the US flag on her tour bus, and the eye-popping news that Kim Kardashian may stop using her last name. When the news story is over, I, for one, feel as if I’ve just left a restaurant after viewing photos of food while eating nothing – I still feel empty.
One of the categories of news coverage most useful to you is that of “Crime” because it very well may enable you to avoid becoming a victim, whether of physical assault, burglary, or identity theft. Again checking the majority of Mainstream Tedium coverage, it is of a Florida murder trial and the now-former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) accused of sexually assaulting a hotel maid. Both stories deserve coverage, of course, and all victims of crime and their loved ones are to be mourned and consoled. Devoting so little time to stories you can use, though, while emphasizing “fluff” must end.
Intentionally or not, the Mainstream Tedium has not been connecting the dots on what I believe should be a major crime story. That is, day after day the types of crimes being committed reflect the present economic circumstance in which we find ourselves – dire. To feature this type of story, however, would point yet another finger of blame at the present administration, so it is largely ignored. We are treated to the same type of misdirection used by magicians who tell us to watch one hand while the other hand performs the trick.
Some of the recent stories should be downright embarrassing to us as Americans. Following an earthquake, a tsunami and a nuclear meltdown in Japan, little or no looting was carried out by survivors. Here in the US, however, large numbers of mostly young people raid stores in droves, literally emptying shelves, in what has become known as “Mob Robbing.” Commodities like Copper, Steel, and Iron have been very popular items for investors around the world. That popularity has now spread to places like Brooklyn, New York, where thieves relieve homeowners of their wrought iron fences nightly. In Russia, the UK, and here in the US, thieves have been making off with sections of train track. The theft of Copper in many forms, because of its widespread uses, is approaching epidemic proportions. We haven’t had a large earthquake, a tsunami, or a nuclear meltdown, just an economic meltdown.
On a local level, such as in Fresno, Californicate, where the city had to seal its manhole covers with concrete to stop copper theft, the stories are known. But no one is viewing the problem in a countrywide manner, nor is anyone pointing a finger at the root cause: the poor and struggling US economy. Continuing to focus on Anthony Weiner and bikini bumps, while being good for business in the Mainstream Tedium’s world, doesn’t serve you in the real world at all. Just like bikini bumps, it ain’t a pretty picture out there.
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Frank Hyland is a long-time Writer/Editor who has written for The New Media Alliance, and also for The Reality Check and has appeared weekly on Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Conservatism on Sunday evenings on Blog Talk Radio, along with Babe Huggett and Warner Todd Huston.