Why is the world news so crappy?

Have you noticed how the world news ( I use that generically to mean the national news on ABC, NBC or CBS) just picks a few key stories and makes them a big deal? Remember last year when there wasn’t enough flu vaccine and the big 3 beat the story into the ground? The nightly news must have run 3 stories a week all through November and December, desperately trying to scare everyone into thinking we were heading for an epidemic. Of course, by “epidemic,” I guess the media meant 36,000 people died from the flu in 2004, approximately one-one hundredth of one percent of the population. None of the news stories mentioned that flu vaccine only helps about 50 percent of the time, or that the only people who really die from the flu are people who would have died anyway. I suppose that doesn’t sound as controversial as “Angry seniors wait hours for vaccine, President Bush does nothing.” Anybody know how much vaccine was available this year? Anybody care? I don’t.

Does the name ‘Roger Coleman’ ring any bells? He’s the guy who was put to death in 1992 for raping and killing his ex-sister-in-law. The evening news did 4 or 5 lead stories 2 months ago about how he may have been innocent and how this raised “serious concerns” about the death penalty in general. They also ran stories about current death-row inmates, implying they had something in common with Coleman (other than being guilty, I suppose). Guess what? He did it. On January 12th of this year DNA tests proved he was guilty. All of a sudden, though, it wasn’t news anymore. At least ABC, NBC, and CBS didn’t think so because I didn’t see them report it at all (actually, I think Brian Williams did mention it but it was just a 2 second announcement at the end of his broadcast one night). Gone were the 10-minute personal interviews with supporters of Coleman, the moral issues of capital punishment, and the invariable footage of protestors waving signs in San Francisco or some other god forsaken nuthouse I’d never want to visit.

I guess you could argue that the news needs to be flashy and controversial in order to keep people interested. After all, it is competing with sponsors against other non-news-related TV shows. Maybe the news could be half news and half entertainment...Good evening, ladies and gentelemen, our 2 top stories tonight “Death row inmate put to death, everyone ok with it” and “Michael Moore stops eating long enough to complain about something."