Damn Thee, Al Gore!!
Boy, another set of words I thought I’d never hear myself saying. And I can’t blame any conservatives for changing my views either. I guess the only ‘silver lining’ to this new found disdain towards Mr. Gore is that it’s not due to his politics. In truth, it’s more due to his lack of politics...
You may not have heard it, but Al Gore recently renounced the political life, calling himself a ‘recovering politician’, and entered the fray of cable TV programming. His new company purchased News World International (NWI) in order to scrap its 11-year format for a modern Internet-hip channel called Current TV. If you haven’t had a chance to watch Current TV yet, please do. It should only take you a good 5-10 minutes to realize that it’s crap.
What’s the problem, you ask? Shouldn’t Mr. Gore be allowed to follow a different path in life, regardless of the direction it goes? Sure, why not. I’m all for re-inventing oneself if such is so desired. But what I take exception to, and what others should know about, is what a disservice he’s done to the political and worldly-minded citizens of this country. Al Gore, of all people, just helped put another nail in the coffin lid of true journalism still available to the American public...
If you never had an opportunity to catch NWI, I’m sorry at your loss because it’s gone for good now. Basically, each day NWI showed TV newscasts in English from various countries around the world. The list included Canada, Britain, Japan, Germany, Australia and others. The reports were factual, concise and relevant to the world we live in today. There was no continual obsessing over the missing middle-income white woman of the week or a never ending litany of the split-scream zero-sum debates on which every other cable news station relies. It was real news. And, as many Americans need to see, it often portrayed an image of our country that a lot of the world is developing - a slow brew of apprehension, even from allied countries, that we aren’t shown through our enter-news-tainment bureaus. I was simply amazed at how much more I would sometimes hear about news events in America from watching one of the foreign reports shown on NWI. Then again, when you don’t give into the OCD-news temptation, that leaves a lot of free time for stories of importance…
Alas, that open electronic window into the world is now closed on the count of, well, on the count of Turd TV (really, just watch it). I remember watching the faces of the main anchors on NWI during the last couple of days they broadcasted. It was the unmistakable expression of shock. Shock in that 11 years of accurate and serious journalism, they were being rewarded by being canned for a faddish Internet channel that was depending on user-submitted materials for a decent percentage of their scheduling. User-submitted materials… *Sigh*
Maybe Al wanted to put the visors on and throw in the towel, but there are a lot of us out here who don't want to be isolated from the rest of the world and would have rather stayed informed through a honest news agency such as NWI. Direct TV satellite (yes, the one that eats your wallet every month) feeds our home TVs and at present offers absolutely no comparable network for news. It’s either the Ritalin Networks or nothing. I wrote Direct TV a letter asking for such a possibility and I could physically hear them laughing when they received it. That’s why I only read my news now. And why I’m not happy with Mr. Gore…not at all…I voted for you once and might even could consider doing so again, but I sure can’t find it in me to wish you much success in this endeavor… Jage
You may not have heard it, but Al Gore recently renounced the political life, calling himself a ‘recovering politician’, and entered the fray of cable TV programming. His new company purchased News World International (NWI) in order to scrap its 11-year format for a modern Internet-hip channel called Current TV. If you haven’t had a chance to watch Current TV yet, please do. It should only take you a good 5-10 minutes to realize that it’s crap.
What’s the problem, you ask? Shouldn’t Mr. Gore be allowed to follow a different path in life, regardless of the direction it goes? Sure, why not. I’m all for re-inventing oneself if such is so desired. But what I take exception to, and what others should know about, is what a disservice he’s done to the political and worldly-minded citizens of this country. Al Gore, of all people, just helped put another nail in the coffin lid of true journalism still available to the American public...
If you never had an opportunity to catch NWI, I’m sorry at your loss because it’s gone for good now. Basically, each day NWI showed TV newscasts in English from various countries around the world. The list included Canada, Britain, Japan, Germany, Australia and others. The reports were factual, concise and relevant to the world we live in today. There was no continual obsessing over the missing middle-income white woman of the week or a never ending litany of the split-scream zero-sum debates on which every other cable news station relies. It was real news. And, as many Americans need to see, it often portrayed an image of our country that a lot of the world is developing - a slow brew of apprehension, even from allied countries, that we aren’t shown through our enter-news-tainment bureaus. I was simply amazed at how much more I would sometimes hear about news events in America from watching one of the foreign reports shown on NWI. Then again, when you don’t give into the OCD-news temptation, that leaves a lot of free time for stories of importance…
Alas, that open electronic window into the world is now closed on the count of, well, on the count of Turd TV (really, just watch it). I remember watching the faces of the main anchors on NWI during the last couple of days they broadcasted. It was the unmistakable expression of shock. Shock in that 11 years of accurate and serious journalism, they were being rewarded by being canned for a faddish Internet channel that was depending on user-submitted materials for a decent percentage of their scheduling. User-submitted materials… *Sigh*
Maybe Al wanted to put the visors on and throw in the towel, but there are a lot of us out here who don't want to be isolated from the rest of the world and would have rather stayed informed through a honest news agency such as NWI. Direct TV satellite (yes, the one that eats your wallet every month) feeds our home TVs and at present offers absolutely no comparable network for news. It’s either the Ritalin Networks or nothing. I wrote Direct TV a letter asking for such a possibility and I could physically hear them laughing when they received it. That’s why I only read my news now. And why I’m not happy with Mr. Gore…not at all…I voted for you once and might even could consider doing so again, but I sure can’t find it in me to wish you much success in this endeavor… Jage
posted by Jage at Thursday, August 25, 2005
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