The 9/11 Deluge

 Continuing my comments on 9/11 overkill from Friday.

On Friday, my local paper--the Delaware County Times--devoted its front page and lead news story to a preview of local commemorations of the 20th anniversary. Also include was an eight-page insert on the subject.

Yesterday, the front-page was again about the local events and the lead stories were all about the anniversary, including statements and remembrances by local politicians and civic leaders. The editorial was also dedicated to the anniversary.

Today--you guessed it--a front-page story and the entire local news "hole" (some five pages) recounted the same commemorations that were previewed the past two days. And the local columnist used the anniversary to excoriate President Biden...not that she ever needs a pretext for doing that.

Three whole days--an entire weekend--when the only thing the editors thought worthy of front-page coverage was this anniversary, despite ongoing local and state disputes about pandemic regulations, an election "audit," school funding and more...all of which will have far greater consequences than ceremonies honoring events of two decades past.

When is enough enough?

Google-Eyed

 Nothing like waking up and finding that none of your usual agenda is working, because all of it is tied to Google.

Normally, we get up, I go to my computer and check e-mail and the like, while Jill turns on the TV in the bedroom to catch up on the news and weather. We get our broadcast news through the YouTube TV service and that was down along with most everything else Google does--e-mail, Google Docs, Blogger, etc. We finally got some news by finding the CBSNews stream.

As of the time of this posting, there's still no word from Google on exactly what the problem was. 

Beginning of the End

 This morning, the news was doing live reports of the first trucks leaving Pfizer's Michigan plant loaded with COVID vaccine. Jill wondered if this were really something that required this kind of coverage, or if it were a circumstance of Pfizer looking for publicity and the media playing along.

I said I think it is a news-worthy event, comparable to coverage of troops boarding ships and planes bound for combat. Since then, another comparison has come to mind: In the days before the launch of Apollo 11, the news media followed the three astronauts constantly. And on the morning of the launch, there were reports on their every move--what they had for breakfast, their farewells to their families, the trip to the launch pad, etc.

 This deserves that kind of coverage...if only to show the public, on a stage-by-stage, day-by-day basis, that the vaccine is real, it is being distributed, it is not being hoarded for the "elite" (and yes, I have seen that accusation being made).

I applaud the media for this.

Investigative Journalism in the On-Line Future

 A question that arose in a conversation with my wife this morning:

Can long-form investigative journalism, the kind portrayed in the movie Spotlight, the kind that takes months of work by a team of reporters, survive in a future where the daily print newspaper no longer exists? In a world where everyone gets their news from TV and/or on-line sources--even if those on-line sources are what used to be the print papers?

I don't think so. On-line journalism relies on getting eyeballs--beyond regular subscribers--onto the advertising it sells. That requires having a major eye-catching headline every day--click-bait, for want of a better term. It hasn't got the time or the money to have a half-dozen well-paid reporters working for weeks, let alone months, on a story that may never pan out or, even if it does, may not garner the national attention needed to generate new readers and therefore new revenue. Even more than the daily newspaper, the daily on-line news source depends on the immediate, the now.

Related to this is the decline in local reporting. Without print newspapers, where will the public get the information on county or small municipal government, including things like school boards? If my local county-based paper is any indication, it won't. It has trimmed its staff to the bone, even to firing all the "stringers" who used to cover the local municipal meetings. It has more people covering high school sports than school boards. I've had friends say that local, unpaid "reporters" will take up the slack--but who will make sure they are reporting accurately and fairly, without editors to check? Imagine a generation of young "Drudges" being in charge of what you know about your local represenatives.

I fear for the concept of an informed electorate in a decade or so.

No Politics Zone 2

 Well, I pretty much managed to meet my goal. I was on Facebook yesterday, but I studiously avoided anything political. I missed the evening news because I was on Zoom with friends. I read the paper this morning and watched a little of MSNBC and that largely caught me up. Nothing's changed in 24 hours of any consequence.

Tomorrow, I will return to my usual routine of FB and news. With less than a month until election day, I don't think it's wise to completely shut myself off from what's happening in the world. There could be yet another "October Surprise"...or events overseas that upset the applecart here as well. 

On the other hand, I'm far more rested and peaceful this morning than I was on Friday...and that's a good thing.