It's easy to get sentimental when long-standing TV personalities bow out of the shows that made them a household name, whether it's an entertainer like Johnny Carson or a news man like Ted Koppel, who just pulled the curtain on a 26-year career as host of ABC's "Nightline." His timing seemed perfect: after the retirement of Tom Brokaw, the self-immolation of Dan Rather, and the cancer death of Peter Jennings, the loss of Koppel's nightly presence drew on fond memories of the so-called glory days of TV news. An era is finished. Koppel is especially beloved in journalism circles as... continue reading
You can tell the hip-hop music community has thrown a successful awards show when they can crow that "no one was stabbed in the lung this year." That was the buzz coming out of the third annual Vibe Magazine Awards that aired on UPN stations on November 15. (Last year, a fight at the awards show surrounding the rapper Dr. Dre ended up with the stabbing.) This show promised to be so filthy that UPN's seven-second delay button pushers were probably doing finger calisthenics preparing for the rappers to come out. This apparently meant nothing to UPN (owned by the... continue reading
Making a mountain out of a molehill is becoming a national media specialty. The news media ought to be awarded advanced degrees for fixing their political microscopes on whatever amoeba of a story will serve their stubborn template: the Iraq war is hopeless; it's Vietnam in the desert. Take Congressman John Murtha, the liberal media's overnight American Idol. Last week, he was almost anonymous. (Bet you couldn't name which state he represents.) By the weekend, he had his name in lights like Cindy Sheehan - another helping of powdered instant media-manufactured anti-war hero. Mr. Murtha boldly declared that the Iraq... continue reading
If I were to tell you that sex on TV is incessant, you'd tell me you already know that. To which I'd tell you that you really, really don't have a grasp of just how much sex is steaming up the tube. The Kaiser Family Foundation recently issued a new biennial study finding that the number of sexual scenes on television has nearly doubled since 1998. Think about it: Just seven years. In its review of more than 1,000 hours of programming, the study found that 70 percent of all shows include some sexual content, and that these shows average... continue reading
There are times when you watch the TV news that you wonder if the 2004 election is over yet. All the arguments that the Kerry campaign tried to use against George W. Bush on the war in Iraq and the war on terror are still being pounded. It's as if the liberal Democrat-media complex still can't get over the fact that Kerry lost, and can't accept that perhaps the election returns meant that the public endorsed Bush's record of defending the country. The dominant theme of recent news coverage remains the MoveOn bumpersticker echo that Bush lied his way into... continue reading
Here's a story you probably missed. In Paris on October 20, the commissars of UNESCO - the United Nations Educational, Social, and Cultural Organization - agreed to a treaty to protect what they called "cultural diversity." In short, it's a treaty for cultural protectionism, allowing countries to staunch the flow of American popular culture through their media systems. It's an attempt by France (surprise!) and other America-tweaking countries to create a broad exception for "culture" in the free trade/globalization debate. Culture is not a commodity, say the French, but we will impose tariffs and import quotas on Hollywood's alleged non-commodities... continue reading
After the debacle nominating his old personal lawyer Harriet Miers to the Court, President Bush has chosen Judge Samuel Alito, a leading light among conservative legal thinkers. The operative question now is: will this be "Armageddon," as some political analysts claim, the most knock-down, drag-out, knee-to-the-groin, multi-million-dollar alley fight in modern confirmation politics? Or will it be peaceful, more decorous, like the hearings and vote for Chief Justice John Roberts? Liberals and Democrats have insisted that unless Bush's choice was soothingly squishy and moderate, there would be war. But that didn't happen with Roberts, and it might not happen with... continue reading
After the last election, a Newsweek poll found 67 percent of Americans believe in the virgin birth of Jesus, and 82 percent believe Jesus is the Son of God. Exit polls also found the number one issue for Americans is "moral values." Hollywood declares (boasts?) it is delivering to the marketplace products demanded by the market. If that is so, why is the entertainment industry so incapable of looking at numbers like that as an opportunity to mine a vastly untapped source of riches? The massive turnout for Mel Gibson's "The Passion of The Christ" was supposed to change Hollywood's... continue reading
Conservatives are rolling their eyes watching the political left's outrage over the Valerie Plame identity controversy, wondering when it was exactly that liberals suddenly became the super patriots defending the virtues of the CIA. For a half-century the American political left has done everything in its power to undermine the national security of this country. Now we are to believe, as they wring their hands in agony and outrage - outrage, I say! - over Ms. Plame's outing, that they...care? This goes beyond rank hypocrisy. It is intellectual dishonesty. Let's visit the left's record on national security matters. History is... continue reading
Halloween is the perfect season for those TV producers seemingly addicted to giving us ghoulish plots all year long. But there is innocent ghoulishness and there is depravity. At the top of that list is Ryan Murphy. Murphy is the mastermind of "Nip/Tuck," the noxious FX series about two depraved plastic surgeons, a series so brutal and so graphic and so vile that a prison in Oregon won't allow the inmates to watch it. It's the kind of video crud you want to scrape off your shoes with a knife. You don't watch this show so who cares, right? If... continue reading