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The strange world of cable new channels
While I don’t have cable tv except for the bare minimum, on Tuesday night I saw “Hannity and Colmes” at a friend’s house. The first segment featured Frank Luntz talking about a focus group he ran during the Democratic debate Monday night. He showed the moment by moment graph of the focus group’s positive reactions to what the candidates were saying, registered by each member’s turning a dial. That lasted maybe 15 minutes. Then the program switched to the much more momentous subject of … Lindsay Lohan! The young actress, just turned 21 (who was delightful and the farthest thing from a sleaze in the 2006 movie Just My Luck), is on a self-destructive course of drugs and drink. Commenting on the Lohan story were three absurdly dolled-up female guests (all the female guests on the cable news channels are absurdly dolled up). The breathless discussion about Lindsay went on and on, much longer, it seemed, than the Luntz segment.
Question: isn’t “Hannity and Colmes” supposed to be a program about politics? And is the same audience that is interested in hearing about the presidential campaign also going to be interested in spending 30 minutes following a tabloid-type discussion about the trials and tribulations of a young actress? I don’t get it. Fed up with “Hannity and Colmes,” we changed the channel to that other guy, Glen Beck (sp?), also supposedly a program on politics. And guess who he had on? An absurdly dolled-up babe talking about … Lindsay Lohan. Email entry |