Why 24-Hour News Channels Will Make You Stupid

I whole-heartedly believe 24-hours news networks were the worst thing to happen to news since, well, talk radio. It’s easy to immediately point to Fox News as a faux news channel, but I don’t even think they are the worst offender. Watching CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, CNN Headline News, and of course Fox, as a primary source of news will provide a brief overview of world and local events, but will not offer intelligent insight into those events. These channels are forced to compete with one another for your attention for 24 HOURS A DAY. Consequently, they fill their time covering irrelevant celebrity scandals and freaking people out. Everyday these channels provide hours of late night fodder for the Daily Show and The Soup. From Rick Santelli yelling on CNBC to the cast of Fox and Friends deep-fat frying Obama’s budget, the Daily Show writers pretty much have their work done for them.

The truly frightening thing is that these channels are not just a major source of news for many, many people, but providing “insight” and “analysis” into those news stories and affecting viewers’ opinions. Veiled as news channels offering commentary, these channels are little more than entertainment channels. Say you want about E!, but at least it’s honest about its objectives: making you care about the Kardashians and Denise Richards. CNN reports on the same stories, but calls it “Breaking News” complete with a news ticker and colorful graphics. CNN was so bombarded with its heavy-hitting stories it had to create CNN Headline News, a channel dedicated to providing viewers snippets of 5 minute news clips.

So where should Americans turn for news? First, turn off the television. Next, turn on your computer and discover a whole word of podcasts. You can listen in your car, when you exercise, while at work, while cooking dinner, cleaning, etc and they are FREE. NPR and This American Life offer intelligent insight into world events, including international news and the economic crisis. The Planet Money podcasts are particularly good: they explain how banks work, the Treasury’s plan, the Stimulus package, etc. Finally, magazines and newspapers still provide news. Picking up your local daily newspaper gives you insight into state, local, and national events as well as supports local news. Even Time is good – and it’s made by the same company that makes CNN. Somehow something is lost when translated to a 24-hour news television station. The Economist is an amazing publication, although it is a bit pricey and dense for a weekly magazine. Fortunately, there are a lot of free sources online: for example, you can read most New York Times stories and op/eds online.

Television is an amazing medium and offers the viewer the entire package in a comprehensive news story: sound and visual. Unfortunately, when forced to provide programming for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, being more outlandish than your competitor brings in the viewers. Sometimes less is more. You’re better off reading a newspaper and watching the nightly news than watching days of useless garbage and holograms on MSNBC and Fox.

Don’t be stupid. Turn off these channels. Your brain will thank you.

I like Twitter.

There. I like it. I admit it. It’s a weird little universe. At first I thought it was completely useless because I was only following three people (in Twitter world “follow” essentially means “friend”) and I had nothing to add to the conversation. It’s like jumping into a chat room. You feel like an idiot just twittering “Candice is tired” or “Candice is going to work”. My day is pretty boring, so my status updates were also pretty boring.

Then I discovered Twitter’s usefulness as essentially a message board. I starting responding to my friends, then added some new friends, including a few of my favorite comedians. It’s interesting because the celebrities on there post what they are working on. My friends and I carry on several simultaneous “conversations” – all in 140 characters or less.

I think what I like best about Twitter is that I still only have like five friends (including my celebrity “friends”) who twitter on a regular basis, making it a very effective means of communication. I don’t have a phone with a data plan and can’t access social networking sites at work, so if I had more Twitter friends I’d just be overwhelmed by the volume of tweets going back and forth.

So there. I’m a convert. It certainly doesn’t replace Facebook, but is actually much more fun. Now all I need is an iphone.

Recessions are harmless too. Really.

As the recession deepens, I can’t help but think Republicans hate poor people. No, wait. Everyone. They must hate everyone.

I know a lot of people who have been personally affected by the bad economic climate. I have friends who’ve been laid off, and my own job isn’t secure for the long-term. My boyfriend and I luckily live in a tiny apartment and don’t have a mortgage or children, but I do have a lot of debt thanks to my education and past spending habits. I don’t feel like we’re poor, but I do feel some loathing from the Republican Party.

There’s a segment of the Republican Party that feels like if you’ve fallen on hard times it’s your fault. They’re right. It’s your fault if you bought into the “American Dream”. If you mortgaged your future on your $30,000-a-year job to buy a house in the suburbs, an SUV, i-pods for the kids, then you deserve to literally have the rug pulled out from under you and the front door locked. The car repossessed and the i-pods sold on e-bay (for pennies). You knew you couldn’t afford that stuff, but you somehow allowed yourself to believe the spending was validated by the fact the banker gave you the loan for the house and the credit card repeatedly increased your limit.

The banks bundled your risky loan with other risky loans and sold them. The credit card company hedged its bets on making loads of money of your mostly interest-only minimum monthly payments. Stores and companies made money off the stuff you bought…everyone makes money as you spend, spend, spend. New companies made new products with new flashy commercials and you want, want, want. You thought you were living the American Dream. You had stuff and a house and a job. Then you lost the job, and the house quickly followed.

Now those same people who made you want, want, want and profited off your spending are blaming you for own irresponsible spending. It is your fault. It’s my fault too – but it’s hard to not be irresponsible when there are so many things out there to want and buy. I don’t think we spenders should be “bailed out” or let off the hook entirely. I just want those Republicans out there who harbor loathing towards those who need help to see that the private enterprise they love so much holds a share of the blame.

Volcanoes are harmless.

I live around 50 miles from Mt. St. Helens. Mt. St. Helens is an active volcano. You may remember it erupting May 18, 1980.

The pictures above are of Mt. St. Helens before and after the 1980 eruption.

That’s the funny thing about volcanoes – they erupt. We can figure when they’ll erupt by using science. Science costs money. Sometimes private industry invests in science, because science can make money. Sometimes government has to invest in science, because the science doesn’t make money. Studying volcanoes doesn’t make a lot of money, so government has to invest in it, because no one else will. Which is funny because natural disasters like volcanoes cost private industry a lot of money – like logging companies, for example. Insurance companies could invest in such things I guess, but that’s just so they know how much to charge people for insurance. I assume they’d rather not because studying volcanoes just to determine the risk of eruption for insurance purposes seems rather expensive. So it seems like this sort of responsibility lies with government. Investing in valuable science that private industry won’t because it’s not profitable seems like just the thing we’d want our government to invest in. To protect us. To protect our towns, our livelihoods, our health.

Instead of monitoring volcanoes, maybe we should be monitoring is the eruption of stupidity in the Republican Party.

don’t be evil

I just Googled myself.

There, two full pages of search results of myself. Mostly insignificant hits at first glance, but look closer and see there, in all its digital glory, an abbreviated list of my life events over the last decade.

Disappointments, like my first law firm job. Proud moments, like law school graduation and an internship with a Congressman. 5K races I’d ran and a field trip from college. Someone else’s Facebook profile. This blog. All there on Google.

I am not any sort of public figure, nor have I published anything or really done anything to warrant a hit on a search engine. But somehow, Google, and anyone who searches for my name, knows what time I ran the 5K in at the Clive Running Festival in 2006. Or how much I was paid to intern for a Congressman in 2003. Neither of which is private information of course, but it is a bit unnerving that an average person like myself can find these things with a simple web search.

It’s also super convenient when filling out, say, a job application. Then I wish Google had more information of me.

The Short Bus

Taking public transportation has its perks. Aside from the obvious, like saving gas money and reducing your carbon footprint, riding a bus or train offers a lesson in human behavior. Even a casual observer can’t ignore the all the crazy human antics on the bus. From the mundane, like where people sit or if they follow bus etiquette rules or how. To the old man pouring rum into his coke bottle or couple fighting.

Sometimes you can observe your fellow riders from afar, like from across the aisle. But other times you are smashed together so tightly that getting off at your stop can be the biggest challenge.

This morning I sat in the back of the bus with a group of teenagers and pre-teens on their way to their respective schools. Most of the kids were on the way to middle school, but the girl leading the conversation and fielding questions was on her way to a high school. The big time. She enlightened them to all the wonderful things they will hate about life when they reach puberty: school sucks, parents suck, everything sucks. They ate it up. She was very impressive to them. She skipped school to smoke pot and her friend got expelled for taking a gun to school. She told them that school was okay if you were smart, but for someone who isn’t like her – “what is the point?” The middle school kids didn’t really have an answer for her.

This afternoon I sat in the back of the bus again but this time with a crazy old man. He mumbled the entire time to himself. He opened a bag of potato chips, “oh yeah, barbeque. Oh man I love barbeque, good stuff.” He read the newspaper aloud. He talked about his daughter. He talked about how much he loved the bus – he could get on it anywhere and be only 15 minutes from where he needed to go. Unlike the high school girl talking to a group of wide-eyed middle school kids, no one paid any attention to the crazy old man. Which is a shame, because I bet we’d have a lot more to learn from him.

Most people who ride the bus are boring like me: reading, listening to their ipods, or simply staring out the window on their way to work or home. But even we boring riders have something to offer…even if it’s just in our reactions to the other people.

Music is My Boyfriend

Music is a powerful thing. It can define an era, or even a period in your own life. Certain songs hold specific meaning and listening to them can immediately bring back memories of an ex-boyfriend or high school or even a season or holiday. Your musical tastes change throughout your life and what music you like says a lot about you.

I was perusing i-tunes looking for a Woodstock compilation – for the music that defined that era: Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful Dead. Instead I found the Woodstock ’99 album. In 1999 I was in the thick of my teenage years and, admittedly, was only beginning my phase into listening to truly bad music. The Snoop Dogg gangsta rap phase was mostly over by this point, and had been replaced by terrible radio “alternative” and the even worse rap-metal genre. I think the Woodstock ’99 album represents the worst in American music, and my past music tastes. The worst. And, I went through some pretty bad music phases: Debbie Gibson, country (when country was BIG), the Disturbed, electronica. And America has gone through some bad music phases (or, is perpetually in a bad music phase). So, to be the worst, Woodstock ’99 has to be pretty bad.

Woodstock ’69 celebrated the spirit of peace and love. Woodstock ’99 commercialized that and ended up with riots.

Unfortunetly, at the time I liked this music. I’m pretty sure I even owned the CD. But now, ten years later, I am no longer an angry teenager and my music tastes have changed and these bands are no longer a part of my life. When something is no longer important to you you sometimes forget it even exists at all, so I started to wonder: do people still listen to Limp Bizkit? Is Korn still a band?

So, thanks to Wikipedia, here’s my rap-metal/things I listened to in high school/Woodstock 99/worst music ever version of “Where are they now?”:

Buckcherry
I think I enjoyed the song “Lit Up”. I don’t know how anyone can’t relate to a song that is entirely about cocaine. Buckcherry dissolved in 2002 but reformed in 2005 and in 2006 had success with another masterpiece of American song: “Crazy Bitch”.

Limp Bizkit
I don’t know if people listen to them or not, but Limp Bizkit is indeed still a band. That means that somewhere out there Fred Dunst is coming up with a follow-up to this:

I did it all for the nookie
C’mon
The nookie
C’mon
So you can take that cookie
And stick it up your, yeah!!
Stick it up your, yeah!!
Stick it up your, yeah!!

Kid Rock
Remember when he married (or almost married) Pamela Anderson? According to Wikipedia he is still an active musician and has released eleven albums over the course of his career. Eleven!

The Disturbed
They didn’t go to Woodstock ’99, but they did define my later teenage years (I think I had some unresolved anger issues). According to Wikipedia they are still together, and still releasing albums.

I’m beginning to think all of these bands are still together…which means someone is still listening to them. Maybe it’s an age thing. You have to be young and angst-ridden to listen to some idiot rant:

Drowning deep in my sea of loathing
Broken your servant I kneel
(Will you give it to me?)
It seems what’s left of my human side
Is slowly changing in me
(Will you give it to me?)

Looking at my own reflection
When suddenly it changes
Violently it changes
Oh no, there is no turning back now
You’ve woken up the demon in me

Get up, come on get down with the sickness

Maybe it’s geography or maybe it’s just the time you came of age. I was 11 when Kurt Cobain died. Nirvana did not really speak for my “generation”. In any event, judging by my past music choices I think it’s good our music tastes evolve as we do. I can’t imagine what I’ll like ten years from now. So, to the sixteen-year-old kid out there who was excited about the new Nickelback album: there’s hope.

The Bush Legacy: The Pop Culture Edition

A lot has happened since W took the oath of office in 2001. Here are some of the better things:

Academy Award for Best Picture:
2001: A Beautiful Mind
2002: Chicago
2003: Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
2004: Million Dollar Baby
2005: Crash
2006: The Departed
2007: No Country for Old Men

Grammy Award for Best Album: (the Grammys, by the way, apparently suck)
2001: Two Against Nature by Steely Dan
2002: O Brother, Where Art Thou? Soundtrack
2003: Come Away With Me by Norah Jones
2004: Speakerboxx/The Love Below by Outkast
2005: Genuis Loves Company by Ray Charles
2006: How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb by U2
2007: Taking the Long Way by Dixie Chicks
2008: River: The Joni Letters by Herbie Hancock

MTV Real World Seasons:
Back to New York
Chicago
Las Vegas
Paris
San Diego
Philadelphia
Austin
Key West
Denver
Sydney
Hollywood

The Bush Legacy

In one week the Bush Administration will be over. Love him or hate him, the ‘otts and my political coming-of-age have been largely defined by George W. Bush’s presidency.

I first heard of Bush when he was Governor Bush. My Aunt, who lived in Texas at time, mentioned that she really liked him as Governor. I should mention she also liked Ross Perot, and I suspect voted for him. Texans.

The next time I heard Bush’s name was obviously in the 2000 Presidential Campaign. I remember him doing some rather nasty political things to Sen. John McCain in the Republican primaries. After that, I don’t remember much other than a few funny SNL skits and that I did not vote for him. In 2000 I was a high school senior and registered to vote for the first time. I voted for Ralph Nader, the Green Party candidate. In my defense, I voted in Kansas, a state so Republican there is a Republican River running through it. I didn’t vote for Al Gore because I grew up thinking “Democrat” was some sort of dirty word, like “Atheist” or “Organic”. I voted for Nader because I was going through the beginning of a very pro-third party period of my life, and also because I liked the environmentally-friendly, anti-corporation platform of the Green Party. I remember feeling somewhat guilty for not voting for Bush. If only I’d known that was the just the beginning of the rebellion-against-Conservative-upbringing guilt I’d come to experience.

During 2001-2005, otherwise known as Bush’s First Term, the world changed drastically. The world watched in horror as terrorists flew planes into America’s financial and government centers. It seemed as if overnight everything was different, and the 24-hour news networks were there, streaming it into our homes at all hours. President Bush was seen as a leader and a hero. America was angry and scared, and consequently more than willing to retaliate against anyone or anything that moved, and be led by just about anyone.

The month or so before 9/11 I started as a college freshman in a small western Kansas university. By partway through that first semester I changed my major to political science and I was quickly immersed in classes teaching the substance of this stuff I’d seen on television, and making friends with people who shared not only my interests, but my evolving views of the world. In March 2003 I was in Chicago with one of these friends. We watched in horror as President Bush announced to the world that he, armed the trust and power thrown upon him by the still angry and scared America, would indeed retaliate against anyone or anything that moved. While Iraq had nothing to do with the September 11th attacks, the President, and the right-leaning media, used a fabricated connection and the premise that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and would attack the United States the first chance it had, as pretexts for war. I remember being very angry.

In 2004 President Bush ran for president again. In 2004 I graduated from college and moved to Iowa to start law school. Iowa is often a battleground state and was again in 2004. I voted early in Iowa and was excited for my vote to “count”. I guess if I really wanted it to count I should’ve voted early and often. While I was never too excited about a President Kerry (and apparently neither was anyone else), I simply could not fathom another Bush term. Inconceivable. But somehow it happened. I remember watching the protesters on Inauguration Day. There were two Americas: the one that, despite images from Abu Ghraib, Dick Cheney and such atrocious dishonesty, was proud to call Bush its Commander-in-Chief, and the other that would rather throw eggs at him.

Now, in 2008, parties instead of protests are planned. There may still be two Americas, but I think they both are tired of being lied to. Both are tired of government being synonymous with corruption and mismanagement. Time will only tell what the Obama Legacy will be, he may prove to be the leader we hope he can be, or he may falter. Either way, it is for the future to decide. The Bush Legacy, on the other hand, is set in stone.

The All-You-Can-Eat Buffet (or Hunting and Gathering for the Modern Age)

I miss Mexico. It’s not that I don’t like the endless series of rainy Pacific Northwest days, but there’s something to be said for 80 degrees and sun in the middle of winter. The one thing I don’t miss about our Mexican resort is the all-you-can-eat buffet. The buffet was fine the first few times, but the endless supply of pasta and deserts got old after awhile. Literally. Additionally, my digestive system quickly grew tired of the truckloads of food I was forcing into it. When people, myself included, are offered an infinite amount of food, the results are disastrous.

Even the most civilized, law abiding citizen will turn into a hunger-ravaged Viking who just raped and pillaged his way to his first meal in a week. He roams up and down the various buffet lines, foaming at the mouth, impatiently waiting in line for a piece of fish or a burrito. When he sees that the pasta he’d craved earlier is almost gone, you see the anger flashing in his eyes. The wise thing would be to let him ahead of you in the ice cream line, but the animal in you wants to go ahead and fill two dishes of chocolate-vanilla swirl.

Things aren’t too pleasant in the dining room either. Tables of people are busy ripping and tearing into their meals. Something about the buffet brings out our inner-caveman: everyone eats as if they may not get to again for a very long time. But, they will, probably in just a few hours at this very same buffet.

I’ve never worked in the restaurant industry, so I don’t know what carnage is left after the feasting is over. I imagine there is much waste, and much stored and set out again the next day. I also imagine there is some resentment towards us, as we consume and throw out more food in one meal than many people do in an entire week – or longer. Buffets serve their purpose: on cruise ships, weddings, resorts, Pizza Hut, but I think there’s only so much buffet my waistline – and conscience – can take.