It has been amusing to watch the interplay of political candidates, their handlers and their associates, and the continual parade of pundits that inhabit the cable news talk shows. People apparently make careers out of punditry, which is nothing more than personal opinion, only loosely connected to the facts.
The looping of controversial comments from the distant or not-so-distant past, ad nauseam, by people not directly connected to any campaign, is one way of spicing up the stream of 'non-news' by creating controversy out of next-to-nothing.
When Marshall McLuhan published "Understanding Media", in which he stated "The Medium is the Message", he was a prophet of our times. What we are seeing in these 'fake' controversies and the substitution of pundit opinion for news facts, is the direct result of creating the 500 channel universe, while not really wanting to spend the money to fill it with meaningful programming. It is cheaper to manufacture news than to go out and find it.
Punditry on the 'News' channels is the equivalent of 'reality' shows on entertainment channels. Neither is 'real' at all, but a fabricated pseudo-reality to fill up space.
The late Alphonse Ouimet, once the head of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, once wrote that television channels do not try to carry what people want to watch. They carry what people are WILLING to watch, given that it is on. This, it turns out, maximizes the total number of viewers, and thus appeals the most to sponsors. So if you can't find anything you really like on TV, it is because there has been no real effort to please any particular group of viewers - the game is to grip the eyeballs with some sort of adrenaline-causing controversy or dilemma, and then carry it on until it's time for the commercial.
Just remember, almost nothing you see is rooted in reality. When you watch TV, you are looking at a stream of lighted pixels, driven by a box of electronics, and fed by a carefully crafted media machine designed to titillate, to enrage, to amaze or to excite. Your job, presumably, is to stay glued, and behave as any modern adrenaline addict should.
End of rant - now, take a walk outdoors!
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