printA “monster tornado” has hit Oklahoma City suburbs causing great misery but, oddly enough, serving media purposes. From blatantly ignoring the stories of the day, as CNN has been doing for the past few days, media outlets like it can comfortably shift into pictorial mode.
Wall-to-wall coverage of a natural disaster (or massacre or crime)—and of every related utterance on the issue since, official or other—quickly replaces the imperative to provide viewers with “newsworthy material.”
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UPDATE I: The Headlines, In Case CNN’s Interested. Here are some of the headlines you should have been informed about but were not:
* At least 95 dead, dozens wounded in Iraq bombings.
CNN has retreated like a tortoise in its shell from the AP and IRS stories, telling you only what you need to know: “Most of you still like Obama.”
Here are the disgraceful CNN’s headlines for the day:
THE LATEST:
The Doors’ Ray Manzarek dies
Teen featured in viral video dies
Hear his goodbye song Hear his goodbye song
Senators: Apple ducks billions in taxes
Most of you still like Obama
IRS controversy: New details emerge
Yahoo buys Tumblr; what to know
Dallas firefighter gets trapped, dies
N. Korea keeps firing stuff, but what?
Hot air balloons collide in Turkey Hot air balloons collide in Turkey
Christie takes heat for role in tourism ad
Mourinho leaving Real Madrid
UPDATE II: BBC NEWS HEADLINES. CNN no longer seems to offer a half-hour headlines broadcast, the way it once did. BBC News, on the other hand, does. This succinct but comprehensive report of the facts on the ground is so much better at getting “the story” out, than freezing the frame on one event, almost statically, as our cable and news networks seem to do.
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