I like NPR's Daniel Schorr's gravely voice and his carefully expressed but blunt opinions. He's an old-time journalist, which means that he actually studies the topics on which he speaks, and that is so refreshing. So far he's said pretty much everything according to my dictates, so he must be a very competent guy!
Here is Schorr on the U.S. media:
Washington these days feels a little like Moscow in Soviet times when the government routinely dispensed information to the public and the public routinely didn't believe it. The two main newspapers were the Communist Party organ, Pravda, (Truth) and the Soviet government organ, Izvestiya (News). People used to say, "There is no Izvestiya in Pravda and no Pravda in Izvestiya."
...
...who can believe TV news reports when they may turn out to be government-financed videos? Have you ever seen the report on the drug benefits of the Bush Medicare act that ran on 40 local TV stations, complete with the "out-cue": "In Washington, I'm Karen Ryan reporting"? The Department of Health and Human Services paid her to play the role of reporter. Or, did you see the report on the antidrug campaign produced by the Office of National Drug Control Policy, narrated by nonjournalist Mike Morris?
He also mentions the nonexistent WMDs and the Armstrong Williams scandal which isn't a scandal because he is on the side of the Washington Pravda and Izvestiya. And that is the real scandal.
I know, I was supposed to blog only cheerful stuff today. Well, Schorr is a small source of cheerfulness in this post.