News War

[Pangloss]

PBS Frontline has produced what looks to be another classic documentary. This one, entitled "News War", is a four-part series by former 60 Minutes legend Lowell ("Al Pacino Played Me in 'The Insider'") Bergman, which looks at the current crisis in the news industry and focuses on where it may be going.

 

Understand -- I find it unlikely that I will entirely agree with his conclusions. It's pretty obvious that he'll blame political extremism and partisanship and probably land most of the blame on the right wing, but even more to the point, he won't show us the side of the news industry that has been contributing to its own demise, focused as it is on politically correct and demogogic memes that bear so little semblance to reality that it's no wonder corporations are demanding that they show a profit.

 

But he is the absolute master of his craft, and he does have a point, which is that the media is very much under fire, and that harms us all. So the series will be very much worth watching.

 

The first episode, which focused mainly on the Bush administration's relationship with the press and other recent media-driven political issues, aired this week, and is available for viewing online here:

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newswar/view/

 

Episodes 2-4 will air over the next three weeks, and will also be placed online at the same site. Each episode focuses on a different aspect of the "news war".

[ecoli]

thanks... I'll definately watch this.