The media's idea of news

I try not to watch the news very often -- I just think test patterns tend to be more interesting -- but my husband loves news. He can't get enough, so I get exposed to more than I like.

One of the big stories lately is Vice President Cheney shooting his hunting partner. Is it news? Yeah, sure, why not? Is it as big a story as the media is making it? Uh . . . NO.

CBS did an entire report the other day about the fact that it was TWENTY-ONE HOURS after the fact before the American public learned what happened. Oh, dear God!!!! Twenty-one hours!!! Which mattered . . . how? Did it affect the quality of our lives or the security of our nation? Would knowing have changed the way any of us lived those twenty-one hours? Did not knowing hurt us in anyway? Of course not.

Hunting accidents happen. Come on -- you give a bunch of men guns and turn them loose in the woods, what do you expect? There's not a hunter around who's been surprised by the story because most of them have heard it before. And there's not a citizen around -- besides the guy who was shot -- whose life was affected by it, the way the media want us to believe.

You know what I think it is? CBS and all the others are ticked off that something happened involving the vice president without their knowing. I think their mouths are poked out because it took them twenty-one hours to find out, so they're treating it like some huge, significant conspiracy to keep the American people in the dark.

Sheesh! You guys are the press. You're supposed to cover the news events of the day -- not create major stories out of minor incidents.

I knew there was a reason I didn't trust the press.

I'm going back to the test pattern for a while. Rachel10:14 AM