CNN = Tabloid Propaganda?

The worst thing about is, that I'm already aware of this - I've even written a report on it (“Media, agenda functions and influential powers” - available upon request), but even so, in the lack of anything else - I turned to Larry King Live

Now, today's story was about Mattie Stepanek. Stepanek is this 13-yearold genius, and I actually mean that - he's written poetry before he even learned to write, who died earlier this year.

Now, CNN puts his mother (who is really reflected and down to earth) on Larry King. Now this is where it all goes wrong. Larry King is great, the mother is fantastic, and the story is (extremely) touching. How can CNN possibly mess this up?

The answer to this question, my friend, is editing. Now, there's this bit where the mother reads one of her late son's poetries, entitled 'Purple Moon' - now, I can vividly render the CNN director saying: “Now, let's go to PhotoSpin.com and find some stuff that's purple and has a moon in it and that make people cry [or barf, if you're not American]”

The guidelines Larry King has to follow doesn't help either. You know, those binding agreements that state that 'Larry King shall mention, in a perfectly nonchelantly manner, the full title of the book, the authors name, the price, the name of the publisher, the name of all bookstores that sell the book, the ISBN and the price AND how much he enjoyed reading the book at least 5 times during the interview'.

I wasn't surprised to find that the other show where the late Stepanek was known to appear was 'Operah'

This CNN mystery-meat production was obviously meant to make me cry. I laughed. Not for the poor kid, who died - I will absolutely buy his next book (“Peace”) - but for the total lack of touch with the real world from the CNN.

And, when a medeokre country music artist like Mark Willis is able to make me cry with his “Whish you were here” (Much due to the lyrics, in my defence) - how come one of the world's most acclaimed journalists isn't?

That's not the only thing I noticed during my 15 minutes of watching CNN. During the break I came to see just how hillariously commercial CNNs approach to it's own position in todays society.

One thing is the way the Discovery Channel is promoting 'Mythbusters' for instance. It's another thing when the CNN starts to 'whore out' it's own coverage of the Saddam trial in the very same way. These are two very different formats - and should be treated as such!

I've pointed out in the past, the way the CNN not even tries to be objective (you can never do better than try, since one may never be 100% objective on an issue), and during the break noticed a quite funny segment, similar to 'Talking Point' on the BBC.

Only, where the BBC tries to have different opinions on a subject on their show - the main message from the CNN-segment seemed to be that 'USA is great, we all love the war in Iraq, and Bush is cool!' - followed by the quick “CNN-does-not-nesseceraly-share-these-opinions-and-these-opinions-may-have-been-edited-to-suit-our-needs”...

Now, I would say that, though the CNN is in no way near as subjective as FOX News, I'm still questioning how on earth this media giant is influencing the views of the averege American - and what effect this has on, not only the US, but on the world as a whole...

Has news really become so commercial, that we need pimp our news in this tasteless fashion?!