Nobody Left to Watch

By Sniffles

Contrary to what you may have heard — particularly from those folks who sell videos of goldfish and birds — cats don't watch a lot of television. Good thing, too, because we're left with precious few TV shows from which we feel confident about getting our news.

Why? Perhaps you saw this lengthy New York Times story on April 20. It details how the Pentagon, with the full cooperation of broadcast and cable news networks, has planted allegedly objective "military analysts" on news shows to generate positive coverage of the Iraq war. These "military analysts" have appeared repeatedly, without the behind-the-scenes relationships revealed, and without any hard questions from the pundits and anchors interviewing them. In short, take Armstrong Williams' little payoff to promote the Education Department's programs, and multiply it a thousandfold, and this is what you've got.

Big story, right? Don't bet on it. If you only get your news from the networks that the Times story names — such as Fox, CNN, NBC, CBS or ABC — you wouldn't know a thing about this. Silence has reigned supreme.

Print journalists like Howard Kurtz at The Washington Post and bloggers like Glenn Greenwald have criticized the networks (and in Greenwald's case, inspired an army of angry readers of Brian Williams' blog to force the NBC anchor to address the subject, at least online). But we've yet to see any substantial coverage of this important story.

Of course, what the Chris Matthewses and Wolf Blitzers of the world have recently given us is wall-to-wall coverage of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Now, that's news you need to know!

Although we cats are inveterate optimists, this depresses us. If this kind of sorry media performance continues, what reliable sources will we be able to turn to for our news? Right now, we think it's down to National Public Radio, "The Daily Show" and the NewsHour on PBS. And, of course, the Internet.

Hey, Brian, Katie, Charlie, Wolf, Chris and the rest of you guys: We're not just HISSing at you for this. We're turning around, with our tails high in the air, and walking away.