When News Readers Attack!

(iStockphoto)

A month ago, MSNBC's Morning Joe news anchor Mika Brzezinski famously refused to read a story about Paris Hilton, going so far as attempting to set her news script on fire. (Unfortunately, her partner's Bic lighter wasn't up to the task) And in doing so, she became a YouTube celebrity, with the footage now having been viewed nearly three million times.

And yesterday, CNN's lovable curmudgeon Jack Cafferty went so far as to - on live TV, mind you – ask/demand that the Lindsay Lohan story be removed from his teleprompter. On the grainy YouTube footage, he says "I wonder if we could get the Lindsay Lohan DUI arrest out of the teleprompter and put my script in. Is that possible?"

What's going on nowadays?

It's starting to feel like the final half-hour of "The Truman Show" when Jim Carrey begins getting suspicious of his environment and stops going along with everything suggested by his 'friends' and 'family' - who are nothing but performers hired to maintain his false and staged world – and succeeds in driving the director crazy.

Because it's not just Cafferty and Brzezinksi, either. With a major tip of the hat to TVNewser, here are more examples:

Fox News Correpondent Shep Smith growing frustrated by the Paris Hilton story and saying "If we're going to spend all day on this, I'm going to have some fun with it."

CNN's Kyra Phillips asking a guest "Are we just so pathetic and so lonely that we have to live life through people like Paris Hilton?..."

CNN's Heidi Collins openly mocking a celebrity reporter about the Paris Hilton story.

And these are just the words the correspondents and anchors use. Imagine if we could quantify the number of shrugs and raised eyebrows and grimaces seen in the past few months as the on-camera talent has begun to rebel against their copy.

What brings all this on? Has the infotainment pendulum finally swung too far for even the established cable professionals? Has the wink-and-a-nudge "Moment of Zen" awareness brought on by the Stewart/Colbert duo percolated up into the cable studios? Is this the hidden price tag of the cable networks' infatuation with 'personality,' that sometimes the journalists become so empowered that they defy orders? Or has the entire culture of cable news become so frustrated by the fluff that the anchors and reporters are beginning to side with their viewers against the people who make the news decisions? Is cable news -- dare I ask -- developing a conscience?

Regardless … There's something happening here. What it is ain't exactly clear. Whatever it is, it's promising.

[mejenny4all]

It was inevitable that someone on the news agencies will go nuts of the same celebrity garbage gossips. And it happened, so think if news readers refused to read what will the general people will do!!!!!!!!!!!!

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[rray52]

The latest attempt to increase ratings, %u2018bonding with the viewers%u201D . Reminds me of the old %u201Cwink, wink, nudge, nudge%u201D skit. Just as stale. Are we to believe that (except for breaking news) they don%u2019t review their copy before they read off the teleprompter?

[memekiller]

I don't know. This stuff always comes off like Olberman's "stories my producer is making me report" segments. It's a winking acknowledgment of the shallowness of the story, something on the level of a viewer rolling their eyes at the promo for the latest Hilton gossip as they tune in.

Paris is not the problem. It's the fact that "character" is not determined by corruption, abuse of power or lying the nation into counterproductive conflicts, but $400 haircuts and brown toned suits. Sending Paris to jail lets you pose as populist as you tout the "authenticity" of ivy league legacies and trust fund babies, while mocking the "hypocrisy" of the by-the-bootstraps success stories who would rather pass legislation that benefits the people from the poor neighborhoods where they came from than the fat cats who host your fundraisers in their billion dollar mansions.

More Paris. Less Love Canal.

[ridingwoman]

What are we going to do when we run out of dumb blondes? Now that we have been through Jessica, Britney and Anna Nicole and Paris, who will be the next bimbo to step up to the sacrificial plate and do her part in distracting America from noticing what's going on in,oh, I dont know, maybe IRAQ and a WAR? How bored are we anyway? Thank goodness SOMEONE who has a job in a business called NEWS had the gumption to call a halt to the stupidity, at least till the next bleach job comes along.

[maxium6]

If the anchors are tiring of this repititious waste of time, how do they think the public feels? I'm tired of celebs, and they almost do us in with, what they consider to be, salacious murders. Who cares about this garbage?

[nunezcabeza]

There was a similar attitude toward what was "newsworthy" in ancient times. When Rome burned, Nero played on his fiddle.