What's The Headline?
The following is a weekly 60 Minutes commentary by CBS News correspondent Andy Rooney.
I read a lot of newspapers every day - or at least I look at a lot of newspapers every day. It would take all day if you read everything in just one newspaper.
There's a story that says Maryland is going to make it illegal for 16-year-olds to drive after 10 p.m. and illegal for 17-year-olds to drive after midnight. That seems kind of dumb if Maryland doesn't mind me saying so. A kid who's a bad driver at nine o'clock when he's 16 is still going to be bad at ten when he's 17, or 27 or 67 for that matter.
This is from The Washington Post: "Two Sides Testify On Same-Sex Marriage." Well, I don't have an opinion on same-sex marriage. Let me phrase that another way: I have an opinion on same-sex marriage but I'm not going to tell you what it is tonight.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the price of platinum went up to more that $2,000 an ounce this week. "Fears Push Platinum Higher," the headline reads. If I had to pick a story out of the papers that interested me least, that might be it. I hardly ever buy an ounce of platinum. I don't really know what platinum is. What do they do with platinum anyway?
Speaking of headlines that mean nothing to me, here's another one: "Billionaire Mahers Rack Up Losses In Auction Bonds." I don't really know how much money a billionaire has, I never heard of the "Mahers," and I have no idea what an "auction bond" is. I do know I don't have any of them because if I did, I'd keep them in my desk drawer and I just looked and there aren't any in there.
Here's another headline that means less than nothing to me: "Sub-Prime Solution: Nationalize." Does that mean we should nationalize sub prime? And if it does, what in the world does "sub prime" mean?
Here's one: "Inmate Who Had Health Issues Found Dead At O.C. Jail." I don't know what the story was, but it certainly must have been true that the prisoner had a health issue if he was found dead.
Newspaper men and women who write headlines have a hard job. They have to make sense of a long, complicated story in just eight or ten words.
I've used about 500 words saying this.
Written By Andy Rooney