This Is CNN

[Daveparts]

For years the melodic baritone voice of James Earl Jones would announce, this is CNN. I guess he lost that gig after becoming the voice of Darth Vader. I see the symmetry but I guess CNN doesn’t. The brain child of Ted Turner, that in it’s adolescence won awards for it’s coverage of the first gulf war but has in adulthood become a fat indolent Homer Simpson sitting on the couch with Duff in hand.

How many times have we seen a child so full of promise succumb to laziness? When CNN was bought out by Time Warner AKA (Mr. Burns) Bernard Shaw left and Peter Arnett left to be replaced today by Wolf Blitzer and Dr.Sanjay Gupta. Turner’s original vision had been a news network with buearu’s all over the world but “Doah! That’s expensive.” Instead we get a 24-hour Time Life book, with pictures and a point of view but very little reporting.

Talent will get you reassigned at CNN the best and the brightest become the least and the rarest. Every once in a while Christian Amonpour is allowed to break free or Candy Crowley is occasionally allowed to ask a tough question. During hurricane Katrina Anderson Cooper did some fine work but you get the impression management hobbles its best horses.

Management have a vision but it’s a corporate vision, they let Amonpour out to do one or two stories a year just to prove they still do those sort of things but Larry King Live is on every night. Lou Dobbs talks about middle class issues but there is very little reporting, only a regurgitating of some one else’s reporting and all with that superficiality that Time Life is famous for. Then Homer, I mean Jack Cafferty chimes in as curmudgeon in chief but then its back to The Situation Room.

For hours the administrations positions are presented with a veneer of scrutiny but never with any context or serious analysis. Yesterday for example, the administration line was Iranian involvement in Iraq, the news footage, a rehash of old footage, with an American General using adjectives such as “we believe” and “we have intelligence that suggests.” The same old discredited story about “Iranian” IED’s and improved targeting of rockets and mortars. I taught myself to play the guitar so if I get better at it is that evidence that Jimmy Page came by?

As the footage ends the CNN anchor was quick to point out that 85% of all American fatalities are caused by IED’s. A = Iranian IED B = dead servicemen so A + B = Iran killing US servicemen with the proof being “we believe and intelligence suggests.” Ignoring the real news that 100% of all US casualties in Iraq stem from an administration that lied us into this war in the first place. That these IED’s (Improvised Engineered Deceptions) were manufactured at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. and broadcast from that very desk. So using the administrations argument, A = cows stand outside in the rain and B. Cows grow bigger so A + B = rain makes cows grow bigger.

Only the most ignorant among us or hardheaded or administration official could deny that this administration has been spoiling for a fight with Iran for years. They want it more than Ralphie wanted that Red Rider BB gun and refuse like Ralphie to listen when they are told, “You’ll shoot your other damn eye out!” On CNN this would be. “Administration takes cautious approach in Iranian negotiations.”

Like Ralphie they live in a dream world where they are the rootinest tootinest cowboys in town and they’re gonna get Black Bart. And CNN’s job is to make sure every one in the country knows just how evil Black Bart really is. But the reality is Black Bart only exists in Ralphie’s mind and in the administrations mind. For CNN war means ratings and profits for the Time Warner Stockholders.

The administration like a compulsive gambler thinks they can get themselves even with just one more sure thing long shot. But for CNN they can only claim naiveté once, the second time around they’re an accomplice just like the rest of them and the blood that flows from the crime is on their hands. If this was just a case of calling Scooter Libby a White House employee rather than the Vice Presidents Chief of Staff or doing a hatchet job on Michael Moore’s movie Sicko it could be excused.

But in aiding and abetting the manufacturing of consent they have crossed the line and commit premeditated crimes against innocents. They cease to be media and lose all protection that might be afforded to them. They have made themselves combatants; the launch of a cruise missile is news but if you aid in making that launch possible you might as well have launched it yourself. But unlike the airman or sailor who are just following orders you do so voluntarily to help the corporate bottom line, blood for profit.

Tass and Pravda and the Nazi propaganda machines could all claim they were organs of the state and required to follow orders and publish what they were told. But CNN takes the mantle of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine and Edward R. Murrow and reduce it to paparazzi that take down the stop signs at an intersection just to wait for the crash.

When Judas sold out Christ for forty pieces of silver he rationalized it to himself.He thought maybe he was doing a good thing and in the long run and that it would all work out for the best. When Christ was crucified Judas realized he had been used by those people, that their plan was dark and sinister from the start. The most famous traitor on earth was overcome with grief, mourning and self loathing yet CNN cares not as it attempts to help sell another war. After all it was all Michael Moore could do to get CNN to admit their transgressions when placed in their face. What can be said in defense of those who promote war?

We call them as we see them? Their job is not to see them but to investigate them and to turn them inside out and to shake them until the truth falls out. If we don’t like our coverage go somewhere else! If I don’t like your lies I should turn my back and let you keep telling them unchallenged? If I don’t like Fascist’s I should just ignore them and maybe they’ll go away?

The imperial President and an unresponsive congress and corporate media have fostered a wave of public disillusionment in our institutions. Disillusionment is followed by anger and then by irrelevance. On the CNN website no mention is made of Cindy Sheehans arrest in John Conyers office or the word impeachment at all. Maybe that’s why John Stewart on Comedy Central is considered a credible news source and Keith Oberman is revered. Like a clock the hands have come full circle but the meaning has changed entirely, This is CNN.

[Autumn Colors]

1. The timeline is off in your intro

For years the melodic baritone voice of James Earl Jones would announce, this is CNN. I guess he lost that gig after becoming the voice of Darth Vader.

The first Star Wars movie was released in 1977 (and James Earl Jones has always been the voice of Darth Vader). CNN didn't appear until the scene until 1980. The second Star Wars movie was released that same year. He was the voice of Darth Vader long before he was the voice of CNN.

[Daveparts]

2. Thanks for the comment

It's not so much a time line as the identification, after the first movie he was just an actor playing a charactor but after what five movies? He has become identified by that charactor the voice equals the man or machine or any part there of. "I am your Father Luke" has entered the cultural lexicon.

[Autumn Colors]

4. Were you around in 1977?

If not, then you should realize that the first Star Wars movie wasn't just a movie. It was a major event. No one knew there would be more, but there was nothing else like it out there. Darth Vader's voice was a sensation almost from the get-go and certainly by the time CNN rolled around.

Why do you think they wanted his voice? The whole world recognized Darth Vader's VOICE at the point, if not many people knew who the face was behind that voice. Contrary to what you wrote, I believe the opposite is true. They wanted that recognizable voice.

Just as a side note ... I went to Tehran as an exchange student during the summer of 1978 and Star Wars was playing at the movies in Tehran that summer. Darth Vader was already very well known over there, too. :)

[Puzzler]

3. At least CNN is always first with the "Wal Mart" news.

I was watching CNN a couple of days ago, and one of the big news stories was how Wal Mart was slashing prices for the "back-to-school" season... complete with examples of how much one dollar would buy.

The piece was one great big ad for Wal Mart... and it was in the middle of a regular segment.


-P