Last Night's News Thursday 2/19/09

Thursday 2/19/09

 

 

The economy is the top story on the evening newscasts. In spite of all of President Obama’s efforts, the market is going down again. David Muir on ABC says it’s because says Wall Street is worried about what government investigators are going to find when they start auditing banks.

 

NBC led off by reporting on sibling network CNBC and some guy named Rick Santelli pulling a Howard Beale on the trading floor saying we’ve got to stop aiding people in mortgage troubles. Street interviews on all three nets have featured people saying “throw them out on the street if they can’t pay.” They totally ignore that foreclosures are bad for banks, neighborhoods, and,of course, people lured into debt by bad bank practices.

 

One telling moment: Brian said he was startled to learn that 92% of the mortgages in this country are being paid on time. His surprise comes from the fact network reporters love to quote numbers with no context: “millions of foreclosures” is easier to say in a standup than “two tenths of one per cent.”   

 

Only CBS pointed out that the leading economic indicators were up for the second month in a row.


The number of houses in the country hasn’t changed. The number of cars, kumquats, and carousels hasn’t changed. What’s changed is the image we have of ourselves and our future. A bad image means market contractions and layoffs. A bad image means the dow goes down. And too often that bad image is being painted by media people who are regurgitating hysterical outbursts of vested interests because it makes “better” TV.  Like Howard Beale we should all be mad as hell. I just wish we didn’t have to take it any more.

 

So J. Allen Standford, the financier who allegedly made off with billions, was either served with papers while he was visiting a girlfriend in Fredericksburg VA (CBS) or showed up at The Department of Justice to surrender his passport (ABC) or both. Whatever. He’s not charged with anything and the 50,000 people who suddenly have no access to their money are currently out of luck. Fredericksburg is just up the road from Bumpass VA.

 

Katie on CBS tried to go behind the headlines to see what proposed bank nationalization in the US would mean. There was so much on-the-one-hand-on-the-other-hand that it was hard to understand. Good try though.  Unlike the dolphin story.  White beaked dolphins are trapped by pack ice in Seal Cove Newfoundland. Katie said their cries were disturbing the residents and that was the end of her story.

 

ABC tried to equate Sulley’s splash landing in the Hudson with a Pan AM ditching in 1956.  George anchored.  I missed Diane and Charlie.

 

Posted by Jon Ward at 2/20/2009 1:24 PM
Categories: uncategorized
 

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