A Year in the News

As the Project for Excellence in Journalism addressed in their 62-page report, "The State of the News Media", the battle to be the top story in American news media this year has been brutal. The two top players: The Iraq war and the dueling campaigns of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, completely dominated. No issue was more apparent, and noting it came to no surprise to me. What did come as a bit shocking, was their findings that celebrity topics like Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears were not as broadcast as we all complained them to be. That give a little hope, maybe making up for the pattern of saturation of news content in the media today and the tendency to keep news consumers devouring under a handful of stories at a time: "almost one-third of the overall newshole for the year [accounted for] U.S. foreign policy and U.S. politics and elections" alone. Having said that, the topics are without question the most important. However, in a society where news sources are already, and obviously, biased (a.k.a FOX News) and citizens are unknowingly taking in this information - without questioning it - that's when the problems of ignorance and miscommunication begins. And isn't news...all about...communication?