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Debates, Networks and Candidates
Posted by HOLLY IN CINCINNATI, Copy Editor in Media, Politics, Society.
Oct 30th, 2007 | 10 responses
Oct 30th, 2007 | 10 responses
Attention All Presidential Candidates and Networks!
There are voters out there like me who do not get MSNBC, CNN and Fox News! Not everybody likes to watch TV all of the time and or pay huge fees to cable companies or satellite networks for a service which used to be free to all (except the advertisers).
From now on, NO presidential debate should be on MSNBC, CNN and Fox News unless it is also broadcast to OTA (Over-the-Air) viewers. Yes, I can watch the MSNBC debate tonight on my computer but only because I pay too much for broadband Internet service. Many voters cannot afford to do this.
10 Responses to “Debates, Networks and Candidates”
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Holly,
I feel the same way about football. Not enough to put games on Fox and CBS and ESPN and NBC, now we have to pay for NFL Network?
Football, politics — that’s Americana at its core, and I agree, it should all be available on free, over-the-air TV!
Holly, do you seriously think they want anyone who isn’t a drone of the media watching on independent airwaves? You have to pay them to shove their candidate down your throat, you know…
I wonder what would happen if all the major networks put forth big stories saying that Richardson or Kucinich were surging, and started evaluating their presidential styles, as MSNBC did with HIllary the other day……
Note that Fox was at the forefront of tackiness with its news and with its sports programming with the use of gimmicky graphics and stupid sound effects.
Now what do we see? Truly decadent openings for the Sunday and Monday night football games, and fast motion replays (stupid programming for stupid people, by stupid people).
Meanwhile, the Sunday talking-head shows are cynically exploited by the politicians, a celebrity culture of its own (politicians, media leeches, and commentators) has evolved in over-sized Washington, DC, and coverage of the campaign so far differs from what people want.
The cable/satellite market is in over 80% of the homes in the U.S. Why should the candidates be stuck having debates on PBS which reaches about the same number of homes instead of cable.
And DLS,
the football graphics, scrolling scores, and now having the down, yardage, number of time outs left, and stats on the screen is due to the large number of people who watch in sports bars. It is very easy to watch a game without sound.
the football graphics, scrolling scores, and now having the down, yardage, number of time outs left, and stats on the screen is due to the large number of people who watch in sports bars. It is very easy to watch a game without sound.
I’m not talking about the graphics such as the current score and time remaining, or the yellow “FLAG” alert. I’m talking about the purely gimmicky graphics that have nothing to do with the ball game itself. And ugh — the sound is often so loud the stupid sound effects cannot help but be heard in a sports bar, along with voices louder than anything in conservative talk radio — only sports talk radio (the bottom of the barrel) competes with the voices you now hear from the broadcast booth. (I even suspect that the broadcast is made or received with treble frequencies boosted to provide additional “sizzle” in the sound — along with the contemporary idiot-trend of over-pronouncing sibilants and other consonants so badly that Dubya’s diction is less painful to hear at times.)
Holly- I’m sure, being a fellow news junkie that its frustrating, but I do get all of those channels, and while the first couple of debates were worth watching, they have now become repetitive, with each candidate saying less and less with more and more words.
Rabbit ears have the right price to use them — zero.
Wow, you can get cable on rabbit ears? I’m impressed. But Krit is right, the candidates have had quite a few debates and are just going in circles now. And just out of curiosity why would your solution be to ban the cable networks from airing them instead of requesting the public channels pick up a few?
I didn’t say that the cable networks should be banned from airing them but that they should also be broadcast OTA.