As I’ve said here before my childhood ambition was to be Lou Grant. Now Lou, I understand, is a cultural reference that only those of us of a certain age will understand; for everyone else I can’t even imagine a suitable modern day equivalent, and that’s the problem. When I was six I knew what I wanted to be- a reporter. Partially because of my love of words and the assumption that the only people who got to write were reporters, but also because I was coming of age in an era when being a journalist meant something.
During the Watergate years I was young and unaware of the world around me. I had no idea of what was going on in the seat of power of our nation or the role that the press, and specifically the print media, played in bringing about one of the most historic moments in the life of our government. I grew up post-Watergate and learned in history class and at the movies what happened-or at least as much as we could know happened. I am the generation that wondered if we’d ever learn the identity of Deep Throat and what was said during the missing moments on tape. I am also of the age that believed in the importance of knowing (and our right to) the answers to such questions, and I wanted to be a part of it all.
Well my journalistic ambitions were killed early on in my college career at the hands of a professor who suggested that I take my tendencies to wax poetic over to the English department. Looking back, I think he was wrong, but that’s a tale for another time. I didn’t take on the task of pursuing truth and accountability, and sadly it seems that no one has anymore.
In our review of this mornings’ headlines he pointed me to this story at Salon about the goings on in the Bush administration. I offer it up as required reading for anyone who wants to know, or doesn’t want to but should.
“If we know this much about torture, rendition, secret prisons and warrantless wiretapping despite the administration’s attempts to stonewall, then imagine what we don’t know,” says a senior Democratic congressional aide who is familiar with the proposal and has been involved in several high-profile congressional investigations.
“You have to go back to the McCarthy era to find this level of abuse,” says Barry Steinhardt, the director of the Program on Technology and Liberty for the American Civil Liberties Union. “Because the Bush administration has been so opaque, we don’t know [the extent of] what laws have been violated.”
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/07/23/new_churchcomm/index.html
For many the anger and outrage they feel learning about yet another potential abuse of power is directed at team Bush/Cheney. Not mine. I hold my party and its’ leadership (like “no comment” Nancy P. ) responsible and I also hold those who call themselves journalists/reporters so also. The tradition of a media that holds the government accountable is dead. How can it be that we get trickles of information and dribbles of insight but no one is truly going after the whole story? Or it they are, why aren’t they writing about it? If we can’t look to our press to inform us, what hope is there that we can demand accountability from our elected officials? How can it be that the current administration is getting away with abuses of power that make the Nixon gang look like preschool playground bullies and no one seems to care? Why isn’t anyone asking the questions? Demanding the answers? Acting like LOU.
Lou would have gotten to the bottom of all this in a one hour episode. Lou would have raged indignant at the thought that someone was trying to get away with trampling on the Constitution, commiting acts of torture, or eavesdropping on private conversations. Lou would have made sure that we the people knew what was going on and how it mattered. Lou would not care one whit about Britney’s custody dispute, the pregnant “man”, or Brangelina’s new twins.
Sigh.
At least there’s TVLand, I think Lou shows up there occasionally.
3 Comments
July 23, 2008 at 1:14 pm
For the record, Lou appears on the American Life Network (channel 122 on Charter) every Wednesday night at 9 and again at 11. As far as I know, TVLand has become the middle-agers’ alternative to MTV fake reality television.
They do show Andy and Granny Clampett, though — and Gunsmoke. So it isn’t a total loss.
July 23, 2008 at 1:39 pm
I have yet to acknowlege that I am, in fact, middle age and as for Andy and Granny and Gunsmoke I believe they are the television of those slightly past the middle. I’ve managed to go through life without a single viewing of Andy and Granny and survived one Gunsmoke which only served to reinforce my distaste for the old American western (I think it was the cheesy background music and all the sweaty cowboys who never seemed to change clothes that bothered me most).
Of the two hundred plus channels available for viewing on my tv ALN is not one. For an additional fee charter would gladly send it my way but even Lou isn’t worth spending more $ given how very little tv I watch as it is. Now if Quincy were available I just might rethink that.
July 24, 2008 at 12:03 pm
I have to admitt I don’t know who Lou is but I do agree that the media lets us down all the time by not reporting on real news. I don’t care what Miley or Brittany are doing I want to know what is going on in the world and I want the truth. And I want unbiased facts not opinions or facts twisted to fit an agenda, no matter what agenda it is.