She also predicted that it seemed very likely to her that Congress would go on its summer vacation and not send a bill to the President for improving the medical services provided for military veterans.
If Rachael Maddow can report those two stories and the backup she gets is from the likes of the World's Laziest Journalist, would it be "Elementary, my dear Watson," to conclude that journalism in the USA is approaching flat lining status?
Perhaps the staff at the World's Laziest Journalist New Organization is monitoring the wrong media, but it seems like, in the summer of 2014, an alarming case of "not connecting the dots" is occurring in the journalism arena in the USA.
As the world headed toward the start of August 2014, in the USA, news media started the week with stories indicating that a compromise between Republicans and Democrats was being crafted and that a bill to improve the health care provided for military veterans would be sent to the President by the end of the week. Cynics were expecting that some minor "parliamentary procedure" would be used to derail that expenditure of funds.
The Republicans were quick to rush to the TV cameras to provide eloquent sound bites that urged support for America's wounded heroes but then they sit around like they are participating in a sit down strike and waste time until it's time to vamoose for the summer recess.
Didn't Bessie Smith die because she couldn't get to a hospital that treated people of African-American heritage? How will the rednecks react if the same thing happens to a Medal of Honor winner this summer?
Many moons ago, when veterans held a sit-in in the lobby of the Veterans Hospital in West L. A., we mentored a young college kid majoring in photo journalism and helped him cover that story. When the police finally came and carried the vets away, the young man provided AP with coverage that got good play.
If the Veterans start a new Occupy the Lobby protest at that hospital, maybe that photographer can provide some assistance to a rookie and help a new generation of photographers get a break.
There's and old saying that asserts things never change. We're beginning to believe that might be so.
Isn't there an adage that says don't tell me what you're
going to do; show me what you do? Actions
speak louder than words but sound bytes on the Evening News help bamboozle the
rubes and win re-election campaigns. If
the Getty and Armstrong radio show wasn't running on "Best of" status this
week, you can bet they would have been urging Congress to do something . . .
but they were so they didn't.
In "The Armies of the Night," Norman Mailer wrote (on page 54): "Either the century was entrenching itself more deeply into the absurd, or the absurd was delivering evidence that it was possessed of some of the nutritive mysteries of a mirror which would yet feed the armies of he absurd." (WTF?)
Now the disk jockey will play some songs for the veterans who are anxiously awaiting the chance to donate to the re-election campaign of their local Congressman. He will play: the 1939 song "Old Age Pension," for those who die before they can get the medical services the Republicans wanted to approve, the WWII song "Smoke on the Water" (not to be confused with a different recording using the same title done by Deep Purple), and the obscure (of course it's obscure it uses Liberal talking points!) Arlene Harden recording titled: "Congratulations (You Sure Made a Man Out of Him)" and plenty more. He'll do a grand finale finish by playing Johnny Cash's "Man in Black" ("I wear the black for mournin' for the lives that could have been"). We have to get to the art opening in Oakland tonight. Have an "adjourned for the month of August" type week.
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