TurnOffYourTV.com The Boob Tube Part 2

Television is obsessed with Britney Spears' breasts. Any news about pop-singer Spears and her often-displayed bosom always makes headline news. For example, on June 1, 2004, the top stories on CNN were:

It's not the top story, but it's there. Stories about Britney always make it into the top ten. On this day, the People's Republic of China was going to allow Spears to perform in Shanghai, however, after seeing her provocative outfits said she will need to alter her wardrobe. Britney can't show off her breasts in China! Big news in TV-land.

Television is a simplistic medium. It is made up of flashing colors on a screen which create images and motion accompanied by sound. You can turn the TV on and off and change the channel. The purpose of TV is to entertain and advertise. In the late 1960s, Marshall McLuhan proposed the famous phrase "the medium is the message" which means the medium is more important than the content. McLuhan said how someone interacts with a medium will "massage" and reshape the mind and senses. If this is true, then it should be no surprise that TV is more concerned with Britney's breasts than with high-impact or complex topics.

The highlight of modern investigative journalism is often remarked to be Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's 1972-73 investigation of the Watergate Hotel burglary in Washington D.C. The two journalists tracked the break-in of the Democratic Party's National Committee offices all the way up to President Richard Nixon. As a result of the scandal, Nixon resigned from office. Since then, however, few journalistic investigations have received the same notoriety. In the opinion of Carl Bernstein, modern journalism has become "the triumph of the idiot culture."

“We are in the process of creating what deserves to be called the idiot culture. Not an idiot sub-culture, which every society has bubbling beneath the surface and which can provide harmless fun; but the culture itself. For the first time, the weird and the stupid and the coarse are becoming our cultural norm, even our cultural ideal," he wrote in the article, The Idiot Culture: Reflections of Post-Watergate Journalism in The New Republic (June 1992). "For more than fifteen years we have been moving away from real journalism toward the creation of a sleazoid info-tainment culture in which the lines between Oprah and Phil and Geraldo and Diane and even Ted, between the New York Post and Newsday, are too often indistinguishable . . . The hard and simple fact is that our reporting has not been good enough . . . We do not serve our readers and viewers, we pander to them."

In a speech in March 2004, Bernstein repeated accusations. He said today's news panders to the public and insults their intelligence. He said good journalism "should challenge people, not just mindlessly amuse them." He said the press lacks leadership and have abandoned the principles of meaningful reporting. "Their interest in truth is secondary to their interest in huge profits," Bernstein said.

One only needs to watch the evening news to see how the dumbing down of America has manifested itself on television. TV news has become entertainment and advertisements. Lowry Mays, CEO of Clear Channel Communications, told Fortune.com "we’re not in the business of providing news and information. We’re not in the business of providing well-researched music. We’re simply in the business of selling our customers products.” Clear Channel owns 1,200 radio stations with annual revenue of more than $6 billion.

In May 2004, TV critic Tom Shales attempted to find live coverage of President George Bush's speech mapping out his plan for Iraqi sovereignty (one year after the U.S. invasion). "The speech, just over 30 minutes long, was semi-nationally televised. It was carried on cable news networks like Fox's and NBC's CNBC and MSNBC, but the four major broadcast networks decided not to air it," he wrote. "Besides, the probable reason they opted out was a matter of profits: This was the last Monday night of the May ratings sweeps and the networks wanted to hew to scheduled programming and the commercials therein. And so the tattered old NBC peacock turned its back on the president to offer two episodes of its ultimate dumb-downer, 'Fear Factor,' the program on which women in bikinis eat worms."

In the fight between Britney's breasts and investigative journalism, the boobs are winning. The Project for Excellence in Journalism released a report in March 2004 titled The State of the News Media 2004: An Annual Report on American Journalism. The group's excellent analysis states that in general, today's news media is more complex than in the past. However, with complex organizations and consolidated ownership comes problems with content. "Quality news and information are more available than ever before," states the report, "but in greater amounts so are the trivial, the one-sided and the false."

As can be seen in graphic below, the PEJ report shows that television is by far the most popular news source in the United States:

Where People Go for National/International News: 1991 to 2003

The report notes that network news programs (from the ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS networks) get 30 million viewers each night. However, the study found that viewership of nightly broadcasts is shrinking while morning news/variety programs are increasing. The content of the two types of news broadcasts also differ with the morning news centering around entertainment and trivia. "Given that morning news ratings are stable or rising, while evening is shrinking, this has significant implications," states the report. "Those who get their television news in the morning are learning about a different agenda of what matters and are far more likely to talk about the trial in the murder of Laci Peterson, Michael Jackson's child-molestation case or Tom Cruise's movie, even in the supposedly hard-news hour of the morning, than those who get their news in the evening."

This is what makes up your world. The report says that cable news de-emphasizes the role of the reporter and focuses on behind-the-desk anchors. This staccato sound-bite style leaves little room for edits or fact checking. If a story is wrong, too bad, if you are watching tomorrow maybe they will correct themselves at some point. "On TV, however, there is no [editor] to clarify and verify. In a sense, that is left to the audience."

The report, however, only focuses on hard news stations and does not take into account the many other types of news found on television. Programs such as Entertainment Tonight, E! News, VH-1 Behind the Music, MTV News, ESPN SportsCenter and others also bring "news" to TV audiences. Albeit, the news is frivolous and trivial, there are many who "can't live without" seeing these programs each night (especially ESPN addicts). News magazine programs such as Nightline, Dateline and 60 Minutes also present news to TV watchers. The news magazine format does allow a more polished investigation, however, topics are clearly info-tainment.

For example, December 2003 topics on CBS's 60 Minutes and 60 Minutes II included interviews with Sean Penn (actor), Judge Judy Scheindlin (TV judge), Michael Jackson (singer) and a profile of Saddam Hussein. A month earlier, 60 Minutes produced an interview with Mary J. Blige (singer) and investigative reports Porn in the U.S.A. and Reviving The Dead. Special reports on the NBC program Dateline in June 2004 include The last days of Jesus; Affirmative action: A question of fairness; Dirty Restaurants? Hidden camera investigation: Top 10 chains; and At home with Ben and Jen: Revisit them when they were still Bennifer. This is in addition to interviews with Michael Jackson (again) and Hugh Jackman (actor). These news magazines also include "coverage of the Iraq war," but it's just coverage not investigations.

None of this comes close to unseating the status of Woodward and Bernstein's Watergate. (The only notable exception being 60 Minutes II showing the Iraqi prison abuse pictures, which was really a story uncovered by New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh.)

Which brings up the topic of The Breasts of Britney Spears' versus The Military Industrial Complex. Television can easily show the trials and tribulations of Britney and her breasts -- but can it show a serious and complicated issue? The emergence of the military industrial complex within the United States should be a topic of hot discussion on TV news. With ongoing military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq and American troops deployed in 135 countries around the world, military preparedness and armaments should be on TV non-stop. It isn't. Why? According to the PEJ report, government stories account for at least one-third of all news stories on network and cable news. Shouldn't the United States' unparalleled military buildup be a top story?

The problem with a TV news story about the military industrial complex is that it can be . . . well . . . complex. It also brings up serious issues. Television is not a serious or complex medium.

The chart below from the War Resisters League shows the breakdown of the U.S. government's budget:

Current Military, $536B:Military Personnel $109B, Operation and Maintenance $164B, Procurement $67B, Research and Development $66B, Construction $6B, Family Housing $4B, Retired Pay $44B, DoE Nuclear Weapons $17B, 50% NASA $8B, International Security $8B, 50% Homeland Security $16B, Ex. Off. Pres. $10B, mi sc. $6B
Iraq & Afghan Wars, $50B: Though the cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is not included in the President’s budget, it is included here because the Administration will request supplemental funding after the Nov. 2004 election.
Past Military, $349B: Veterans’ Benefits $69B; Interest on National Debt (80% estimated to be created by military spending) $280B
Human Resources, $633B: Education, Health/Human Services, HUD, Food/Nutrition programs, Labor Department, Soc. Sec. Admin.
General Government, $244B: Legislative, Justice Dept., State Dept., International Affairs, Treasury, Go’t. Personnel, 20% interest on national debt, 50% of NASA, 25% Homeland Security
Physical Resources, $114B: Agriculture, Commerce, Energy, Interior Dept., Transportation, Environmental Protection, Army Corps Engineers, NSF, FCC, 25% Homeland Security

What would happen if the news media displayed this graphic? What would happen if the TV news investigated where HALF of the U.S. budget was really going? Since 2001, the U.S. government has increased military spending more than it has in 20 years. The U.S. has the largest military in the world and the most advanced weapons. The top 10 defense firms (Kellogg, Brown & Root/Halliburton, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, United Technologies, General Electric and DynCorp) are getting billions of dollars in contracts. For example, Lockheed Martin's military contracts from 2000 to 2003 totaled $69.1 billion to produce F-16 and F/A-22 jet fighters, the CJ-130 air transport and Hellfire and Javelin missiles. Next to this, Alliant Techsystems' $92 million contract to provide 265 million rounds of ammunition for the Army looks miniscule.

The reason the Bush administration gives for the military buildup is "terrorism." However, many appointments in the Bush administration are former employees of major defense manufacturers. According to the Arms Trade Resource Center and the Foreign Policy In Focus think tank, 32 members of the Bush team are "former executives, consultants or major shareholders of top weapons contractors." For example, former Lockheed CEO Peter Teets is now undersecretary of the Air Force, former Northrop Grumman vice president James Roche is now Secretary of the Air Force and former General Dynamics vice president Gordon England is now Secretary of the Navy. It should also be noted that Vice President Dick Cheney was a former executive at Halliburton and his wife Lynne Cheney served on the board of Lockheed Martin.

According to the group, one insider calls the current situation "Department of Defense, Inc." The study of defense contracts leads the author to question why the ties between top policymakers and the ballooning military spending have not been given more notice? "At a time when corporate scandals are making headlines, the administration's reliance on individuals with ties to the arms industry deserves far greater scrutiny that it has received to date," says researcher Michelle Ciarrocca.

Undoing more than 20 years of nuclear policy, the Bush administration is now pursuing the development and construction of a new batch of nuclear weapons. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan said, "I support a zero option for all nuclear weapons . . . my dream is to see the day when nuclear weapons are banished from the face of the earth." In 1999, Paul Nitze, the former arms control negotiator under Reagan said, "the fact is, I see no compelling reason why we should not unilaterally get rid of nuclear weapons. To maintain them is costly and adds nothing to our security."

Since the Reagan arms treaties, the U.S. has not produced any new nuclear weapons and the Los Alamos Weapons Laboratory in New Mexico was charged with developing technologies to maintain the current weapons systems (called Stockpile Stewardship). In 2002, President Bush put forth a new program to develop low-yield nuclear weapons. "I view our nuclear arsenal as a deterrent . . . And the President must have all options available to make that deterrent have meaning," said Bush. The Bush administration has withdrawn from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of 1972 and is pursuing a course which could begin a new arms race.

Development of low-yield nukes is an attempt to combine the conventional "bunker-buster" style bombs with nuclear warheads. Proponents say such weapons could be precisely targeted and greatly reduce collateral damage. A study performed by the prestigious Federation of American Scientists, an organization including more than half of the current American Nobel Laureates, argues that low-yield nuclear missiles are a technological impossibility.

"No Earth-burrowing missile can penetrate deep enough into the Earth to contain an explosion with a nuclear yield even as small as 1 percent of the Hiroshima weapon," wrote Princeton University physicist Robert Nelson, the author of the FAS study. "The explosion simply blows out a massive crater of radioactive dirt, which rains down on the local region with especially intense and deadly fallout." The study stated that a 1-kiloton explosion, less than one tenth of the Hiroshima bomb, would have to burrow 450 feet to avoid civilian impacts. There is no research that such burrowing capability and precise targeting is possible. There is also no evidence that mysterious underground bunkers even exist.

Military escalation is nothing new to world history. However, when nuclear weapons are involved, the stakes are much higher. A nuclear weapon called the "New Triad" is being developed at a cost of $8.3 billion in the 2002 and 2003 budgets with at least $33 billion in additional expenditures likely between 2004 and 2008, according to the The World Policy Institute. In a report titled About Face: The Role of the Arms Lobby In the Bush Administration's Radical Reversal of Two Decades of U.S. Nuclear Policy, the authors show a relationship between the arms manufactures and the current U.S. executive administration. Many firms with close political ties will gain billions of dollars in contracts because of the new weapons manufacturing requests. In addition to the political appointees, the World Policy Institute has also tracked campaign contributions and notes that "contributions by ten major nuclear weapons and missile defense contractors revealed that these firms made $8.6 million in political contributions in 1999/2000, with 61% of the funds going to Republican candidates; and $4.2 million in contributions so far in 2001/2002, with 64% going to Republican candidates."

Republican military think tanks, such as the Center for Security Policy (CSP), receive funding from defense contractors and have close ties to many politicians. "The Center for Security Policy has had a particularly visible role in shaping Bush administration policies on missile defense, as befits its status as a high profile policy advocacy organization," says the report. The CSP motto is "Promoting Peace through Strength." The report notes that "according to the [CSP’s] own annual reports, it has received more than $3 million in corporate donations since its founding in 1988, which represents more than 25% of its total funding in the thirteen years it has been in existence. Corporate contributors to CSP have included Boeing, General Atomics, General Dynamics, Litton, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Textron, Thiokol, and TRW." Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith and Assistant Secretary of Defense J.D. Crouch are both former CSP research associates and are instrumental in developing the Bush administration's new nuclear policies.

The report concludes with a disconcerting message: "The fact that such a narrow, ideologically-driven network now has a dominant role in crafting U.S. nuclear policy is cause enough for concern, raising serious questions about the intent of the new policy: is it merely an attempt to seek greater 'flexibility' in U.S. nuclear policy, or does it represent the first steps in a renewed drive for nuclear superiority, regardless of the global consequences?"

These facts are NOT being investigated by the national media. Where is ABC, CBS and NBC News? Where is Fox, CNN and MSNBC? Since NBC and MSNBC are owned by General Electric, a major defense contractor, it makes sense for those networks not to bring such an explosive story to the national stage. What about the others? How can we enter a new nuclear weapons race without any notice from the major news organizations? Why is there not a detailed analysis of the nuclear weapons buildup? Has the United States forgotten the horror inflicted upon Hiroshima?

The American media has the power to control discourse in the country. News stories about important issues, like the U.S. military buildup should be making nightly news every day. They don't because it would involve a level of reporting TV news cannot accommodate. A story such as this would be powerful and emotional and require detail television cannot provide.

Reality is too intense for TV. Although, perhaps it can handle a Britney Spears reality show . . . we can only hope.

The Boob Tube Part 2:

The Breasts of Britney Spears vs. The Military Industrial Complex

by Ron Kaufman

Where People Go for National/International News: 1991 to 2003