Wednesday, April 27, 2005

Strange Bedfellows

Guest post by Jen.

“It’s Passover,” explained the first student, refusing her classmate’s offer of pretzels.  The second student, a fundamentalist Christian, apologized for forgetting. 

Anti-Semitism seems relatively uncommon here, and, to my great surprise, charismatic Christians seem to interact more comfortably with Jews than with other (non-charismatic) Christians. 

After much reading and discussion with our friend, I realize that many charismatics are Christian Zionists, who believe that

...all of historic Palestine—including all the land west of the Jordan which was occupied by Israel after the 1967 war—must be under the control of the Jewish people, for they see that as one of the necessary stages prior to the second coming of Jesus.

I am working to commit the taxonomy of fundamentalist Christianity to memory.

Morning television & me

I switched my season pass from the Today Show to Good Morning America but alas, there was Katie Couric again this morning. I don’t blame TiVo, I blame the cable company because even though I have an expensive digital box, the serial port isn’t active so I have to use the IR controller to change channels, which sometimes fails. Even so, TiVo still beats the cable company: The Comcast DVR Belongs in A Dumpster, “All I wanted was to watch 24 last night, and apparently that’s too much to ask from the nation’s largest cable company.”

I’m so out of synch. I used to be a regular Good Morning America viewer but recently I’ve favored the Today Show. It turns out the Today Show is struggling and GMA is moving up. And Katie gets the blame:

...lately her image has grown downright scary: America’s girl next door has morphed into the mercurial diva down the hall. At the first sound of her peremptory voice and clickety stiletto heels, people dart behind doors and douse the lights...The strained chemistry between Ms. Couric and her colleagues - Matt Lauer, Al Roker and Ann Curry - could be one reason..."Today" has turned her popularity into a Marxist-style cult of personality. The camera fixates on Ms. Couric’s legs during interviews, she performs in innumerable skits and stunts, and her clowning is given center stage even during news events.

Yowza! That hurts. And there she was this morning smiling and joshing with Matt, good as ever if you ask me. I was glad to see that Steve Brill came to her defense:

It’s one thing to write a review in The Arts Section saying the show is slipping or that it seems desperate, or that “the camera fixates on Ms. Couric’s legs.” That’s all about the content of the show—fair game for a critic, and really good stuff. But it’s quite another to report as fact—all unsourced—that “people dart behind doors and douse the lights” when Katie approaches, that “panic has set it,” etc. Who says? What’s Katie’s comment? Was she asked to comment?

The sad thing is that based on that article I was set to abandon the show. Fickle eh? Maybe I’ll just go and change that season pass back.

I’d watch that

Romenesko points to the Wall Street Journal:

Former ABC News producer Paul Friedman’s advice to CBS News execs: Summarize the news of the day in five minutes or so; spend a big chunk of time—10 minutes or so—on covering one really good story; and give people even more to think about by ending with opinion.