I finished The Nightly News Nightmare and was generally disappointed. The book provided overwhelming evidence that the nightly news is failing Americans. The nightly news increasingly focuses on the horse race, scandals, and has an increasingly negative tone. They also, in the rush to be first with breaking stories, do not research stores as much as they should. Take the 2000 election as a prime example.
After finishing this book, I began reading Fireside Politics. Part I of this book focuses on the history of radio as a medium. Initially seen solely as a way to communicate between two people, General Electric quickly realized that mass broadcasts of entertainment had the potential to make a lot of money. They created RCA with this mission. I was surprised to learn that during World War I, all radio was put under the control of the Navy. Although Part I does not necessarily relate to my topic, I think it will be beneficial to have a background on radio before reading about its effects on political culture, which the book covers in Part II.
For next week, I hope to finish Fireside Politics and begin to examine what I will be writing about for our November papers.
No comments:
Post a Comment