I know I've written about this before but guest blogger Dennis Hartley over at Digby's place (Hullaballoo) got one of those "transcendental moments" (okay, okay, I'm making this crap up) while watching his TIVO'd episodes of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Or, as he put it:
"...first few episodes of NBC’s “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”, I got up off my couch, switched off the DVR, went to my DVD shelf and made my annual pilgrimage back to The Source-Sidney Lumet’s Network ."
Why do I consider this important? Or "blog-worthy"? Simply because I think the Movie, Network, should be shown to every Junior High Civics Class (which should be required again, btw) and every Senior Social Studies Class (which should ALSO be required) to teach kids a couple of valuable lessons:
Lesson #1. Not everything you see on TV is true.
Lesson #2. Money and TV News Don't mix.
The predictions made in that movie were profound....remember this was in 1976. Here's a snippet from Hartley's excellent post:
In the opening scene, drunken buddies Peter Finch (as Howard Beale, respected news anchor soon to suffer a complete mental breakdown and morph into “the mad prophet of the airwaves”) and William Holden (as Max Shumacher, head of news division for the fictional “UBS” network) riff cynically on an imaginary pitch for a surefire news rating booster-“Real live suicides, murders, executions-we’ll call it The Death Hour.” Funny punch line back in 1976. Sadly, in 2006, we call it “The Nancy Grace Show”.
Think that's prophecy? Check this out.
Later in the film, when the corporate “hatchet man” for “CCA” the network’s parent company (brilliantly played by Robert Duvall) barks “We’re not a respectable network, we’re a whorehouse”, one can not help but flash on the Fox network.
I will probably bore my son and his new bride to death, but I'm buying Network and showing it over the Christmas Holiday.
In other news:
I was listening to WPR in the car today...(I had another impromptu road trip) and I heard Lieberman from his appearance on Face the Nation today. He's already refuting some of the leaked reports coming from the Baker Commission's recommendations, specifically, he's refuting the recommendation that the Administration talk directly with Syria and Iran in solving some of the issues in the region.....Lieberman says that's like a "fireman negotiating with arsonists"....
bullshit....
Lieberman is so busy kissing Dubya's behind that he's turned his brain off....the Baker commission is talking about DIPLOMACY and Lieberman is playing it like the neocon talking points...
That guy makes me nuts....
The other blogs have pointed out the bizarre juxtaposition of the Republican on the Panel, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska who was ripping Bush and company apart, and the Independent (former Democrat) Joe Lieberman, defending Bush....welcome to the twilight zone....
tomorrow....
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