Our Dumb Media

I was trolling internet “news” sites looking for fucked-up stuff to blog about when I realized that headlines seem to be getting dumber and dumber. Seriously. This morning, CNN.com features beauties like “Boyfriend Charged in Woman-on-Toilet Case” and “Giant Speed Bumps Irk Scraping Drivers.” Even the stories that seem relevant to what’s going on in the country only seem to point out the obvious, like this ABC News headline: “McCain, Obama Camps Clash on Iraq”. Because we thought they agreed on Iraq? Really?

MSNBC’s headlines aren’t as stupid, but I can’t quite figure out why a story like “Texas Man Gets 60 Years for 10th DUI” should matter to the average American. You’d think this would be a good time to be a reporter. I mean, we’re fighting wars in two countries, we’ve got an administration shrouded in secrecy that keeps getting tangled up in messy situations (CNN says Scooter Libby got disbarred, by the way), and we’re coming up on one of the most important elections in recent history. Sure, they cover the election, but it’s either 24-hour cable news networks beating us over the head with poll data all day long or network news channels blowing candidate squabbles way out of proportion. There’s no legitimate information available. They don’t talk about where the candidates stand on different issues; they just talk about what the candidate say about each other. It’s completely useless.

But sometimes the completely useless media at least manages to give me a decent laugh. And with that, I present my favorite headline of the week.

“Hillary at White House on ‘Stained Blue Dress’ Day”

Yup. This is a real headline. From yesterday. Apparently, the folks at ABC thought that somehow Sen. Clinton’s whereabouts on February 28, 1997–the day President Clinton left a stain on Monica Lewinsky’s dress and, subsequently, America’s dignity–are relevant now during her campaign for President. Seems pretty desperate. What possible reason could they have for recycling an 11 year old news story? It’s like they’re bringing it up just in case the American people have forgotten that Sen. Clinton is married to former President Clinton who, you know, got a blow job. Egads! Clinton got a blow job! And Hills was in the house when it happened! Well…that must mean she was somehow involved in it. Oh, I get it! It’s her fault Monica blew Bill and then the Republicans found out and threw a temper tantrum about it (which I totally get…I mean, if the Repubs have to be all sexually repressed, the Dems should have to be too). Maybe Hillary’s a lesbian. That’s gotta be the only possible explanation for a wife being in the same house as her husband while he’s getting a blow job from another woman! I mean, if she’s not a lesbian, she’s just a horrible wife. After all, a good little Christian wife should know what’s going on in each room of her 55,000 square foot home. Right?

And ABC News is just bringing this up because it’s critical that the American people know where Sen. Clinton was 11 years ago when her husband was jizzing all over an intern. Sure.And moving on from stupid headlines to stupid people….

McCain: Warmongering Master of Rhetoric or Total Fucking Moron?

Senator John McCain, Presidential candidate and complete douchehound, went on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show Monday and made the following comment: “As you know, there are al-Qaeda operatives that are taken back into Iran, given training as leaders, and they’re moving back into Iraq.” Then, on Monday he was speaking in Jordan and said that Iranian operatives are “taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them, and sending them back.” His audience pressed him to clarify that statement and McCain said it was “common knowledge”. Well, what McCain seems to have missed is that the likelihood of Iranians training al-Qaeda is basically non-existent. You see, Iran is a Shiite nation-Shia muslims represent about 90% of the population. Al-Qaeda is a Sunni extremist group. That puts them on opposing sides of this civil war they’ve got going on in Iraq right now. It’s highly unlikely they would form any sort of alliance. Al-Qaeda doesn’t only hate Americans,you see, they also hate Shiite muslims. Apparently, Sen. “I’ve got so much foreign policy experience I’m the obvious choice for President” gets confused about all those Muslim factions with similar-sounding names. Or, maybe he intentionally tried to implicate Iran in supporting al-Qaeda. After all, you know how Americans get squirrelly when people talk about al-Qaeda and how people vote Republican when they get squirrelly.

After he got called out for his mistake (or poorly-devised manipulation) his pal on the campaign trail, Joe Lieberman, had to correct him. The McCain campaign is trying to play it off as an honest mistake that was immediately correct, but the fact is, he said it on two separate occasions before he corrected himself. And it was only corrected because someone pointed out that he was wrong. My first instinct was that it was some sort of Cheney-esque rhetorical tool to make Americans more nervous about Iran and potentially throw their support behind yet another war on “terror”. But honestly, I think McCain is just too dumb to keep all the facts straight. At the least, this should give people reason to question his claims that he’s so well-versed in foreign affairs.

He’s So Gay He Came Out Twice.

In a recent interview with Spin Magazine, Michael Stipe of R.E.M. fame came out of the closet…again. Apparently, to help kids understand their sexual identities. In 2001, he identified himself as a “queer artist”, but hasn’t talked much about it since then. Which is actually completely unsurprising since Stipe has a reputation for being a loner and avoiding people who recognize him on the street. Yet, he’s taking one for the team by opening up about his sexuality in the hopes that kids will have more positive queer role models. Of course, everyone knew he was gay, right? I mean, I assumed he was gay way before he came out in 2001. Still, I think it’s a nice gesture for the usually-private Stipe to open about his personal life. Nice work, Michael.