Spare us the nonsense

Is there anything more pointless than the post-debate fluff on the networks and, especially the cable 'news' channels? Which is saying something since cable 'news' channels are pretty much expert peddlers of pointless fluff.

On Larry King following the 2nd Bush-Kerry face off, they had Ann Coulter (a conservative so incoherent that she apparently hasn't been innoculated against rabies) and Paul Begala (a liberal yapping head who was one of Bill Clinton's spinmeisters). Immediately before that, Wolf Blitzer interviewed John Kerry's campaign manager and also Karen Hughes, who was one of Bush's top aides.

What happened will astonish you.

Begala and Kerry's campaign manager said Kerry did a fantastic job and clearly won the debate. Coulter and Hughes said Bush cleaned his opponent's clock. Both pairs used the appropriate phrases as though they were (ahem) reading out of a playbook.

The Bushies spoke of their man's resolve and clarity. The Kerryites spoke of multilateralism and healtheducationjobs (a single word for Democrats).

Yes, the Republicans said Bush won and the Democrats said Kerry won.

I'll wait a moment to let the shock wear off...

It's worth asking why the heck does CNN and the others even waste our time with this.

Get Karen Hughes to say John Kerry is an honorable patriot and crushed Bush like he'll crush al-Qaeda, and then it might be news. Until then, spare us the nonsense.

Basically, each campaign got long infomercials on the cable networks under the guise of 'analysis' and reaction. And the supposedly independent channels were complicit in this ruse, probably because they feared offending the tyranny of neutrality.

Instead of letting viewers digest what they just heard, the channels instantly bombarded viewers with people telling them how they should think, how they should interpret what they just heard, what candidate insta-polls definitively insist 'won' the debate. And the day after, all media outlets will be citing polls to 'prove' who won the debate.

We know politicians don't like citizens to think for themselves. Now we know the television media doesn't either.