Thursday, April 19, 2007

"Network": The Sequel

My high-school classmate Paddy Chayevsky wrote the movie “Network” about TV executives who keep an insane anchorman on the air when ratings soar and then have him assassinated on camera when the public has had enough.

If he were still with us, Paddy would have relished the past 24 hours as an updated replay of his plot: After brief operatic anguish, TV executives fall back on “the public’s right to know” and give us a night of prime-time, repeated-ad-nauseam insanity.

Less than 24 hours later after wringing Cho’s rantings for ratings, they tell us how sensitive they are to public revulsion and will curtail their use.

Even Fox News joins the mea-culpa chorus and when the shameless are embarrassed, you know it’s unanimous.


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