The News - Or Lack Thereof

This will be another rant. It's been building for a while, so with the Libor news, it's reached a boiling point.

The reason the recent Libor scandal was the tipping point for me is that, unless you actually went looking, you would barely hear a mention of this on our TV news. Who reading this knows what Libor is? If you don't - go find out.

It's likely larger than the financial meltdown of 2008, but it's a little bit difficult to understand. We would rather watch "Trending Now" on the local station and see what Joe Butthole says about Katie Perry on Twitter.

This isn't news!

Why is it that "news" programs pander to us and we reward them by watching? Every network is the same - from Global to CBC to MSNBC to CNN. And god forbid we talk about Fox.

I watched the first three episodes of Aaron Sorkin's "The Newsroom" over the weekend, where he ponders a network news program that, for an hour each day, actually delivers the news. Facts, not innuendo or a left/right angle, and no social media nonsense. Quite the indictment of what we're spoon fed today. If we would actually reward real news programs by watching them, networks might just do it. But they're too afraid to try, so we'll never know.

The closest I've found for real news today is Al Jazeera. It's staggering to go back and forth from CNN to them and see the difference. One is talking about Mitt Romney's Jet Ski, and the other is talking about the possible poisoning/assassination of Yassar Arafat. Guess which one.

I suspect that the BBC News could also be a good choice, but they've shut down their web feed here in Canada, so the only way to get it is via your local cable TV company. If anyone has it, and finds that it's a whole lot better than the trash we get now, send me a note.

So here's a suggestion - reward your local news (and national/international news) by not watching it. Get your information on-line from a trusted, non-biased source (there are some of them out there). This way, you can consume it when you want, and read interesting things to the depth you're comfortable.

It won't be like the baby food you're getting now, but I bet it'll be a lot more satisfying.

PS: Cap yourself at a half-hour a day on Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter. Your brain is a valuable thing to destroy.