el crispito

I also have been watching some CNN, which is absolutely horrible. The effect it has seems to be like some anxiety inducing drug. It makes me angry, hateful and disgusted, mostly at the American idiots they keep showing on it. There is considerable evidence that the justification for the war in Iraq was fabricated, then used by both parties to freak Americans out, perhaps to lull them into apathy about being spied on by the government. Nobody nobody seems to care about that. Yet a congressman hits on a former page and everyone freaks out.

Not that such behavior isn't inappropriate, but it's depressing to me to see what the American media has become, and how it's used primarily as a platform for politicians to control the public, attack each other and re-write history. In defending the Republican cover-up of Mark Foley's inappropriate conduct with pages on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, Newt Gigngrich said, "I think, had they overly aggressively reacted to the initial round, they would have also been accused of gay bashing." On The Situation Room on CNN, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said, "it shouldn't be totally surprising when we hold up tolerance and diversity as the guidepost for public life. This is what you end up getting: a congressman chasing 16-year-old boys down the halls of Congress." Please.

To set the record straight, I've accused Republicans of being homophobic on numerous occasions, like when they repeatedly espouse that denying the same rights to gay couples to which heterosexual couples have access will somehow protect the 'institution of marriage' and that gays cannot openly serve in the armed forces because it makes heterosexuals uncomfortable. Also for the record, I've accused many, many Democrats of the same thing. Yet had the Republicans come out early to deal with the Foley scandal, I think everyone, gay and straight, would have felt it was appropriate to deal with it as the possible exploitation of minors by an adult. Many politicians are homophobes, but nobody calls them that for investigating allegations of pedophilia. Still, those folks are being allowed to say such things on television without their even being questioned.

Indeed, television has been a strange experience for me on my return to the United States. I get a little homesick when I see the Mexican government advertising here. The Secretaría de Turismo or SECTUR is running ads here for various Mexican cities: Guanajuato, Acapulco , Oaxaca, Queretaro, etc.

It's strange that between Cheaters and CNN, the ads on American television are much more enjoyable. Maybe that was the plan all along.