February 25, 2003 From: Jennifer Jane Leitham February 21, 2003 One of the ramifications of my newly scaled down simplified existence has been the weeding out of a lot of the luxuries of modern life. Probably the thing I miss the least is cable television. Paying a monthly fee for the privilege of being bombarded by 24 hour corporate news channels, bad movies, overblown sporting events driven by highlight reel coverage instead of real skill and teamwork, vapid self-serving entertainment reporting,( not to mention the incessant commercials), makes it easy to cross cable TV watching off my list of worthwhile activities. While in the hospital for my most recent round of surgery on the comeback trail I was delighted to find that cable TV would be my companion once again. Being a captive audience, a little too groggy and pained to read or write, I settled in to check out the latest news regarding the coming cataclysm in the Middle East. Secretary of State Colin Powell had delivered an important speech at the United Nations a day earlier. President Bush just appeared on the screen at the White House. Breaking news. It looked like something important was going to happen. I was watching CNN. Faced with the problem of reaching an audience possessing increasingly short attention spans, most of the "news" networks have resorted to a teletype scroll across the bottom of the picture that gives the viewer something to do when the talking head on screen is too boring. The President of the United States was about to make an announcement that could plunge the world into war. Across the teletype scroll an extremely important announcement rolled by that told the world that a hockey player was going to miss tonight's game because of an injured groin. Could you imagine the impact from 1941 to the present if when FDR gave his address to Congress and the world about the "Day Of Infamy" there was a banner behind (or scrolling under) informing us all about a hockey player's groin? Maybe our problem today is that we don't take the "News" seriously. How is it possible when it's presented in such a fashion? News outlets have become mere shills to the entertainment and cyber conglomerates that own them. Is there a way to bring the arts into the mix? Symphony orchestras are floundering across North America because of a lack of funding. It's made worse because of a lack of appreciation for art forms that require education to understand their depth and expressiveness. I don't even want to rant about the state of Jazz. It hurts sometimes. At the same time, people filled with performance enhancing substances are reaping insanely huge rewards for "athletic" prowess while playing at sports that have devolved into putting the individual above the team. Major movie musicals are being cast with people who can't sing or dance. "Musicians" are reaping huge rewards not for playing but actually splicing already recorded music together and calling themselves artists. I guess art is in the eye of the beholder. As is news. The cameras roll. We're going to war. Let's watch a hockey player's groin. Jennifer Leitham February 21, 2003