This just in from the Democratic National Convention: there are reports this morning that some of the balloons dropped last night after Senator John Kerry’s acceptance speech may have slowed his exit from the FleetCenter. It remains to be seen how this mix-up will affect the democratic candidate’s standing in the polls, but top campaign insiders say he won’t waste time making up the wasted time.

“John Kerry has always been a leader in times of hardship,” said Kerry’s mother. “He won’t let some balloons keep him from reporting for duty. He can do better. And HELP IS ON THE WAY!”

We’ll be covering these important developments and other equally important developments, such as the historical precedent for balloon-dropping, throughout the day.
Reporting live from Boston, this is Every News Media Outlet In Hysterics Over the Convention.

This week on the radio, on the internet, in the newspapers and in my living room, all I’ve seen is the very definition of non-news.

When a soap company sends out a press release saying that their product is better, stronger, and more ethically sound than all the others, it is generally considered (except in the most news-starved places) to be garbage. Literally garbage. These press releases accumulate on the fax-machine trays of newsrooms all over the country like pizza boxes on dorm-room countertops.

The Democratic National Convention and the upcoming Republican convention are such pizza boxes. News garbage; remnants of real news. To be sure, the national gathering of delegates to designate their presidential nominee has real news value. It only happens once every four years; there are sometimes dissenting factions within the party; and it’s the first real look the American public gets at the nominee.

But when the news media starts airing wall-to-wall coverage of an overblown political rally, it can mean only one thing: someone is taking a vacation.

Please, by all means, cover the candidates’ speeches. Go ahead, televise the remarks of important political figures (the Clintons, Barack Obama). Report on the views of the delegates and protesters and critics. All that, you may do, dear producers of the news-media, and my stomach-bile will remain unperturbed.

But this week has been too much. The swift-boat crewmates. The daughters. The wives. The friends. The convention is a public relations concoction. Everyone knows this. The politicians, the reporters, even the viewers know it. And yet there it is on my television: Move America Forward; Stronger at Home; A Tested Leader.

What does this stuff mean? Why is it news? Why do the conventions – moderately news-worthy at best, political publicity stunts at worst – deserve the kind of coverage they receive?

If the purpose is to present the candidates to the public, fine. Present the candidates. Televise their speeches, allow them to state their case. But if your goal is to let the public educate itself about the candidates, airing 15-minute campaign ads disguised as biography films is not the way to do it. Giving each candidate a huge chunk of the information spectrum to spew what is mostly vague, meaningless NON-NEWS is not the way to do it.

If those hours of television and radio time, those newspaper and Web pages were devoted to real reporting about the candidates’ records, their platforms, their actions and the results of their actions, that would be news-worthy. That would represent a real contribution to the voting public’s knowledge of the issues and the candidates.

Instead we see, for the most part, the news media descending on these non-news events like Flying Elvises on the plains of Las Vegas, if the plains were filled with lonely, topless dancers. And they treat the empty vacillations of the national parties like the real news that they’re not.

Why? I don’t know, maybe because it’s easy. Maybe they think that’s what people want to see.

And maybe it is.

But when I turn to the news and see nothing more than dressed-up press releases from the Kerry or Bush campaigns, all I want to do is turn it off. With all the balloons, confetti, and cheesy music, it starts looking a lot like the coronation of a prom king.

And to tell you truth, whether John Kerry or George Bush wins that honor, I couldn’t care less.

Update: I was just kidding with the balloon thing up top, but no sooner did I post it than I saw this (here’s the audio). What am I, psychic or something?

This entry was posted on Friday, July 30th, 2004 at 9:53 am and is filed under Journalism, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.