Of beauty queens and lesser things . . .

A cloudy, rainy, thundery Saturday morning. Looks like I'll just have to sit on the sofa and drink coffee. Dang.

I watched my news shows last night and this morning. I am dealing with an addiction to cable news programming. But it is the week-end, and I went a little crazy. I was alone, which was a mistake. Of course, with an addiction to news programming, it it not surprising that I am alone a good bit.

Anyway, my personal issues aside, thank God for the Iranian elections. I never thought I would offer thanks of any kind to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but this morning, he may get a fruit basket. (If you haven't checked the news, Iran held elections yesterday. Ahmadinejad apparently won the election by a large margin, a margin that greatly exceeds the pre-election predictions, which has caused supporters of the opposition to fill the streets in protest.)

As a result, the news channels have reluctantly cut the coverage of Miss California losing her crown to about fifteen minutes each hour. That leaves only another fifteen minutes per hour to cover the history-changing feud between Sarah Palin and David Letterman.

The heart-wrenching saga of Miss California's rise and fall is a compelling story of a young woman (who just happens to look really nice in, or partially in, a bathing suit), who would not compromise her moral standards in answering a judge's question. That would be a beauty contest judge. Hers is a story that must be told . . . apparently over and over and over, along with her professional photographic portfolio.

And the Palin/Letterman controversy is central to the raging freedom of speech debate. Palin is on a noble quest to bring to the nation's attention the shocking revelation that late night television talk show hosts tell jokes that are in extremely poor taste. As a result, the terribly tasteless joke of which she complains has been re-broadcast over and over and over again, now in prime time, which is obviously not what Palin intended. In her attempt to raise the moral standard of public broadcast media she has inferred that David Letterman is a pedophile himself. What a breath of fresh air. Straight from the Alaskan wilderness.

So it is no wonder that the television news outlets, including the ratings leader Today Show that featured a Matt Lauer exclusive interview with Sarah Palin, have been able to let real reporters take vacations for the past week. (More likely unpaid leaves of absence). It is just not that hard to get the news from a politician and and a beauty queen who are looking for face-time on the tube.

But this morning, thankfully, there was rioting in the streets of Tehran. At last, something interesting enough to place that world changing election on equal footing with the sagas of two beauty queens scorned.

I do not mean to diminish the legitimate concerns of Palin and Prejean.

I do mean to diminish the editorial judgment of those whose job it is to determine what is news and what is not.

I guess the ratings guys pointed out that the public just won't watch a steady diet of real news about the economy, taxes, supreme court appointments, war and peace, social justice, and other such mundane matters.

Maybe the ex-Miss California should be in charge of the news. At least she didn't care what the judges thought.


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