Why The Blog Exists

I'm a middle-aged man. I grew up in New York City and have now lived in eight states. A few years ago, I moved to the Oregon Coast. Our "local" TV news comes from Portland (I put "local" in quotes because we are about two hours away from Portland; it's the nearest large city so we get all the stations from there on cable and by satellite).

KPTV is Channel 12 in Portland. It is a Fox affiliate which has the only 10 PM news show in Portland. Put simply, KPTV's 10 o'clock news show is THE SINGLE WORST TV "news" show I have ever seen. It is particularly embarassing for the product of a major market TV station.

On any given night, KPTV's 10 o'clock news is a cornucopia of stories designed to frighten the viewer into believing that they are in constant danger from criminals who want to break into their homes, rape their women and pets, smoke crack and steal their identities, punctuated by stories about pseudo-scientific nonsense and celebrity puff pieces seemingly torn from the pages of Star magazine.

It is a rare night when KPTV gets more than 10 minutes into their "news" show without a crime story featuring a man on the street or neighbor of the victim "speaking out" (one of KPTV's favorite phrases--no one ever just "talks" on Planet KPTV) about how "you don't expect that in this neighborhood." That exact phrase or slight variations on it appears on almost every KPTV 10 o'clock "news" show. This is, of course, designed to make the viewer believe that no one is ever safe anywhere and that he better watch this abortion disguised as "news" every night to keep up on the latest alleged threat to his liberty and security.

When KPTV isn't trying to frighten its viewers into thinking that meth smoking rapists/identity thieves are freely roaming the streets of the Portland suburbs (like reanimated corpses from Night Of The Living Dead), it's wasting time which could be better spent on informing the audience about the REAL issues in America by breathlessly "reporting" on which contestant was just voted off American Idol or showing tape of the fans lined up outside a theater waiting for the new Star Wars movie to open. Only a cynic (or observant viewer) would point out that American Idol airs on KPTV or that the Star Wars movies are produced by Fox, with whose network KPTV is affiliated. The industry term for this sort of thing is "cross-promotion"; a less charitable term would be "whoring out your news show."

As if content scraped from the bottom of the barrel isn't enough to make KPTV's "news" an embarassment, the actual production of the show easily rivals it. It is a rare night indeed when the 10 o'clock "news" show on KPTV manages to get through an entire hour without a technical snafu. I have made something of a game out of watching the show with one eye on the clock, checking to see how soon the first screw-up occurs. Since I have been keeping track, the record is three seconds.

"Chyron" is the name of the machine which creates the text you see on the screen during a news show. Chyron errors are as common on KPTV's 10 o'clock "news" show as white people at a Republican convention. My wife and I have long suspected that KPTV had interns operating the technical equipment for their show. This was confirmed a while back when they wasted some valuable time with a "behind the scenes at the 10 o'clock news" segment, showing an intern operating--wait for it!--the Chyron.

A Chyron machine is far from the most difficult-to-operate machine in television production; one might think, however, that a TV "news" show on a station in a major market would want to at least make the attempt to look professional. TV is, after all, a mostly visual medium. Saving money by not paying competant people to operate critical equipment, however, is apparantly MUCH further up KPTV's list of priorities than creating a show that isn't an embarassment to all concerned.

So What Pushed Me Over The Edge?

I've been threatening for some time now to create a site chronicling the continuing desecration of the "news" represented by KPTV's 10 o'clock show. Tonight's show finally pushed me over the edge.

It was 10:37 PM. My wife spoke out (to use KPTV's favorite euphemism for "said"). "Hey, shouldn't the weather be on now? Did I miss it?"

She was right. The usual format is that the weather segment starts at 10:32 or 10:33. She hadn't missed it. What was KPTV airing in place of the usual start of the weather? A story about "cyber bullies" (whatever the hell THEY are). Yeah, it's crap disguised as news, but even that wouldn't be enough to make me finally take the step of creating this blog. After all, it's exactly the same kind of crap they populate their "news" show with seven nights a week.

No, what finally pushed me over the edge is the fact that THEY HAD AIRED THE EXACT SAME SEGMENT THE NIGHT BEFORE. Yes, the same story about "cyber bullies" which had aired on KPTV's "news" show the previous night was being aired again with no changes whatsoever. This was not an "update"; it was the exact same story! KPTV's "news" department has now voyaged beyond the mere airing of crap to the uncharted New World of repeating the same crap twenty-four hours later. Apparantly, they can't even be bothered to come up with NEW garbage.

The weather finally came on at 10:40, after KPTV stopped treading water with the latest entry in their never-ending parade of fear-mongering stories. By the time the "meteorologist" commenced contradicting his previous night's forecast, I made a decision. These circus clowns had to be exposed for the fake "journalists" they are. This blog is the result of that decision.

What This Blog Is Going To Be

I am going to make an attempt to post every day (or as close to it as I can) and chronicle the mistakes, crap, lies and nonsense with which KPTV fills its 10 o'clock "news" show on a nightly basis. I will list the inaccurate and misleading information they put on the air along with their technical screw-ups. My hope is that others who watch the show will contribute to this blog via messages.

What's The Point Of This?

I believe that the American public is entitled to accurate information. The survival of participatory democracy depends on the public being accurately informed about the issues of the day. Unfortunately, a majority of Americans report that they get all or most of their information from TV news shows and/or late-night talk show monologues. As TV news is perhaps the worst source for accurate and comprehensive information, this is unfortunate. Where Americans get their news from doesn't seem likely to change any time in the near future, however, so the least we can do is demand that our TV news shows give us accurate information about important stories. I'm hoping that I can contribute to this effort via shaming KPTV into doing a better job in the near future by exposing the poor job they do now.

It is my hope that others will follow my example by creating similar blogs about bad "news" shows in other markets. Local TV news shows are a large source of profit for their stations. The least they can do is make the effort to give their audiences accurate information about important issues.