Saturday, June 25, 2005

I remembered something Saturday. A while back, KPTV used to have a guy (whose name slips my mind at the moment) who they called their "Washington bureau." He did stories about the federal government, usually while standing on the National Mall in D.C. with the Capitol Building behind him.

Yeah, although they pulled their usual "KPTV's So and So" crap when he was really a guy who made a living by selling segments to several stations around the country (I found that out by Googling his name, back when I remembered it), at least they make an attempt to put something with a national perspective on their air. He seems to have vanished from KPTV's 10 o'clock "news" show some months ago. Too bad. I guess there's just no room for something like that inbetween the stories about pederasts and ID thefts. Oh well.

Top Story: Wild Chase. A car thief shot at a cop and crashed the car he was driving. "Terry," the owner of a car the crook hit and damaged, was pissed, understandably. "Reporter" David Frietas used something that looked like part of a hubcap as his prop for this story.

Meth Watch. Randy Hendricks is going bye-bye. Meth. Oh, KPTV finally got around to telling us that the Oregon legislature passed that bill making cold medicines with pseudoephdrine available only to those with prescriptions.

A hiker from Washington state died in Oregon.

A hiker from Parts Unknown (as they used to say in pro wrestling) died in Southern Oregon.

Milking the story about the boy who died in the park in Salem one more time, KPTV told us that his mother and father held separate memorial services for him Saturday. Get the feeling there's something of a backstory here?

We next got a story about Tae-Kwon-Do self-defense classes for kids held in Wilsonville. They also hand out pamphlets about "What To Do Just In Case" and DNA kits. Jesus, what are we teaching our kids about the world around them? Yeah, bad stuff happens from time to time but sheesh.

I grew up in the Bronx, New York City and this reminds me of the time I visited my cousins in southern Illinois. Some of their friends asked me, with straight faces, how many times I had been mugged. They seemed shocked when I informed them that I had never been mugged and that neither had most people in New York City. If there is an evil to what KPTV does with its steady diet of blood and guts, it's to create the same kind of impression my cousins' friends had--that violent crime is out of control, getting worse with each passing day, that we are all in constant danger and must protect ourselves by any means necessary. That's just wrong.

A local priest is going to work at the Vatican and some folks want to know what he knows about child abuse in the Portland area by his peers before he leaves the U.S.

Toxic algae has been found in Hills Creek Reservoir. Oooo-wee-oooo [imagine a theramin like on a science-fiction soundtrack]

There was a "micro-earthquake" beneath Portland on Saturday. It measured 2.7 on the Richter scale.

Northwest Tonight

*The mayor of Spokane, Washington is in trouble. Gee, no kidding? KPTV largely ignored this story when it was white-hot and for some reason, tonight they mentioned it.

*Some dogs in Beaverton were attacked by a "beaver-like animal," believed to be a nutria, one of the larger members of the rodent family.

*A couple of baby hawks were rescued in Washington state.

And that, my friends, are the most important stories in the Great Northwest tonight.

Break.

America Tonight

*Fatal shark attack in Florida!

*The 3 missing boys in Camden, New Jersey were determined to have been accidentally asphyxiated in a car trunk. Oh, this story was brought to us by "KPTV's Rebecca Gomez."

*Again we were told about that team of volunteer searchers from Texas who are in Aruba to help look for Natalee Holloway, the missing attractive young white woman.

*A car some men were working on in Detroit slipped into reverse, shot across the street, went through a fence and hit a little girl.

*A small plane crashed in York County, Pennsylvania.

*A train derailed in Texas.

*A state trooper in Illinois forced a couple he pulled over to strip naked. Oh, this is the second time he's done that this year. Must be a strong police union in that state, huh?

*There was a shooting during a bank robbery in Oklahoma City. Does it seem to anyone else that there has been an increasing number of bank robberies lately? Why, it's almost as it the economy isn't quite as good as the administration claims! Nah, couldn't be.

*A monkey attacked a fast food worker at a drive-through in Kentucky. The owner said it had been her "privilege" to live with a monkey for the past year. O-kay.

*Catfish are crossing the road in Florida. To get to the other side, I assume.

World Tonight

*Deadly flooding in Beijing has claimed several people.

*Some yutz covered himself with bees in Ireland to try to make the Guinness Book. As he "only" managed to get a quarter-million bees on himself, he failed in his quest. Damn, I hate it when that happens!

And that, my friends, is the most important stuff that happened in the hundreds of countries on Planet Earth today.

Break.

Fight For Iraq

*A suicide bomber killed 6 people. 8 more died in another attack.

*A female National Guard soldier got a Silver Star.

War On Terror

*Some members of Congress went to Guantanamo to see how bad it is or isn't there for our prisoners. We were told that things there had improved of late. So, they were bad, contrary to what the administration has been saying?? I'm so confused.

*There's a crackdown going on to catch people with illegal licenses. Arrests were made in 4 states. We got the obligatory warning about how Al Qaeda *could* be using fake licenses to do unspecified bad stuff. Yeah, maybe, but isn't it a good idea in general to get people with fake licenses off the road, without invoking hypothetical terrorists?

Break.

We got another story about people using 911 for non-emergency situations. So, uh, don't do that at home, kids. Find out your local non-emergency number.

Weather. Break.

Final Cut

*There are kids who call themselves "Straight Edge," meaning that they don't use alcohol or drugs (my daughter is one of them, for the record). This is usually considered a good thing. For some reason, cops in Reno, Nevada and Utah are saying that Straight Edgers are a "street gang." It seems that some Straight Edge kids have gotten into fights, so that makes them a "gang." This story was brought to us by "KPTV's Claudia Cowan" who of course doesn't actually work for KPTV. She also said she was in San Francisco, which is interesting, given that the story was about Nevada and Utah.

*The state of Oregon is cracking down on speeders who exceed 100 MPH by imposing big fines of up to $1000. "Reporter" David Frietas was back, trading his hubcap for a set of car keys as the prop for this story. Oh, this was kind of funny: I happened to notice that one of the monitors in the KPTV "news" van behind Dave was set to another station. So, even the crew can't stand KPTV's "news" show either, huh?

Hollywood Buzz

*"KPTV's Bill McCuddy" (gee, they have a large staff, don't they?) gave us an absolutely vital story about Tom Cruise's ex-wife Nicole Kidman and his current squeeze Katie Holmes "having a feud." Uh, no, not exactly. The "feud" amounted to the fact that both women have movies currently in theaters. Yup, that was it. No evidence of bad blood between them at all, even if that did constitute "news" in some way.

As if to prove that TV news is completely irony-free, the piece concluded with Steven Spielberg talking about how gossip amounted to people trying to leech a living from the fame of others, like Tom Cruise. Nothing like indicting yourself within your own story, huh, "KPTV's Bill McCuddy"?

*Jamie Foxx has been invited to become a member of the Motion Picture Academy.

*Supermodel Elle McPherson is single again. At last, my chance has arrived!

*The Live 8 concerts on July 2 are "available" to something like 5 billion people. I would point out that being "available" doesn't mean that anywhere near that number of people will watch or listen to them.

*Monday is World Refugee Day. Damn, I didn't buy a card! Anyway, there was some kind of diversity celebration at Portland State University and KPTV was there. Judging from the carefully-chosen camera angles, it was very sparsely attended. I really hate when TV news shows do that. If there's a small crowd at an event, that's part of the story, says me. Show it as it is for better or worse.

Lastly, the American Cancer Society held a "Relay For Life," whatever that is. I gathered that people, some of them cancer survivors, ran around a track. I'm assuming that people donated money depending on how many laps they ran or something. Sorry, I get a little numb to details after being barraged with the doom 'n' gloom and celebrity irrelevancy of the KPTV 10 o'clock "news" show.

WHAT KPTV DIDN'T TELL YOU ABOUT TONIGHT (a sampling):

*Hey, KPTV schmucks, might it be prudent to tell your audience that the ultra-conservative mayor of Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has won Iran’s presidential election run-off?

*Oh, how about the fact that the airport in Baghdad is closed indefinitely?

*The IRS may have lost information on millions of taxpayers. You didn't hear about that on KPTV. There was that fast-breaking story about the non-existant Kidman-Holmes "feud" taking up valuable air time instead.

*Oh, I probably shouldn't even bother to mention it but the Supreme Court ruled that local governments can seize your land to make room for private development! Jesus H. Christ!! Nah, no news value in that story!

*If they felt they had to do a Tom Cruise-related story, why didn't they talk about how he went kind of nuts on the Today Show on Friday, arguing with co-host Matt Lauer about psychoactive drugs. Cruise, a member of the Scientology cult, is against the use of the medications.

*How about the fact that pressure from members of Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, is increasing on President Bush to announce a timetable for troop withdrawal in Iraq? That sound like a story to you losers?

*OR how about Congress defying the administration by giving the Corporation for Public Broadcasting the money Bush wanted to deny it?

Hey, Channel 12 "news" people: Here's a tip for you--some stories don't come to you via the police scanner!