On the worship of ugliness :
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http://www.townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2007/02/22/rise_of_the_anti-hero
Rise of the Anti-Hero

By Cal Thomas
Thursday, February 22, 2007

"Anti-hero: A main character in a dramatic or narrative work who is
characterized by a lack of traditional heroic qualities, such as
idealism or courage."

Consider what occupies and diverts our attention from substantive
matters: Anna Nicole Smith; Britney Spears; the astronaut gone wild,
Lisa Nowak; the sleeping, dating, marital and divorce arrangements of
film stars. It is all about the base, the tawdry and the anti-heroic.
Today's heroes are cartoon characters and those (Superman, Batman, etc.)
are from another era in which real heroes mattered.

On Feb 22, 10:30 am, Sir Frederick fuzzysys.com> wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 10:30:54 -0800, Sir Frederick wrote:

become less popular..
http://www.whitedot.org/issue/iss_story.asp?slug=viewers_desert_tv1

what IS Thomas' real point? This topic has been done to death. The speech
by Edward R. Murrow in 1958..

http://www.rtnda.org/resources/speeches/murrow.shtml

being the high water mark, I would say.

There is a significant difference between Thomas and Murrow however.
Thomas blames viewers, Murrow blames producers.

This is the important issue but for another time maybe.

Thomas throws this out..

".. Sixty-one percent say they think the media overplayed the death of
Anna Nicole Smith, but 11 percent said they followed it as closely as the
2008 presidential campaign.. "

Huh? Ok, what IS going on since this does deeply under-mind his argument.
Could be the whole reason behind this article is his weeping over the lack
of 'hero' images, another topic done, done and re-done..