Salad bar sting operations. It's so nice outside. Infrared motel room microbes. Deadly children's toys. And tortured segues to the weatherman that make the Jerry Lewis Telethon seem as if scripted by Shakespeare by himself.
Local news is the disease.
To be fair, people within the media have been fighting the good fight against hype, chit-chat and luridness for years. To be unfair, their feebleness just might shock you. Legions of academics and committees of concerned journalists including an outfit called the Committee of Concerned Journalists would like to bring back to TV news the values embodied in men like Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite. Potter is the executive director of Newslab, a non-profit organization that works with local TV stations. Her conversations with news viewers played well with the Columbia crowd, yet they're not backed up by evidence.