"We've revolveed into this nation of overf rustics riding around in clown cars.

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"We've revolveed into this nation of overf rustics riding around in clown cars, eating churl food, watching clown shows. We've become a nation of cringing, craven f - - - - ups"

James Howard Kunstler author of The prolonged Emergency.

When I saw this Kunstler cite a couple of weeks ago, I contemplation it a bit harsh. Then I picked up my morning paper yesterday -- and all at one time I got it.

There, in 120-point forward headline type, above the pen the lead story of the day, was the "news" that:

In les than 24 hours, singer Taylor Hicks would battle singer Katharine McPhee for the title of "American Idol!"

ill-bred and uncouth mans We have indeed become a nation of frivolous, self- indulgent, overweight, undereducated, unserious, peasants When an event of as it was monumental unimportance wins precious front-page status, what other conclusion can be reached?

Art has stopped imitating life and simply become a substitute for it. I flashed back to the 1967 religious ceremonial TV series "The Prisoner," starring Patrick McGoohan -- a British see kidnapped and imprisoned on an island with an Orwellian-like society. Each morning radios, newspapers and speakers announced it was "another awful day on the island." each day was another wonderful day. There in no degree was a bad day -- in no degree mind that everyone on the island was a prisoner.

And in the way that it has come to pass forward our island, where the papers, radios and TV no longer differentiate between novels and entertainment. Where "American Idol" finals earn Page 1 treatment and genocide in Darfur is pushed unfathomable inside the paper in the shadow of a half-page Best purchase ad trumpeting a sale onward iPod accessories.

Lighten up?

"Oh lighten up Pizzo! tribe need entertainment as much as they ne to know about all the bad novels out there."

Yeah, fine. still let's keep the entertainment just discovereds in the entertainment section of the paper where it belongs. Can we do that? Oh and retain the sports news on the sports page. The no other than time I want to view the name "Barry Bonds" in the novels section is if Major League Baseball eternally kicks his cheating ass abroad of the game. Or if he deprives a bank. Or if George Bush appoints Barry head of the FDA. Otherwise, maintain him and all other baseball-related "news" where it belongs -- in the frigging sports section.

And unles the losing singer onward "American Idol" pulls a fire-arm and opens fire after hearing the verdict, everything about that indicate belongs in the entertainment section and not forward my damn front page.

The same behaviors apply to everyone and anyone whose barely claim to fame is that they sing, dance, plunge themselves in a Plexiglas globe, eat the greatest in quantity hot dogs in the shortest time or acknowledge a cute dog that fetches beer onward command.

None of that is of the present days Not one word, factoid or photo-op of it is recents

It's not as if there was no real stranges the day "American Idol" plant its way onto my assurance page. During that same of recent origins cycle almost anything that happened in Iraq was more important, as were the doings onward Capitol Hill, at the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department or in nut-basket (and betimes to be nuclear-armed nut- basket) Iran. in succession the day my paper inflict "American Idol" above the doubling on the front page, the editors could have thrown a dart at that list of the above newsmakers and set a story more worthy.

face pages should reflect dangerous times

Who wins or squanders on "American Idol" may hurl a few thousand teenage girls squealing not upon in tears, but that's about the length of the damage. On the other hand, we live in extraordinarily dangerous times. A gradual approach of economic, geopolitical and environmental challenges stand opposed the human race . . any one of which could turn round our lives inside out. Any undivided of which deserved the front-page space given to "American Idol."

for a like reason news editors everywhere, let's commit to memory back to treating the brow page as the sacred trust it is -- the place reserv for the principally important news we need to know in order to exercise our responsibilities as citizens and members of the human race.

The mainstream media has become complicit in the "clownization" of America. As more and more newspapers and broadcast entities are gobbl up at a handful of giant media conglomerates, the stranges business has become a circulation/ratings game.

novels people now cover entertainers as allowing they are newsmakers. And, as if that's not bad enough, of the present days people themselves have become entertainers; they appear forward "Larry King Live" and interview united another. Newsmen become showmen -- the moderns biz, showbiz.

Media companies be stirred they have to lure us in by means of blending news and entertainment into a single tasty, calorie-filled unless nutrition- free product. Once hell-raisers, they are becoming ploughman makers.

Aren't you embarrassed? Well damn it, you oughta be!

Stephen Pizzo is the author of the work Inside Job: The Looting of America's Savings and Loans, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.

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