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CNN: Not as bad as you might think
Yeah, yeah, I know.
It's easy to bash CNN, but how many of us have actually sat down and watched it? I will admit that I *rarely* watch CNN, partly because (a) I rarely watch TV at all! and (b) the general image of CNN being a propaganda machine.
And yet, today in a rare moment of bored channel-surfing, I landed on CNN and watched a few minutes of it. There was an interview of sorts, actually one of those "ask 2 experts for their opinions at the same time on a controversial topic and let them eat each other's heads off." The 'controversial topic' was, you guessed it, Iraq.
Basically there was a pro- side and an against- side. The pro- side was from some woman in Washington, forgot her name or what she does. The against- side was from some talk show host, forgot his name, but probably a somewhat well-known figure otherwise why would he be on CNN?
Anyway, this guy was going completely nuts. He was openly saying stuff like, "My opinion of the Bush administration's stance on Iraq? Actually I don't have much of an opinion of Bush ever since he stole the election," and spewing out most of the bigger anti-Bush ideas. He openly denied the existence of any WMD's in Iraq, called the "proof" of WMD's "utter bull", and just generally caused a ruckus. It was great fun! And the best part was that the interviewer was completely neutral and did not participate at all. He addressed both sides with equal gravity and respect - I was impressed. At one point I was rubbing my eyes and looking in the corner of the screen to see if it really said "CNN" there or if I was watching some weirdo conspiracy theory channel I had somehow found myself in. 
Anyway I just want to say that prior to those 10 minutes, all I thought of CNN was that it just consisted of stories fed to it by Washington, "the hawks," and the Pentagon. Although that may or may not be true to some extent, at least I saw that there is some semblance of journalism in CNN and it might not be so bad as I had originally thought.
Funny, while the talk show host was presenting his views, I was half expecting to see men in black suits come in and haul him away, or for "technical difficulties" to arise, or something of the sort. Thankfully there were no disruptions. 
Thoughts/comments?
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