Category Archives: The Contrarian

The Lean News Diet

Commercial “Breaks” as Depressing as the News | by Sherry McGuinn | The Top Shelf | Medium

Maravatío My father was a career newspaperman and would turn over in his grave at what I am about to say. But he was cremated, has no tombstone and never believed in the afterlife, so fuck it.

I’m cutting news from my brain diet.

Wait, that’s not completely true; I plan to cut at least 95% of my daily news intake. So I guess I’m going to try a lean news diet.

That means no CNN. No MSNBC. NO FOX.

But I plan to go further. No evening news. No local TV news. No 60 Minutes, Datelines or 20/20s. And, toughest, no late night comedians, who have become the informational standard bearers for liberal news addicts like me.

I had been considering a personal embargo for months, when it became clear that Trump’s ouster and covid’s vaccine were not going to change the tenor of news coverage.

Initially, I could forgive the fret fixation. After all, Trump attempted an insurrection and legally challenged the results of an election. Fairness dictated we tend to worrisome matters.

But then the story morphed into chronicling America’s Bottom Third — the 30 to 40% of U.S. citizens who have turned this era into a Golden Age of Ignorance. QAnoners, Flat Earthers, science deniers and election fraud hucksters became the day’s news narrative.

Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.

No. Enough visual junk food. Enough Fear News (it was never fake). I’m done renting worry.

The gamble here, of course, is the 95% reduction. My loose reasoning is based on what I learned on the cop and film beats: that important news — good and bad — filters naturally to people. Call it the theory of natural infection.

Someone got shot on your block? Your street will literally buzz with gossip. A series of break-ins in your neighborhood? Your next door neighbors are just as worried and probably clustering as threatened primates do. Global warming? A firefighter will tell you when you have to run for higher ground.

It works in the inverse, too. See a great movie? Read a fantastic book? What good is fantasm without someone to tell?

So, in that spirit:

Introducing the Lean News Diet! All the nutrients your brain needs for healthy, informed social interaction — without the bile and bitterness!

The Lean News Diet couldn’t be easier! Just turn off your TV, look only at the day’s headlines, and — Snap! — you’re done! IT’S THAT EASY!

But wait, there’s more! Order the Lean News Diet now, and we’ll double the order! That’s right, call in the next two minutes and you can turn your TV off TWICE!

Let’s see the Lean News Diet in action. These are actual headlines, not actors, unscrubbed from Apple News on the 20th anniversary of 9/11, a news day if ever there was one. See if you can complete the headline or predict the story just from the morsels of information in the Lean News Diet:

“Watch live: Biden marks 20th anniversary of 9/11 in New York, Pennsylvania a…” I’m going to go with “nd D.C.”

“End of eviction moratoriums adds urgency for 3.5 million Americans behind on rent.” Extra! Extra! America urgenter!

“Georgia college faculty, frustrated by lack of COVID…” hmmm, balloons?

“As young talents flee, Afghanistan faces a dying arts…” I’ll guess any word here except “district.” That folded in downtown Kabul during the hedge fund scandal of ‘08.

THE LEAN NEWS DIET! You watch what’s going into your body. Watch what’s going into your brain!

Order now! Operators are standing by — and very worried about it.
(Offer not valid in Mississippi, Alabama, Texas and other American Bottom Third states.)

The Lesson of Afghanistan



It’s hard to avoid newscaster parallels between our mad scramble to get out of Afghanistan and our mad scramble to get out of Vietnam.

After all, troops are sprinting to helicopters. Residents are clinging to departing aircraft — and dying in the plunge down. A country curses our name for promising safety in the face of tyranny.

But any comparisons of war strategy, troop movement or foreign presence need to stop with the period of this sentence. Because the lesson of Afghanistan is not the lesson of Vietnam (assuming either can be reduced to a singular moral).

Ken Burns’ 10-part series on Vietnam underscored the threat of exporting morality. Namely, the American lifestyle.

Afghanistan is a lesson on importing morality. Namely, religion.

Theists will cry in protest, I know. I think I can hear them now, just under the shrill din of anti-vaxers. Those are Muslims, not Christians, I hear them caterwaul. And what about Hindus and Buddhists, you ignorant slut?

To which I say, good question. But did you have to ask it so rudely? Asshole.

What was I saying? Oh yeah! Lesson.

This is the lesson. Religion poisons everything. Everything.

Those people beating down the doors of Kabul? They are believers, like Christians. Those people enforcing their own mask mandate (in the form of burkas)? They think they know the word of God, like Jews. What we’re seeing are just jersey and coaching changes on Team Abraham.

And as for the Buddhists, the Hindus, and anyone else who believes the universe has your best interest in mind: You are part of the problem. That reasoning is why the the Earth overheats and why beatable diseases linger and grow. The debate is no longer about accountability; it’s about degree of complicity.

We are the lesson of Afghanistan.