American TV

One of Juan Cole’s posts really got me wondering about TV or at least American Television. He asks why can’t we get BBC over here? With all our channels we seem to be limited to extent we see what the rest of the world sees. It would be great to have a channel or two devoted to what the rest of the world sees.

But that would mean Americans would be exposed to things outside their bubble and would be dangerous for this administration.

Here’s a part of Cole’s post:

Fine reporters such as Nic Roberts at CNN will set up brief clips of a Jaafari press conference or a short Q & A on a particular issue with an Iraqi official. But on the hour-long t.v. news magazines, or even just with the anchors during the day, we never see so much as an extended interview with Ibrahim Jaafari. Isn't that weird? The real UK BBC will do an hour-long interview with an Iraqi cabinet minister like Ali Allawi. But our television news almost never talks to anyone among important Iraqi politicians, with the possible exception of the Kurdish politician Jalal Talabani, the mostly ceremonial president of Iraq. Aren't the Iraqi politicians who have come to power in the celebrated purple-thumb Iraqi elections worth talking to? Don't Americans care what they think? Or are they just a blank set of canvases on which Kansas gets to paint its own preconceptions and prejudices (a process made all the easier if real Iraqis are not allowed to speak on camera to Americans)? And, with all these cable channels and satellite capabilities, why can't we see the real BBC in America? I mean, I can watch French and Italian and Egyptian and Lebanese channels. I'm not even being offered by my satellite company the possibility of the real BBC. Isn't that weird? There are so many weird things. The upshot is that if you don't have Joe Scarborough's profile, you don't get seen or hea