View From the Bushes

I'm kind of a political junky and I've been very interested in the Democractic presidential primaries. The nine candidates (eight, if Mosley-Braun drops out like people are saying) are all fascinating, though that's not necessarily a good thing. The first primary is the Iowa caucus on Monday and I'm intensely curious who's going to come out on top, though it will mean little since the Iowans are actually pretty bad at predicting the eventual nominee and many candidates have chosen to skip Iowa.

Of course, the question is why (other than temporal proximity) do I bring it up? Lately I've been watching a lot of The Daily Show (with Jon Stewart). It's freaking hilarious, but that's not the point. I've been wondering recently about the rise of "fake news." There's The Daily Show, The Onion, and at least a half a dozen other satirical news websites. I'm no expert on the history of news satire, but it seems quite a bit more prevelant than it was historically.

My theory on this is currently incredibly rudimentary, but I think Generation X (which seems to comprise the core demographic of The Daily Show at least) has been so saturated with media, most of it fictitious, that they only appreciate media when it's pesented in a surreal quasi-serious fashion. Like I said, it's rudimentary, but I think there's something there.

Carpe Diem Quam Minimum Credula Postero
Ross