Wednesday, April 18, 2007

On his blog today, Colin McEnroe wrote about the lengths " B-List " pundits go to get face time on MSNBC. Columnists and bloggers want to get that call to appear on screen and mouth off about the news scoop du jour.

And now we learn that the Virginia Tech shooter sent a video and pages of his writing to NBC. And will be getting very much face time on NBC Nightly News this evening. The reports I'm seeing as I write this are that Cho sent the materials to NBC after the first shooting on the Virginia Tech campus and before the second one in which 30 more people were killed.

Since this story broke I've been dreading seeing the shooter's face plastered all over the covers of Time and Newsweek. I haven't seen that yet. An hour from now, we'll all be seeing the TV equivalent of making the cover of Time and Newsweek. I know, I know. It's news. It's huge. The worst mass murder in U.S. history. But for someone like that getting that kind of attention, that kind of face time.

I majored in journalism. Was a reporter. I know that the news business is not about NOT telling us stuff, showing us stuff. But I feel really uncomfortable about how this shooter is getting his shot at the big time tonight.

I'm really concerned that he's made that pundit A-List. Shot to the top of that list. And, of course, how he did it. What lengths he went to to get to this point. Guy had something to say and now he's king of the hill. Talk about disturbing. And like MSNBC's Chris Matthews, I'm reminded of the videos those middle eastern suicide bombers make, just before they blow themselves up.

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