CNN: The Corrupt News Network

Tim Rutten, media critic at the LA Times, has an insightful -- and incisive -- commentary about the recent CNN-YouTube Rethug debate:

THE United States is at war in the Middle East and Central Asia, the economy is writhing like a snake with a broken back, oil prices are relentlessly climbing toward $100 a barrel and an increasing number of Americans just can't afford to be sick with anything that won't be treated with aspirin and bed rest.
So, when CNN brought the Republican presidential candidates together this week for what is loosely termed a "debate," what did the country get but a discussion of immigration, Biblical inerrancy and the propriety of flying the Confederate flag?

Read the whole thing and see if you agree with him. They spent the whole first part of the debate discussing immigration, an issue that maybe 10% of the populace considers the top issue facing the US.

And why would they do this? One simple reason: Ratings. Lou Dobbs, the neopopulist/neonativist has made it his signature issue, and CNN is losing ratings to MSNBC. The more they can fire up the great unwashed television audience on this essentially made-up issue, the more people will stay tuned into CNN.

Rutten thinks that's corrupt.

And he's right.