Apr 17, 2007

The media swarm

My local NBC affiliate has been running commercials all morning about how they have their own correspondent down in Blacksburg to cover the Virginia Tech massacre. This enables them to give "in-depth" coverage of the event. I saw the guy's report and he had nothing to report, which is to say he knew no more than anyone else down there: The gunman killed himself; police haven't yet released his name and 33 are dead as a result of his actions.

In the meantime, local reporters who stayed put are scouring the area for a local angle to the massacre. About the best they could do was to find a local alumnus whose son attends Virginia Tech. The son's roommate, or friend--they seem to be unclear on that--was shot in the leg. They aired a very brief clip of an interview the gunshot victim gave to someone, followed by the reporter explaining that the friend of the son of the local alumnus was fine. She seemed rather peeved about it. Too bad she couldn't get a dead friend or roommate of the son of a local alumnus.

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