Merge news and reality television?

Last week I proposed merging two popular syndication formats.

Today I'd like to propose merging Sunday morning news shows and Reality TV. It would go like this. At any time the person being interviewed, say on Meet The Press, could press a button and the show would switch into Reality Mode. In this mode, the reporter would have to stick to asking questions about things that are really happening. In this mode, anything the subject said wouldn't be scrutinized for hints of reality sneaking in, in fact the opposite would happen, he would lose points if he said something clueless or obviously untrue. With a special twist, the subject could turn any question back to the interviewer, who would have to answer the question under the same terms. This would help keep the questions grounded in reality (which is somewhat the point).

For example, on today's Meet The Press, the interviewer, Tim Russert, kept banging on Massachusetts senator Edward Kennedy about his use of the term "bribery" to describe how the Bush administration was creating alliances. In the new upgraded news system, Kennedy would hit the button and Russert would have to answer his own question. "Well Tim if it's not bribery, what would you call it?" (Note that Kennedy almost did this.)

Another example. When Vice-president Cheney says in a speech that if Kerry had had his way there would still be death squads in Iraq, if the subject came up in Reality Mode, he'd have to explain exactly why that's our problem, and what the hell are we supposed to do about it anyway. Remember when people used to complain about the cost of going to the moon. They'd say let's solve our problems at home first. Exactly. And by the way, Cheney didn't say things are better in Iraq, only that Hussein is gone and his death squads are too. The void they've created is (remember we're in Reality Mode) certainly as bad as he was, probably much worse.

Here's another idea that would add a dose of reality to the talk shows. Add a requirement that the interviews happen only in the place they're talking about. So if Cheney wanted to talk about how great everything is in Iraq, he could do that, but he'd have to say it in Iraq. Russert would have to go there too.

Anyway, at one point I thought Kennedy was going to break down and just tell the truth. He's an old guy, a boozer for sure, and he was having trouble walking the walk of Washington where you have to carefully not say anything while somehow conveying some information in code that some voter somewhere understands. Like Jack Nicholson in As Good As It Gets, he might just say Aw fuckit, this is so exhausting, let me just talk for a while, okay?"

Some day...

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