[speaker001:] how do you get your current events are you a po couch potato or
[speaker002:] well actually no uh it's it's multifaceted for me since I'm married to a news junkie
[speaker001:] oh is that right
[speaker002:] uh yeah we we get the you know about three papers a day plus there's four different newscasts that we watch and of course if there's nothing else um worth doing or watching on television we'll watch either headline news or CNN itself and uh plus I'm a member of a an electronic community and I get a lot of news that way so uh
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] it's really pretty hard to not be informed
[speaker001:] that's right yeah
[speaker002:] how about yourself
[speaker001:] well I start out the day listening to the radio on my you know as I'm getting ready for work and in the evenings and and I'm in a vacuum all day except what news I get electronically we have uh electronic news at work
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] uh the lunch table discussion usually brings up a few things that people have seen in the paper that morning and I haven't had time to read
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker001:] and uh some more radio on the way home and it's usually too late to watch the news by the time I get home but I can uh read the newspaper then the morning news of course
[speaker002:] um-hum and of course everything's changed by that time and
[speaker001:] and oh of course of course and then uh the ten o'clock news at bedtime
[speaker002:] um-hum
[speaker001:] so that's about it I don't have cable TV now I used to do like you did and the default was CNN
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] you know and I could just I'd have that thing going for hours
[speaker002:] yeah they really have some fascinating stuff especially on the weekends uh we kind of uh we kind of like CNBC I don't know if you've ever seen it but it's a it's a cable well you don't have cable cable NBC
[speaker001:] hum
[speaker002:] and it's sort of like uh National Public Radio on cable television
[speaker001:] oh wow
[speaker002:] so they go into all sorts of neat little off the wall kind of topics that you normally wouldn't get in uh in uh in a conventional news broadcast or even on CNN it's sort of like socketed little special interest kinds of things and it's really fascinating to see you know they're out there covering it um one thing I wanted to ask you about was the you're you said you're in Dallas the quality of your local papers do you do you see
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] pandering because
[speaker001:] well the the most noticeable thing about our two local papers is that we now have one local paper
[speaker002:] uh no
[speaker001:] The The Times Herald went out of business it was always the weak sister of the two
[speaker002:] okay
[speaker001:] uh and the Morning News uh managed somehow to acquire nearly all the comics and features that the Times Herald had been carrying
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] so I mean they just they just plundered the poor Times Herald I mean it was financial you can blame the syndicates for going where they're you know they got bigger bucks or whatever
[speaker002:] yeah well see we're a Gannett city
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] and uh the Democrat and Chronicles and Times Union are our papers and a a few years ago they merged editorial boards however they still continue to publish they put out three additions well it's actually DNC puts out two one in the morning And the Times Union puts out two but they're virtually the same paper
[speaker001:] um-hum
[speaker002:] there's an there's an evening edition which comes out at noon and and the late edition which comes out at three and just to give you an idea of what I meant by pandering it's like sometimes they their news for the news for the incredible stupid or comatose
[speaker001:] wow
[speaker002:] the past two days the headlines have been massive storm hits area and it's like
[speaker001:] in case you're brain dead
[speaker002:] well you know oh well that explains all the snow you know as if someone was worried about it I just you know I I have to wonder uh
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] uh how how well they're serving us because uh you you they've they've got a lock on it they don't there's not that many there's a few alternative newspapers but they all all the alternative newspapers have this sort of an underground feel to them
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] and you you know you really can't trust them they're not I I think I need conservatism from my news I don't know I'm funny
[speaker001:] yeah just the facts please
[speaker002:] yeah just the facts and and I don't want really much of a slant on it at all I just want the news
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] you know I don't want uh someone judging the news for me
[speaker001:] that one of the most famous headlines and I think this was on the editorial page and I don't remember it exactly of the Dallas Morning News was was some story about how well people can read and the fact that they can't and the headline was something like Let's Ban Literacy and wait a minute that sounds fine at first they want to ban illiteracy I think think
[speaker002:] I think so Let's Ban Literacy but that's going to put you guys out of business don't you think
[speaker001:] that's right