ShareThisBy RICK KUSHMAN
Thursday, October 26, 2006
We are in one of those stretches when it's excruciating to watch TV. I'm talking head-splitting, eye-poking, drop-a-brick-on-your-hand painful. And it won't stop until Election Day on Nov. 7.
It is unoriginal and trite to whine about the way political ads reach new detestable levels every election cycle, but, I'm telling you, this time around it's killing me.
Maybe it's because there's so much decent TV out there, and the IQ drop to any political spot is so steep. Maybe it's because the political conversation in America these days is so angry and mean-spirited that the ads are depressing reminders of our general incivility. And maybe it's just their own naked dishonesty.
In any case, I know there's nothing anyone can do _ who thought up free speech, anyway? _ but here are some suggestions for at least not getting sucked in.
First, ignore them all. Doesn't matter if you love/hate the candidate/proposition. There is nothing in the ads _ not a single syllable _ that is remotely useful for casting an informed vote. These are not about imparting information.
Everything in them _ the look, tone, pacing, music, lighting and, especially, word choice _ is manipulatively chosen to get emotional (usually angry) reactions.
Even the positive, image-building ads are bunk, of course. All the candidates hang with their perfect families, bathed in sunlight and playing with puppies. The negative ads say those candidates actually intend to block out that sun and eat those puppies.
Ads for or against initiatives use sneering phrases like "bureaucratic program," "corporate waste" and higher "taxes," "prices" or, I dunno, "blood pressure" _ whatever they think will tick you off most.
And that's the point of negative ads: to tick you off. Political consultants will tell you negative ads aren't designed to get you to vote for their candidates; they just want you to not vote for their opponent. In other words, people running for office are trying to get you not to vote. How patriotic.
Here's how to fight back. Turn them off. Hit the mute. Change the channel. Stick your fingers in your ears and scream. Anything to not watch. That way, they'll be wasting the millions they're spending for TV ads. It's a small thing, but it will make you feel better. Plus, it'll make watching TV way less irritating.
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Some programming reminders here.
First, NBC's "Las Vegas" finally returns for its season opener Friday (9 p.m. EDT), and a gunman is going after Big Ed (James Caan). I'm not saying if the bad guy succeeds, but, c'mon, no one messes with Big Ed, or James Caan. Anyway, "Las Vegas" is back.
"Crossing Jordan," however, is not back yet. NBC originally planned for it to return with "Las Vegas," but then "1 vs. 100" became a solid success (at 8 p.m.), so the game show is going to stick around for a while. "Jordan" will eventually return, sometime, somewhere, on the schedule, NBC says.
Also Friday night, we get the _ take a deep breath _ 40th anniversary of "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" (at 8). How is that possible? Forty flippin' years? Those kids don't look like they've aged a day, although I do hear Snoopy's eating the more gentle, older-dog food these days.
Besides the dogfight with the Red Baron and Linus' adventure in a most sincere pumpkin patch, this is the one that gave us one of the most enduring touchstone lines: "I got a rock."
And for more frightening Halloweenlike creeps, Showtime Friday night starts Season Two of its 13-week anthology series, "Masters of Horror" (at 10).
Each week, directors like John Landis, John Carpenter and Mike Garris produce one-hour, pay-cable, grisly episodes, some with big-time scares. This particular hour, Tobe Hooper's reworking of Ambrose Bierce's short story, "The Damned Thing," has a Texas town terrorized by something very, very bad.
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On another programming front, NBC announced it will rejigger its Thursday lineup next month, and will bring back one of TV's best, and most-underappreciated, shows, "Scrubs."
Starting Nov. 30, the network will run a two-hour block of comedy on Thursdays _ just like it did in the days when it had, you know, funny shows. Actually, that's not fair, all these are good comedies.
"My Name is Earl" (8 p.m. EST) and "The Office" (at 8:30) will keep their current spots, to be followed by "Scrubs" (at 9) and "30 Rock" (at 9:30).
Notice that's a switch from Wednesdays for "30 Rock," the Tina Fey-written comedy, which is also a vote of confidence for a show that's not getting huge ratings. It also sounds like it's goodnight for "Twenty Good Years," the comedy _ to use that word loosely _ starring John Lithgow and Jeffrey Tambor, which has been airing after "30 Rock" on Wednesdays and getting pretty grim ratings. Or put another way, Lithgow and Tambor got a rock.
(Contact Rick Kushman at rkushman(at)sacbee.com.)
