Home » Archives » April 2007 » Blowing Off Their Foot, One Toe At A Time
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04/23/2007: "Blowing Off Their Foot, One Toe At A Time"
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News is a cyclic beast. Anyone who's ever been trapped in its spotlight knows that it's just a matter of time until someone else does something to attract the attention away from you. That's why Don Imus was the big story until the Virginia Tech shooting, which was replaced by the NASA shooting, which was replaced by the Blue Angels crash, which was replaced by the first day of classes back at VaTech. Keep low, act contrite, don't screw up, and eventually the media will shift their glare elsewhere.
You'd think that if any organization would understand this, it'd be CBS. Apparently not.
"Imus In The Morning" was a CBS property, and they took heat when they only fired him after MSNBC dropped their simulcast. The feeling was that if it were up to them, he'd have kept his job and they only fired him under pressure. In the wake of the eventual firing, a media watchdog blog decided to check the CBS website to see what their diversity policy was, presumably to see if they were in fact following their own policy. What they uncovered was far more embarassing.
On the site, the banner above the diversity statement displayed a series of five images of CBS radio personalities - all white males. Once this was pubicized, rather than a measured statement indicating their concern and that they'd look into it, they apparently panicked and told their webmaster to clean it up - quick. As a result, the banner soon has replaced the previously-fired David Lee Roth and Imus with - no surprise - a woman and black man. I'm not sure who the woman is, but the guy is Brian McKnight - a singer with no known connection to CBS other than perhaps their playing his songs. It's as if the webmaster Google'd "black man" and went with the first image that came up.
As if that embarassment wasn't enough, now they've done it again. When CBS suspended Imus, one station - KCAA in San Bernardino - was very public in their support for Imus and what the station manager there felt was a First Amendment issue. Unable to broadcast Imus live, they began running old taped shows from past Imus broadcasts.
CBS claims to have tried to handle this in private, but apparently decided they needed to do something flashy, so they've sued KCAA for copyright infringement. They might be in the right, but they'll definitely remain in the media spotlight.
They've shot themselves in the foot three times in the last month - how much more can they take and remain standing?? 
