Media Matters

     It's no wonder that The Academy Awards Ceremony this past Sunday had no host. That person would have had to be a woman who was black as well as Asian. The individual would have also had to be Jewish and probably Muslim, no doubt. Sounds goofy, right?  Judging from the "mix" that the Academy was aiming for, it wouldn't have been that goofy.       The idea of mixing genders and races is not a novel one. Black presenters, especially, were always included, not to mention films made by African- Americans about African-American subjects ( although this particular phenomenon is fairly new ever since a few years ago when people complained vigorously about black movies being neglected in the nomination process. The complaints appeared to work. MOONLIGHT was named Best Picture in 2017. Its excellent fellow nominees ( FENCES and HIDDEN FIGURES) were also both about the black community.      This year's winner,  GREEN BOOK, is a buddy-buddy film of sorts about th

     In this day and age of ambiguous TV news reporting ( Is it or isn't it "Fake News" we ask ourselves? ), there are still aspects that are clear as a bell: some correspondents have a distinct style that can't be mistaken for anything but what it is. Their use of words and syntax is consistent, their manner is predictable, their delivery is distinct. We don't expect Judy Woodruff ( PBS ) to be loud, brash and emotional; Sean Hannity (FOX NEWS) doesn't suddenly start to cry over a story and become soft-spoken and gentle; Lawrence O'Donnell ( MSNBC ) doesn't begin to ask questions employing only single sentences and simple words. Jeff Glor (CBS ) doesn't commence to deliver op- eds at the top of his show.      Perhaps that's a good thing. News consumers like to count on a few things. For example, we don't like surprises, meaning abrupt changes from our journalists in matters of style. We may not always believe what they say, but we be