5 minutes of CNN

I haven’t glanced at CNN for months, but at the gym today I clicked over to CNN to see what they were saying about Stevens and the upcoming Supreme Court vacancy. I like to think I’m quite aware that CNN is breathtakingly vacuous and has no discernable redeeming value or purpose, but even I was unprepared for what I saw.

The scene opens with former Minnesota governor and 9-11 truther Jesse Ventura, who appears to be the “host” of the program. He is interviewing disgraced and indicted former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich on the following topic: Are the Tea Party protesters good for America? this little vignette is wrapping up as I tuned in. Back in studio, an young woman of Asian descent with whom I am not familiar appears to be arguing that Obama and Bush are more or less identical because Bush took us  to war in Iraq, and Obama took us to war in Afganistan. Ventura’s remaining connections to reality are apparently sufficiently robust for him to call bullshit on this particular narrative, and as he is doing so, he is interrupted by an off-screen and previously unseen Ron Paul, who proceeds to speak uninterrupted for approximately 27 minutes on the dangers of creeping socialism. When he pauses for air, Ventura interrupts to observe that he “makes a lot of sense” and they cut to commercial.

At the current rate of deterioration, what will CNN’s programming look like in 5 years? The mind, it boggles.