National news ignores youth

Johnny Carson’s death left many people across the country grieving for the long-running host of “The Tonight Show.” Newspapers ran front-page stories about the funnyman – telling of the many genius skits and characters he created during his television stint.

But the story probably didn’t help with one of the biggest problems facing newspapers – attracting younger readers.

While Johnny Carson was a big part of the late night television watching experience until his retirement in 1992, many of the young people newspapers should be trying to attract did not establish a relationship with him. Many of the people who are being targeted as not reading newspapers were not in their teens when Carson was replaced by Jay Leno.

It’s not to say the story was not worthy of front-page placement, but newspapers constantly drop the ball on covering topics that relate to a basically nonexistent audience. The Famuan ran an article about Timothy Burroughs, known to many students as DJ Skip-A-Chuck, on its front page because many students could relate to its significance. The Tallahassee Democrat did not run an article on the local DJ’s death.

It’s not that embracing the longtime readers is a bad thing. Ignoring the news of the younger audience, who already feel slighted in news coverage, is not the way to draw them in.

U.S. sends robots to fight war on Iraq

The war on Iraq is an issue that no one wants to hear about anymore. But it’s always the hot topic in the news.

Bush is demanding $80 billion for military operations, when the nation’s Social Security is supposedly in danger of bankruptcy. The departure of U.S. troops from Iraq is uncertain and often a subject avoided by the entire Bush administration. The upcoming elections in Iraq are destined to be a totally disaster.

What’s even more ridiculous about “Iraq Freedom” is that the U.S. military is so worn with coalition casualties and “accident” bombings, that it will now deploy robots that will fight this war.

One billion warrior robots will be sent to assist the human soldiers starting in March or April.

The creation of these robots only signifies the unnecessary deaths this war has caused this nation. Soldiers are becoming a decreasing commodity that are being supplemented by robots that can barely moved at four miles per hour and needs to be refueled about every four hours.

Robots are not the answers to the questions of global democracy and liberty.