The Criers

It isn't often that we sit down and watch TV, however tonight turned out to be one of the rare occasions we turned on the tube.  Since we cannot justify paying for real cable, we have only the cheapest version of analog.  In other words, WKAR was the only station worth watching...that we can actually see.

The show was detailing some hearings in congress.  The footage from the hearings really shocked me.  It was like big time wrestling.  The guy asking the questions was loud and belligerent, the guy who was not answering any questions was loud and belligerent, and also, the fans in the bleachers were loud and belligerent.

The people watching these public hearings were holding up signs they made with markers and heckling the person being interviewed.  This would be inappropriate at a high school basketball game.  Why would it be happening in our capital?

As usually happens, the answer came to me a while later.  The signs were too imperfect, the heckling a bit too practiced.  I remembered that back in "the day" people had this custom (actually, they probably still do) where a family would hire professional criers to attend the funerals of loved ones.  Can't have people thinking that Uncle Louie was unpopular, now can we?  Then my "Aha!" light went on.  The hecklers in the audience were pros, and they were trying to look like amateurs.  No doubt, they worked for lobbyists.

Now I have to question this indictment of our "democratic government".  Literally everyone in the hearing was posturing for someone, and each was insincere.  They were just giving people such as myself a good show, so as to convince us that everyone is doing their job in Washington.

Yeah, they were all doing a great job.  Too bad they were doing the wrong thing, really well.  I wonder if they ever got around to finding the truth they were so desperately pretending to search for.