CNN - Hard hitting news

When I can't sleep, I generally turn on CNN because their incessant rambling about nothing will generally put me straight to sleep. Over the past week, there have been a number of interesting media stories that CNN is not covering. I'm not going to focus on what they didn't cover, but more on what they did cover ... Blackfish. No, not some racial story out of the ocean, but better yet, the story of killer whales, Orcas, in captivity and how they kill their trainers.  That's right boys and girls, the global economy is collapsing, we are spying on our friends and DC is in chaos ... and CNN is covering Orca's.

In fact, they covered a 90 minute story about the trainer at SeaWorld that was killed by an Orca that lived in a cage.  They even dedicated hours upon hours of programming time to talk about the dangers of Orca's potentially killing their trainers. I'm not saying its not a sad story and we probably shouldn't have giant killer whales living in a small cage and a swimming pool, but should this be the hard hitting news that CNN needs to cover? Or is our society becoming so idiotic that ratings are more important that real news and whales are more important that sharing the story of our countries problems?

While watching all of this, a few things popped into my mind as I watched the show:

1. Opening credits:  Who in the f*ck approved this story? 
2. 15 minutes in:  Let's play the common sense game:  You take a whale that is used to swimming in a 50 mile radius and put him in a swimming pool and cage at night ... and then wonder why said whale is angry and ate his trainer? 
3. 20 minutes in:  Whale weights 4  tons, trainer ways 140 pounds -- wonder who's winning this fight? 
4. 30 minutes in:  What's happening in Syria? I'm really curious about that right now? 
5. 50 minutes in: Wait so, Orca's are so dangerous that they could, could mind you, eat people in the ocean if they swim by them.  Would these people already be dead b/c the Orca's swim / live in artic waters?  Wouldn't hypothermia kill the people first?  And why in the hell would random people be swimming in arctic waters? 
6. 80 mintues in:  Why in the hell is this a story and that dude who trains tigers is on Piers Morgan next.
7. Post show:  Piers Morgan is actually interviewing people about Orca's. WTF has his career come to? I didn't care for his rants at the NRA, but at least they were relevant. Poor Piers Morgan is just doing whatever they tell him. Nothing like a hard hitting interview with Free Willy!
8. CNN is re-running Blackfish b/c of fan demand.  Oh dear lord ... CNN just confirmed their fan base is the largest group of not intelligent people alive. I now understand the political drama now ... CNN is shaping the minds of the tired, the poor, the huddled masses. 

So in a nutshell, the fact that CNN bowed to ratings and promoted Blackfish is stupid. Granted, Blackfish is a sad story, but it belongs on Discovery, Animal Planet or NatGeo.  CNN should be about hard hitting news and getting the facts out ... not about how three people (in a planet of billions) were killed by an Orca. Let's say we release all the Orca's tomorrow, it's not going to help the global economy nor is it going to solve the espionage or political issues.  

If this is the trend, then I'm excited to see FOX do a show on Polar Bears and MSNBC cover the Passenger Pigeon.