Silly season
The term "silly season" was coined for summertime, but really seasons don't get any sillier in the Irish media than the Christmas and New Year period. Last time around it was dominated by the grim pseudo-journalism of the ascending tsunami death-count. This time there was almost literally nothing, and it seems our papers have got worse at disguising their boredom.
Thus in the tabloids we've had, for example, a lead-story about Bertie Ahern's alleged World Cup pick ("England!" the headline shouted too loudly), and another virtual April Fool page-one about a planned pub appearance by the "ColumBEER 3". In the tabloids and further upmarket, some relief was found in the old news of the State papers, now an annual opportunity for head-shaking at the government-numbing awfulness of the Troubles, and in BUPA.
What with all the ads for post-Christmas sales, editorial pages have to be filled with something, and often it's news from countries that don't grind to such a complete halt: stories that might barely merit a brief at other times of the year become page leads, and we learn the name of, say, the German opposition's finance spokesman. Quirky medical miracles and pet rescues fill more space.
But undoubtedly the season's freakiest manifestation of silliness was the appearance of Noam Chomsky in the unaccustomed position of front-page lead in the Irish Independent.
It's fair to say that most corporate-media outlets wish Noam Chomsky didn't exist – and in the United States they do a fair job of making their wish come true. Much of his work, alone and in collaboration, is a devastating account of how the media "manufacture consent" to powerful social forces, and his "five filters" offer the beginnings of an explanation without resort to conspiracy theory.
His work on media bias is hugely popular, precisely becausegins it helps explain what we see every day. So why, Noam, did we see Tony O'Reilly's Indo shouting out that "Ahern is accused of being Bush's puppet" over the use of Shannon, with rather juiced-up quotes about Bertie being a "shoeshine boy" and a picture of the "leading academic" making the charge, none other than Chomsky himself? (Chomsky is flanked by a particularly dumb-looking Bush.)
Perhaps, in due course, as Chomsky's visit to Ireland this month plays itself out, a profound explanation for this editorial choice will become apparent. But for now, Meejit reckons the most telling detail about this story is the date above it: Wednesday, 28 December. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Perhaps it's partly down to the stodgy news flow this season that former Irish Press editor and Irish Times colleague Hugh Lambert was ill, dead and buried before I knew about it. It was my great privilege to know Hugh, not in his Press days, but after that great paper died, when he came to the Irish Times and was found a job sub-editing on the weekly education supplement. His immediate "boss" was, of all people, Harry Browne – completing a ridiculous, even humiliating Timesian inversion of knowledge and talent that we duly ignored in our working arrangements.
A man of real erudition about literature and film, he also had the easy unpretentiousness that often seems the mark of the ex-Press journalist. He had survived the most difficult of circumstances in his previous post but showed only occasional weariness. More often he was enlivening office life with a great sense of humour and tremendous, persistent journalist gifts. "Stop talking in headlines, Dad," he told us his kids would complain.
He had earned a sense of perspective about newspapers, and the fact that he ended up producing advertising supplements for the Irish Times didn't lessen his annoyance, the last time we spoke, at the ascendancy of accountants in the running of that paper. He recalled similar priorities from the late days of the Press.
If I'm still a Meejit, it's no fault of the likes of this fine, good media man.