Pancho The Alien and The Echo Chamber

The ongoing melt down of the American media continues. From its childish tantrums over the vice-president’s hunting accident to the multi-faceted hypocrisy intrinsic in the non-airing of the Mohammed cartoons. The true face of our media is being revealed by the day. And the image is not a pretty one.
How does one reconcile one’s need for information with the obviously unhinged and immature creatures from whom one is forced to accept it? I do not have that answer and felt there was only one place I could go to ease my confounded mind. To gain some incite and maybe even a little wisdom. That place is of course, to Pancho the alien, my expert on nearly everything.
So I put my reservations aside, took a dozen Advil, and made the call.

S&S: Good day, Pancho.
Pancho: It is so good to hear from you, Earthling. It has been awhile, I feared for your health...
S&S: Yeah, well...
Pancho: Good, so you are fine. I as well...
S&S: Uh, can we just...
Pancho: Your abilities at the feminine trait of small talk are unmatched throughout the galaxy.
S&S: What?
Pancho: You see I am being sarcastic. I am blowing smoke up your rectum.
S&S: It’s ‘your ass’...
Pancho: Why, what did I do?
S&S: No, no, not ‘rectum’
Pancho: Oh good, he’ll be OK. I thought I’d damn well killed ‘em...
S&S: Shut up. I brought you here for a reason. I have a question about how things are handled in The Collectivist Federation of Planets.
Pancho: Great. You called the right man. I recall my early days at The Department of Reactionary Misinformation as some of my most cherished. I started out as Assistant Pseudo Clerk to the Director of Hyperbole and quickly moved up ten pay grades, all the way to Neo-Assistant Proto-Clerk.
S&S: Sounds like quite a bureaucracy.
Pancho: Oh, thank you so much. Now who’s smoking whose rectum?
S&S: Drop it. I only hope your vast experiences there won’t be needed in answering my primitive questions.
Pancho: Go on...
S&S: They concern the media in America, or in reality I guess, the media in your Federation. The news media on my planet are out of control. I wonder how advanced life forms like yourselves deal with such an enigma.
Pancho: Oh, we had enough eons ago. The Division of Nanny-like Protection funded a study to uncover the amount of stress the proletariat endured due to the excesses of our galactic media.
S&S: Ah, now we’re getting somewhere. What did they find?
Pancho: It was bad. We found that the attention wasted by our working class through the media’s lust for controversy, their anti-establishment mentality, their puerile interest in the trivial, and their neurotic need for personal reinforcement was not only inefficient, but down right annoying.
S&S: Sounds like a very scientific study.
Pancho: Yep. It was done by the text.
S&S: You mean ‘by the book’.
Pancho: Oh, I wouldn’t waste my time on that. I’d just hold out and wait for the movie.
S&S: Ugh.
Ok, so it was bad. What did your people decide to do?
Pancho: Well, The Department of Funding Unfunded Programs got together and decided to form a committee to look into what to do with the situation.
S&S: And?
Pancho: Well, they came up with some ideas and passed them along to The Bureau of Moving Plans to Other Divisions Department. And that was that.
S&S: Help me out here. What was the plan? Was it implemented? How did it work out? C’mon, give me something here...
Pancho: Excuse me...I guess I dropped the spheres on that one.
S&S: It’s ‘balls’...can’t you see its ‘balls’.
Pancho: No, sorry. It must be wearing pants.
S&S: Enough!
What happened with the galactic media?
Pancho: Oh, that. Well we decided that we could have it all. We could let the media continue to do what they do and yet the average comrade could go on with his life as normal, but not have to be bothered by the annoying inanities.
S&S: Go on.
Pancho: We put aside four uninhabited planets for what we call The Echo Chamber. We sent all our ‘journalists’ to the first planet... New Ork. The Second planet, P’litser, we populated with critics and such. Their only task is to devise award shows and scholarly honours for our journalist friends. Minutia, the third planet, is manned with Federation employees whose only job is to come up with pop stories to keep the inhabitants of New Ork busy.
S&S: And the fourth planet?
Pancho: Ah, Lefteria. This planet is designed to keep all our columnists and broadcasters heading in the right direction. Did I say ‘right’ direction? Now that is funny.
S&S: Do you need a minute? No? Good.
So you have four planets, how does that cure your problem?
Pancho: Oh, well, we let them do their stories and such, but there is a force field around the planets that does not allow their mindlessness out into the universe.
S&S: Hmmm, I like it. But let me ask you a few questions about some of the planets involved.
Pancho: Knock yourself off.
S&S: ‘Out’! ‘Out’! For God’s sakes, ‘out’!
Pancho: Hey, relax, you asked me here...
S&S: No, no...let’s just go on.
Tell me more about the third planet, Minutia.
Pancho: Minutia, eh? Well, that’s where it all begins. Everything stems from here. Ideas such as ‘death toll radio’...the theory that all radio news must have at least 3 items dealing with death, murder, or mayhem. And ‘if it bleeds, it leads’...this is the theory of leading any newscast with some form of violence or destruction. And then we have “scare the little guy’...these are news stories invented to add stress to the lives of the average Joe through the fear-mongering of events that have a near zero chance of actually affecting him. And then there are the ‘it must be important because a celebrity did it’ stories...I think those are pretty self explanatory. Also, of course, we have the ‘make the leader look stupid or guilty’ items...ceaseless attacks on those in power from those who wish they were. There are many more. Is that enough?
S&S: Oh yes, thank you. Tell me about the second planet, then, P’litser.
Pancho: Sure. P’litser is where all our media friends go to fan their flaming egos. Our planning committee found that most journalists couldn’t care less about the facts of their stories, they’re simply looking for some accolades. Looking for their peers to give them a stretch around.
S&S: ‘Reach’, damn it! ‘Reach’!
Pancho: Ok, ok...just don’t shoot.
S&S: Put your hands down and tell me about Lefteria.
Pancho: Sure, but try to relax. Lefteria is the planet where our journalists can go to spend time with their fellow story tellers. They can get training in many diverse areas...areas dealing with such ideas as socialism, secularism, anti-establishmentism, and galacti-culturalism. This elite planet personifies the whole Echo Chamber ideal. Where each man, woman, or other can stretch the boundaries of their beliefs by conversing with others who think exactly as themselves.
S&S: Great, sounds like paradise...
Pancho: Ooh, sarcasm. You wear it fountain.
S&S: ‘Well’! ‘Well’! ‘Well’!
Pancho: What? I’ve told you all I know.
S&S: Thank God, because I can’t take a moment more.