{"id":8699,"date":"2011-08-28T14:37:58","date_gmt":"2011-08-28T21:37:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bradblog.com\/?p=8699"},"modified":"2013-11-18T19:54:55","modified_gmt":"2013-11-19T03:54:55","slug":"howard-kurtz-hurricane-of-haplessness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=8699","title":{"rendered":"Howard Kurtz’ Hurricane of Haplessness"},"content":{"rendered":"[UPDATED a number of times at bottom of article, with more extraordinary photos and videos of devastating “hype” in NY, MA, NC and VT leading their governor to declare<\/a> Sunday that the state has “a full-blown flooding catastrophe on our hands.” ||| To date, at least 45 are now dead in 13 states<\/strong><\/a> in 3rd deadliest U.S. storm in more than 30 years.<\/strong><\/i>]\n

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Setting aside that at this time following 2005’s Hurricane Katrina — the morning after — most in the media were breathing a sigh of relief that New Orleans had “dodged a bullet”, one wonders if the folks in Wilmington, Vermont<\/a> today…<\/p>\n

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…or in the Catskills of New York<\/a>…<\/p>\n

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…are inclined to agree with insightful media critic Howard Kurtz’ assessment that Irene amounted to little more than “A Hurricane of Hype”<\/a>:<\/p>\n

National news organizations morphed into local eyewitness-news operations, going wall to wall for days with dire warnings about what would turn out to be a Category 1 hurricane, the lowest possible ranking.<\/div>\n

Um, surely Howard knows that category rankings for hurricanes refer to wind speed and velocity, not the amount of moisture in the storm or the possibilities of life-threatening floods that may accompany it, along with the storm surge to follow, right? Surely he has many reliable sources<\/em> that have explained that to him by now, doesn’t he?<\/p>\n

Does anyone seriously believe the hurricane would have drawn the same level of coverage if it had been bearing down on, say, Ft. Lauderdale?<\/div>\n

Dunno, Howard. Would a storm bearing down on Ft. Lauderdale have some 65 million people in its path, as Irene had? Please, Howard, have some apples with your oranges…<\/p>\n

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Really, Howard, I am sorry that your reliably regular Sunday morning show on CNN<\/a> was preempted this morning and you were unable to bring us important planned coverage, including “NYT’s Tom Friedman on lame political coverage; the media scrutinize Rick Perry, and the breaking of UMiami’s football scandal,” as 14 people had already inconveniently died by showtime today from the hype<\/strike> hurricane.<\/p>\n

I’m not one to go out of my way to approvingly quote New Jersey’s Governor Chris Christie, but when he argued at his presser<\/a> this morning that “The fact that we were successful in evacuating over a million people was a pre-emptive measure that I am confident saved lives,” it’s difficult to disagree with him.<\/p>\n

Without the serious media attention given to the incoming storm — featuring, as usual, the standard sensationalism that all corporate media, including CNN’s Sunday morning shows, routinely bring to the news every single day — it’s likely that many more lives would have been lost.<\/p>\n

If that’s the cost of “hype” in a situation like this, I’ll welcome it — even as Sunday morning quarterbacks like yourself may prefer to congratulate themselves by filling a few column inches with biting 20\/20 hindsight in lieu of the important, not-hyped-at-all media scrutiny of Rick Perry, or much-needed “breaking” coverage of “UMiami’s football scandal.”<\/p>\n

How about you broadcast next Sunday’s show about all of this week’s “hype” from the Wilmington Tavern<\/a> in Vermont? I’m sure they’d love to see you there!…<\/p>\n

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UPDATE 5:38pm PT:<\/b><\/i> According to the New York Times<\/em> this afternoon<\/a>, Gov. Peter Shumlin says his state has “a full-blown flooding catastrophe on our hands.”<\/p>\n

“We’re going to be devastated with flooding”\u009d he said, expecting “the devastation to spread across the entire state of Vermont.”<\/p>\n

The Captain of the VT State Police describes the flooding as “epic” and says they are “advising people to get up to the highest point of their residence because we just can’t get to then right now.”<\/p>\n

Silly Captain. Silly Gov. Shumlin. Wonder why they’re not simply advising residents that it’s all just “hype”?<\/p>\n

Oh, and in Shelburne Falls, MA? They’re just flooded with “hype”…<\/p>\n

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And look! Even more “hype” in Windham, NY!…<\/p>\n

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Good thing there were no kids in this school bus! They could have drowned in all that “hype”!…<\/p>\n

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UPDATE 6:07pm PT:<\/b><\/i> And now watch this historic covered bridge “get caught up in the @HowardKurtz<\/a> ‘hype'” as Burlington, VT columnist Shay Totten described it<\/a> to us:<\/p>\n