I thought for sure CNN would report on the Pat Tillman hearings especially Jessica Lynch. I clicked to CNN several times throughout the evening.

What I saw instead was non-stop coverage of the Alec Baldwin phone message. They brought on Larry King to show excerpts from his interview with Baldwin last November. They brought on Dr. Phil to dispense whatever bogus wisom Dr. Phil had. Then, over on CNN 2, they had Nancy Grace dissecting the phone call.

I clicked over to Fox News and Baldwin's call was also their big story.

Several times I came back to CNN to try to find their coverage of the Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch hearings, but I found nothing. Anderson Cooper had Baldwin as his top story.

In conclusion I think CNN is useless. Fox News has always been useless, but CNN used to have real news. What the hell happened to them?

It figures: Anderson Cooper is a former CIA applicant who may or may not have actually worked for them (it would be classified if he did). He is also allegedly a closeted homosexual. Nancy Grace was an opportunist lawyer who has lied about her own victimhood and who has been wrong on many of the things she's reported. Larry King is a 5-times-married interviewer who asks softball questions and has been convicted for fraud. Wolf Blitzer is a former AIPAC lobbyist.

If you watch CNN in the morning you are treated to that foxy chick who sits on a couch so you can see her legs and f*ck-me shoes.

Not that their credentials matter. I am sure whoever pulls the strings at CNN would make even the most reputable journalist into a puppet in minutes flat.

Baldwin's phone call should be non-news. It should be laughed out of the news meeting at every reputable broadcaster and publication except as a little sidebar on page 16 or something in the entertainment program. Why is it the top story? That fucking sickens me.

I just saw a documentary called "Iraq for Sale" about how private contractors have been screwing American taxpayers every which way since 2003. Blackwater, Titan, CACI, Halliburton, KBR, SAIC, those are just beginning. Most of them have CEOs who are former Pentagon brass and who have received no-bid contracts to do important jobs incompetently for outrageous amounts of money, often with the result being that our troops suffer or die.

Why isn't this sort of information on CNN?

Why did CNN completely avoid the Pat Tillman/Jessica Lynch hearings today?

Though I don't blame Salon for writing a reality-check article about it, I do think the media jumped on it and made it a story for way too long. It is all too lazy and too easy to use a story like this to improve ratings. "Alec Baldwin was angry and mean to his daughter -- film at 11!"

I listened to Baldwin's rant and thought, "So what?" He crossed the line a bit, but he didn't cross more serious lines. He didn't threaten harm, and his insults were not adult-level insults. Calling a young woman a "pig" is like calling a boy a "creep" or a "jerk." I also noticed Baldwin pulling back from his anger a bit, trying to contain himself. He very clearly was venting his frustration, not getting a sadistic thrill out of being spiteful.

In the same day that the Baldwin story came out, there were several really big, important news stories that got less coverage. We all need to remember to "vote with our attention" and make sure to minimize time spent on Baldwin-type stories in favor of stories that affect massive numbers of people.

Now excuse me while I go read the latest on Iraq, the attorney general scandal, Sudan, the environment, dying bees, corporate corruption, etc.

Let's face it, all of "Lord of the Rings" is male-based. The women are only there so you don't wonder how creatures reproduce. In a way, "Lord of the Rings" is so implicitly gay it would be redundant to try to make it explicit.

Read the books, then compare to the Peter Jackson movies. Guess what -- most of the female content of the movies was written in by Jackson's wife and the female co-writer to make the movie more palatable to women.

There are only a few female characters worth noting: Galadriel (Cate Blanchett), Arwen (Liv Tyler), and Eowyn (Miranda Otto). Galadriel is powerful and has no apparent sex life; Arwen exists to make Aragorn look more masculine; and Eowyn exists to give Aragorn additional macho cred and when he rejects her she proves herself by fighting like a man.

All of the elves are effeminate in the way of bisexual glam-rockers like David Bowie. The hobbits are like homoerotic hippies. The dwarves hang out in clans underground where the women are reported to be as hairy and masculine as the men. Gandalf the wizard has no wife or children, but the symbol of his power is a phallic staff.

Frodo and Sam are like a married couple. Pippin and Merry are like their wilder married friends. Frodo forms a Greek-style man-boy "mentor" relationship with Gandalf, which includes them departing together at the end of the story. Legolas and Gimli break through the elves/dwarves discrimination barrier by becoming competitive pals. The wifeless Bilbo spends time playing with his "precious."

The movie trilogy ended with many of these male characters hugging and jumping up and down and staring at each other with glistening eyes. Not a single female was included in this emotional denoument, even though it went on for like 15 minutes.

So I say to you -- why would anybody want to make this any gayer?