Topical news

We all know that the mass media have their obsessions. It is sometimes difficult to gauge

which obsessions are flavour of the day but here is one way to do it. Have a look at the NewsNow website and look at the drop-down list of hot-topics.

The current list of hot topic News feeds is as follows: Afghan politics, Ashes test series, British Muslims, cash for peerages, energy politics, George Bush, Iran sanctions, Iraq politics, Israel, Israel/Palestine, London Olympics, Military UK, North Korea, Politics US, Russian spy poisoning, Somalia, Sudan, Tony Blair, Bird Flu, Northern Ireland, Saddam Hussain, Afghanistan, Climate change, Guantanomo, ID cards, Iraq, Islamic news, Lebanon, Syria, US/Iran, Zimbabwe.

It is nice that they have given separate news feeds to British Muslims and 'Islamic news'. You will not be too surprised though that most of the articles in both are usually connected to terrorism most of the time. It’s also very kind of them to offer Iraqi politics a separate News feed to Iraq the country, which comes way down in the drop down list. Clearly they felt that Israel needed more exposure hence two separate news feeds – one for the country and one for its conflict with Palestine (a non-existent country that allegedly threatens the existence of Israel). Speaking of non-existent threats, Iran does get a couple of news feeds too. One to cover its belligerent attitude to the USA, and one to cover the sanctions imposed on it to prevent it from being the first nuclear power in the middle-east. Oops, I forgot Olmert has declared Israel a nuclear state in a state of nuclear ambiguity. I am still surprised to see Bird Flu still on the list but apparently it is still making the news despite the non-appearance of the long awaited pandemic. Obviously Saddam Hussain is a topical issue but I don’t think it will hang around for very long. Good to see climate change and ID cards up there but I don’t think George and Tony should have a News feed each, inseparable as they are. All the usual state villains are up there including the Syrians and North Koreans and likely to remain for some time but don't expect energy politics to make a long appearance.