Cost-Cutting by TV Networks

I like the word oxymoron. I like the look and the sound of this noun, which means “a combination of contradictory or incongruous words.” I am grateful, therefore, to reporter Thomas B. Rosenstiel for giving me a chance to use it. In his story (Nov. 22) on “infotainment,” that mix of news and entertainment being served up by the networks, Rosenstiel refers to the “dull, bald, erudite Kuralt.” Bald and erudite, yes. But dull? Dull as in stupid, lacking sharpness, slow in perception or sensibility? Dull as in uninteresting? No. Not dull.

It is Charles Kuralt, with his “Sunday Morning,” a news program free of cute chatter, flashing lights, nervous graphics, insistent, intrusive music, who brings many of us back to the networks on the weekends. Turned off by “infotainment,” we turn for our news on weekdays to National Public Radio’s “Morning Edition” and to Public Broadcasting System’s MacNeil and Lehrer.

“Dull Kuralt.” Would that be dull as dignity? Dull as a sense of humor and a sense of excellence? Or dull, maybe, as a newsman with the eye of a poet and a poet’s gift of expression. The qualities Kuralt has shine. Bright Kuralt it is. And that is no oxymoron.

MICKEY MILLER REGAL

Idyllwild