The Networks Don’t Like This Reality Show

The networks that give us “Fear Factor,” “Big Brother” and “The Bachelor” didn’t see good business in showing us the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday night.

It’s true enough that, as a reality show, the convention doesn’t offer people eating worms or pledging their undying love to a hard body they met a few hours ago.

Is this a violation of public trust or a strategic, if jaded, view of the lack of drama at today’s political conventions? No doubt ABC, NBC and CBS felt vindicated after Monday night’s coverage mustered fewer than 14 million total viewers combined, according to figures from Nielsen Media Research, down 24% from first-night coverage of the convention four years ago.

Tuesday night, all they missed was an electrifying speech by 42-year-old anointed rising star Barack Obama and the unveiling of first lady hopeful Teresa Heinz Kerry -- a black man and a middle-aged woman, neither of whom represents demographics the networks particularly care about.

“The pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into ‘red’ states and ‘blue’ states; red states for Republicans, blue states for Democrats. But I’ve got news for them too. We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don’t like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states. We coach Little League in the blue states and have gay friends in the red states,” Obama said in his speech. Some interesting points. Except that he wasn’t speaking as a contestant on, say, “Survivor,” which lessened the size of his audience considerably.

Comedic correspondent Mo Rocca, who used to file fake news for “The Daily Show” and is now roving the convention floor for CNN, previewed Heinz Kerry by referring to her as “the bored, brilliant millionairess.” This proved to be apt, as the televised Heinz Kerry came off as far more removed than she had a night earlier, when the cable news networks were rerunning her “shove it” comment to a reporter ad infinitum. She did, however, offer greetings Tuesday in all five of her languages.

Most of the pundits deemed the night’s lineup a nod to the traditional party faithful, with career politicians Edward M. Kennedy, Dick Gephardt and Tom Daschle setting the tone. Meanwhile, up in the skyboxes, celebrity pundit Ben Affleck made the rounds of the cable news shows.

Affleck told Fox News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly that he would not violate Pakistan’s sovereignty to get Osama bin Laden. On “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” he defended a celebrity’s right to pontificate, though he conceded that, when it comes to political discourse, “actors have more enthusiasm than information available to them.” But, he noted, “the line is increasingly blurred between politics and entertainment.” On this he had a point.