Pondering The Telescreen A Tale Of Two Cities August 15, 2004 Denunciations of television have become as routine as breathing: the programming is crass, stupid, propagandistic, so bad that only an idiot would watch it yet everybody does. Actually things are worse. They are much worse. To see what is happening, start with what may be the crucial truth of our times: People will watch a screen. They will watch anything in preference to nothing, watch programs they don’t really like, comedies so unfunny that only the laugh track tells them when to respond. The bright know that the fare...