Though I would tend to distrust anyone who self-identified as a raconteur I waded into that morass anyway. I hope her raconteur skills follow a better pattern than the prose, but what's the point? That DN does not cover gay/lesbian/trans issues as much as she would like? I'm not even sure that's the mission of DN. I kinda like the last comment when the person said: Every time I've tuned in to Democracy Now, they're discussing either the wars in the Middle East or some corrupt political figure. I never gave the show much of my time because those topics didn't interest me.
And that is the mission, to cover political - as opposed to social and cultural topics - events, particularly the ones ignored by the MSM - and to cover them from a distinctly far left of center standpoint. So while you might not hear much about Trans issues, you will hear from people who get no coverage elsewhere in the broadcast media. And I have seen a much higher profile for trans stories elsewhere in the media, down to CSI/L&O eposodes that treated the subject with some insight and compassion, so I'm not sure they are being totally ignored.
And I like Goodman's focus on corruption, large and small, because if decisions are for sale (and they are) then you're really not in a democracy anymore are you? Which is kind of her point. And she is good at it. That dry (a dryer commentary on TV is not to be found) works well with issues that are more political than social. Matter of fact, as good as she is at patiently taking apart the problems in the Mid-East and explaining them, that's how bad she is at doing social/cultural coverage. When Rachael Maddow does a pop culture deal she's having fun with it. She likes pop culture. Perhaps loves it even. Amy Goodman feels - and perhaps not without some merit - that all that pop culture stuff is a sideshow - bread and circuses, smoke and mirrors - to distract people from the real issues and the real power plays, which is what she is interested in covering.
I'll tell you that no one else did the kind of reporting on the connections between the insurance industry, the medical industry and how the 'health care' bill got all marked up to insure that no one really got any coverage, but whoever did would pay more for it and get less out of it. To the degree that health care coverage is an important issues for a lot of trans persons, then Amy was covering topics that just weren't us, but topics that were critical to us.
I think that's more important in the long run.
