Sometimes it’s not so much the outcome of a situation or discussion that matters. Sometimes the very fact that you’re having a converation is sufficient to signify serious trouble. For instance:

• “Did you hear a door slam? I hope my husband isn’t home early.”
• “The ambulance is on the way.”
• “Who should I vote for – George Bush or Mike Dukakis?”
• “It’s been downgraded to a Category 4 and we think the levees will hold this time.”

You get the idea. Anyhow, we’re now involved in another conversation where the possible outcomes aren’t “good” or “bad,” but instead run the gamut from “bad” to “how the fuck do we fix this mess?” Starting Tuesday, Katie Couric becomes “the first lone female anchor of a nightly newscast.” Will she set women back 20 years or 40? To those who say give her a chance, I say she’s been trivializing everything she touched for years, and putting a clown in an expensive suit doesn’t make him Ed Murrow.

This little story from the Toronto Star gives a glimpse of just how deep the hole is right now. Let me slide you a few quotes:

• NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams: “Some have written the obituary, going back a couple of decades, of the time slot that I now occupy. It is and remains the largest single source of news in America every day. Here we are, in a world of 600 channels and all these websites and all these podcasts, and yet Americans in very large numbers for our day and age sit down and make it appointment viewing — maybe because there is so much other stuff, and this is where they go for a reasoned, sober analysis of the day.”
• Williams believes the attention being paid to Couric will strengthen all three networks. “That there is all this talk about the time slot and this competition can only be good. It makes us better. It keeps us on our game.”
• “This is a very different venue,” Couric concedes. “But hopefully there are cases where I can interact with people and I can occasionally have fun doing a story. It’s been challenging for me because the morning format is so multidimensional, and because it has such a variety of pieces and you are asked to do such a variety of things, that sometimes people forget that I have done a lot of very serious things. It’s almost as if, if you do the fun stuff well, then you can’t be serious. “Just because you embraced all the different things on that show, that should not in any way diminish your intelligence or your ability to do serious news.”
• Ted Koppel: “There are pressures that come from the corporations that own our respective networks and news divisions to get larger audiences, even if that means ignoring some of the more important subjects … I hope they will recognize over the next few years and as audiences continue to diminish somewhat that the future really does lie in continuing to provide substantive and responsible coverage.”
• Dan Rather: “The trend line now is toward the other argument, which is, `Dumb it down, sleaze it up, tart it up, go for what’s interesting over what’s important.’ Don’t misunderstand me; there are a lot of good people trying not to have that happen. But if you look at it, that trend line is clearly heading off in that direction.”
• Couric: “I also think that we heard from many people that the news is just too depressing. Now, obviously, we can’t sugarcoat what’s going on in the world, but there are cases where I believe we can be a little more solution-oriented … All those things will inform the way we approach the news.”

It’s possible that Couric will be less of a trainwreck than I expect. Heck, if she can get through a newscast without giggling herself silly she’ll be exceeding my expectations. But there are some facts here that are important to understand.

First, credit where credit is due. Couric is not an unknown quantity. She’s been around for awhile and has established herself as a very successful television personality. Brand Katie is a winning brand that has made lots of money for herself and her employers and their shareholders. And that’s great. That’s business.

But (you knew there was a ‘but” coming, didn’t you?), her success has not been as a journalist, but as a perky, pleasant gab hostess. She’s never demonstrated the gravity to cover anything more serious than a dog show. She’s fine for a morning show, I guess, because I think we all bring an ample willing suspension of disbelief to that format.

Finally, we’re expending bandwidth on something that an advanced society shouldn’t be wasting time on. Shouldn’t The Greatest Nation on Earth® insist on a long, proven track record of intelligence and thoughtfulness when deciding who’s going to serve as news director for one of its largest news agencies? Shouldn’t we believe – know – that this person is one of the brightest and best? Shouldn’t we expect that someone in this position is something more than minimally competent (at best)? I mean, if your kid needs brain surgery, do you want a surgeon who scraped through med school with all Cs and barely passed the boards or do you want the best damned surgeon in America?

And do you believe that Katie is the best damned surgeon in America, so to speak?

I mean, hey, Bongo might be the funnest party clown in the tri-county area, but what does it say about us when we’re on the verge of making Bongo our main source for information about the world (information that frame how we vote, by the way)?

Katie Couric isn’t the cause of our problems. She’s merely another in a long line of proof points. Her taking over the chair that Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite used to sit in will not lead to the Fall of Rome. No, we’re past that. If Rome weren’t already in deep trouble the person who recommended her for the job would have been turfed on the spot and flung into the streets by security.

If it matters, then this is a debacle. If it doesn’t matter, that’s even worse, isn’t it?

So hey, let’s get the party started…

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