Who saw NBC's "Hand Of God" this a.m.?

[bluedeminredstate]

During The Today Show this morning was a teaser for an upcoming episode of Dateline or some such newsertainment program. It was about a tornado and how it affected three different people, who all survived MIRACULOUSLY. The announcer, in his most serious newsman voice asked, (I'm paraphrasing the first part b/c by that time I was freaking out) "Was it an act of nature or THE HAND OF GOD?"
I thought I was hearing things because I couldn't believe the overall tone, not to mention the content of this commercial.
First NBC yanks The West Wing for that nutball, crazy-ass "Revelations" and now they are asking in all seriousness if the events involving a freaking tornado was really the hand of God?
Is it me or are they just shoving it down our throats without trying to hide it?

[phantom power]

1. Every year or so, they throw a bone like this to the

religeous nutcase crowd, or the paranormal nutcase crowd, etc. "optical illusion... or UFOS! You decide!!!"

"coincidence... or PSYCHIC POWERS! You decide!!!"

"luck... or HAND OF GOD! You decide!!!"

[coffeenap]

2. May sweeps--purely ratings.

[Az]

4. Its much more blatant and frequent than that

We watch the Today show (for it's ineherant comedy) and its a contest. Whenever Matt Lauer has a human interest story we watch as he tries to work the hand of the divine into the story. He invariably tries to get the subject to say their happenstance is a miracle or that they prayed.

[coffeenap]

5. Ewww. I gave up on tv months ago--now I remember why.

Except for CSPAN and a few movies and reruns of West Wing, that is.

[ewagner]

3. Although I didn't see it....

I think I know what's going on......try out this logic and test it...

Event #1: Bush* is (allegedly) re-elected, the surveys show his success due to "moral values" voters.

Event#2: Terri Shiavo incident....media gives non-stop, pre-emptive coverage to Randall Terry and his band of wackos in front of the hospice; Tom Delay, Bill Frist and Dubya himself start preaching their "culture of Life" BS all over the news.

Event #3: Just Us Sunday goes down and the media dutifully reports that the broadcast has the "potential" of reaching 60 Million viewers although nobody ever reports just how few actaully see the broadcast.

The network programming wonks take note of all three events and conclude (wrongly, but what the hell, they have the power to do it) that all programming (news and entertainment) should reflect what they perceive to be a new wave of "religousity in America", which MUST be true because their news media is reporting it over and over and over again.....

I think that's what's happening and it has to be changed because, quite frankly, it's scaring the hell out of me....

[liberalmike27]

6. Haven't you noticed?

The media has gone to work lately to try and religionize the society. Nothing works better than getting increasing numbers to believe in a possibly (I'm agnostic) fictitious God myth. It makes believing all of the other myths more palatable.

About Five Newsweek's in the last couple of months have been dedicated to the highly current news of religion. Some were the pope, but I mean exploration of religion in general. We have new shows like the one you mention, and Revelation, both examples of shows that push theocratic angles.

Anyway, there are other examples that you will see and have seen. It should occur to you that it is just part of the whole package of brainwashing, is pushing theocracy.

By the way, I believe in a lot of the tenets of religion, like most of you do. Killing, coveting, adultery, fornication, lying, and most of the things in the bible will generally cause trouble from devastating to mild. But just like we can logically see many of these things as bad, so could those who wrote the bible (many different parts from many different men, inspired by God, or not). Not firmly believing in mysticism does not in any way make you immoral, as we all know.

One other notable fact is that much money is going into building huge numbers of new churches. That too can not be looked at as merely coincidental, it is just another front dominated by the right-wing that they attack us with.

Both parties have very anti-religious things, certainly Republicans' attacks on the poor and lower middle class (mostly) are biblical sins. One can certainly mention this to any right-winger and tell them they can choose the sins, and either way there will be some sins in either party, so you might as well vote for the one that helps you and your family survive, usually the democratic party.

[erichzann]

7. NBC renewed West Wing for a seventh season.

The season had completed all of its 22 epidodes which is why its not on the air right now.