Dan Rather, OJ and the Culture of the Delusional Celebrity

Howard Kurtz’s interview of Dan Rather in the WaPo this morning moved me to get quickly essayish…. My article begins this way:

It’s very unfair, of course, to compare Dan Rather to OJ Simpson – Simpson killed people – but both reemerged at roughly the same time and represent extraordinary examples of a kind of sociopathic behavior created in part by our culture of celebrity.

OJ, as everyone knows was a huge sports, movie and media star. Rather was an anchorman of the most celebrated sort – the one to “interview” Saddam as if representing all of us, among other flak-jacketed, high profile activities. In fact, his demise helped put a stake in the heart of that particular occupation, the television anchor a la Cronkite. The idea that one individual has that much power over the public’s view of the world now seems almost Neanderthal and certainly reactionary.

In the case of OJ, we see our television lives dominated once again by the bizarre saga of an unpunished celebrity murderer.

We have lived for some time in a society in which stardom seems to motivate people to lose contact with reality. The more attention they get – the crazier that get. And if they feel that attention diminishing, they act out to regain it. It‚Äôs like a drug – media crack cocaine….

The rest is at PJM.