MMMM #418 -- Thanksgiving Dinner is costing more! Less! The Same!

     There are certain stories in local (and even Network and cable) TV News that crop up every year, normally around holidays when there's not much else happening. For example:

• Christmas Depression (Typical lead: IT MAY BE FEELING A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS IN (YOURTOWN), BUT MENTAL HEALTH EXPERTS SAY IT'S A TIME OF MISERY FOR SOME PEOPLE.
• Halloween Candy Dangers (Typical Lead: PARENTS IN (YOURTOWN) MAY WANT TO GO THROUGH THEIR CHILDREN'S HALLOWEEN LOOT...THERE MAY BE DANGERS LURKING IN THAT BAG OF GOODIES!

     And now....The Increased cost of Thanksgiving Dinner!
     Do a Google News search under "cost of Thanksgiving Dinner" and you'll find dozens of examples...reporting that the price is up, or down, or about the same as last year. It's a fairly easy story to do...just grab the prediction from the local Farm Bureau, convince a supermarket to let you shoot video inside, and boom. A visually appealing story for a slow news day that is virtually meaningless.  Same as the other examples above.
     Huh?
      On The Media on NPR reported this week (click on the first story of the program...the one with the dinner plate) that the up and down of the typical dinner on Thanksgiving has little or no relationship to the economy...and the reporters doing the story are somewhat math-challenged.
     Oh...and Happy Thanksgiving!

[PLUS: A Harvard Student newspaper article included the following statement:

'We, the Jews, collectively rejected God and hung Him up on the cross to die, and thus we deserved the punishments that were heaped on our heads over the last 2000 years," the anonymous (Jewish to Christian convert) contributor wrote. 

I'm shocked...that they allow anonymously written articles? Other than a newspaper's editorials, which represent the collective position of a paper, what papers allow anonymous articles?

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of TimLennox.com]