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80's forevaaa

As the 2008 elections come closer, it is now more clear than ever before that the world has an important stake ^[2] in this election. So, coverage of the U.S. economy and events are primary content for many international news channels. A particular channel called Zee News ^[3] is broadcast via satellite into the homes of many Indians in the U.S. While they seem to do an OK job on capturing Indian sentiments on the U.S. situation (they interviewed parents with kids studying in American universities last night) when they tried to get the U.S. point of view, their footage was limited to B-roll (video you see when there is voice over going on in a newscast) from the 1980s.

How did I know that the footage was from the 80s? Well, they showed Wall Street with people that looked like our friend in the photo to your left. Lots of people looking like him were walking around and the analog quality footage, graffiti reminiscent of a scene from “Coming to America ^[4]” sprayed on the back of a newspaper van were also key indicators that we were watching OLD footage. After this, they cycled through footage of Capitol Hill and some other random 80s shots of U.S.—completely unrelated to the topic at hand. So, is this how the world views the U.S. still? I hope not.

Unfortunately when I watched the Zee News cast, I was at an Indian vegetarian restaurant ^[5] in Queens with no one to share the comedy with. I’m glad I have you beautiful people to do that with here. If you want to see more 80s photos, go this blog ^[6].