CNN - FORMER CNN ANCHOR BROWN SAYS TV NEWS AVOIDS ISSUES

Television news is more concerned with delivering ratings than it is with informing the pubic, with many important issues like the war in Iraq shunted aside for "mud wrestling," former CNN anchor Aaron Brown has told a Palm Beach, FL audience. As reported by the Palm Beach Daily News, Brown acknowledged that he had tried to deliver both light and serious news on CNN's NewsNight, recalling that when he devoted four hours to the arrest of actor Robert Blake, he received thousands of complaints. Nevertheless, he reported, the program received the highest ratings of the year. Brown praised former network anchors Tom Brokaw, Peter Jennings and Dan Rather who, he said, "resisted the temptations of their bosses to go for the ratings grab." But he suggested that it will be years before any other anchor has "the clout to fight these battles."

27/01/2006