ble." One of the longest two articles in this section, which both fit on same page, is devoted to informing parents about a new on-line tool kit where they can claim if children's educational television programming is less than up to par. Arguably, this is news that people, especially American parents, can use.
The second piece in this section of U.S. News & World Report devotes itself to talking about what a successful Taiwanese movie director, Ang Lee, is about to direct. This smacks more like a motion picture studio's idea of how to promote a couple of new movies by one of its hot directors than it does of "news that you can use." But it is one of the few entertainment-related pieces in the magazine, whose pages are almost entirely devoted to what traditional journalists have always considered news instead of the often popular new breed of tabloid journalism.
The remainder of the page called with the "News You Can Use" heading is comprised of three more tiny articles. Under the art column we learn about an exhibit of an American landscape painter, which is interesting and informative, albeit short. The second column is titled "music" and talked about a book that you can buy about Hawaiian cowboys ($15.98). Again, this reads more like an advertisement for Warner Brothers books couched in the form of a news item than it seems news worthy of local, national or international interest. Finally, the last piece is an ad for a maplewood puzzle shaped like an autumn leaf ($29.95), which certainly seems more like advertising trivia than news. This kind of information does not empower the democratic citizen in any way except, perhaps, to encourage consumerism. Fortunately, the remainder of the magazine contains better stories and more informative news items than found on this catchy page which Mr. Fallows may have coined the heading for.
Both of the magazines selected for this analysis have several main components to them...