Educational TV

In 2004, television gave us untold hours of entertainment and information. But more than that, it gave us new insight. Here are a few things we learned, were reminded, or came to suspect thanks to TV this year:

Christmas is under siege and threatened with extinction! Only a sharp-eyed observer like Fox News Channel personality Bill O'Reilly could have spotted the undermining forces, obscured, as usual, by a flood of Christmas specials interlaced with Christmas advertising overstuffed with Christmas songs ("Good King Wenceslas" for Old Navy; "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" for Coke). It's a Christmas counterassault that's been in play at least since the airing of Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the designated kickoff of the yuletide buying frenzy.

But alert sentries like O'Reilly weren't distracted by TV's diversionary tactics. He understood that, while the rest of us were watching the umpteenth rerun of "Frosty the Snowman," a cadre of nonbelievers, secularists, elites and troublemakers were plotting to overthrow Christmas for everyone.

McCartney vs. Jackson

What else did we learn in 2004? Watching the Super Bowl on CBS last February, we learned what indecency is: Janet Jackson's bared right breast. Then, with the announcement of the entertainer for the 2005 Super Bowl halftime show, we found out what constitutes decency: Paul McCartney.

Odds are, McCartney will avoid any tactical errors on the order of Jackson's wardrobe malfunction, which triggered a new battlefront of the culture war. A year later, it continues to rage, with viewers still riled up, regulators out for bear and broadcasters spooked.

Red and blue

In hyping Brian Williams -- the newly coronated anchorman of "The Nightly News" -- as well as in other ways, NBC has driven home the political lesson of 2004: This is a red states nation; blue states people just live in it.

NBC seems determined that Williams, despite his New Jersey background, be identified as red states-friendly, and, despite his polished style and erudite manner, as a regular guy. And as a proud NASCAR fan. (In the new cultural divide, NASCAR is another way of saying red states.)

NBC president Jeff Zucker summed up Williams' bona fides in a USA Today story by saying, "No one understands this NASCAR nation more than Brian," a remark that spurred The New York Times' Frank Rich to write about "the NASCARization of the news."

But if that's what it is, it goes further than the news. Clearly, NBC aims to understand, and embrace, this NASCAR nation in broader terms. Since 2001, it has even aired NASCAR races.

It better do something. NBC in recent years has given us a crash course in programming mismanagement as it squandered its commanding lead in prime time, not to mention its high-toned, upscale image.

In last week's Nielsen ratings, NBC placed just one show in the top 20 viewer rankings. Significantly down from this time last season, it's scrambling for second place with a resurgent ABC.

No wonder. NBC's slate of new fall shows was its most timid and derivative in decades. The boldest stroke was "Father of the Pride," a shopworn cartoon sitcom most distinguished by its brazen product plugs. Meanwhile, the network squandered Heather Locklear in a witless melodrama about an airport, and Matt LeBlanc in its spinoff of "Friends," a departing hit from a bygone golden age.

In 2004, NBC only dug itself deeper as a network of rip-offs, where puffery and packaging substitutes for showmanship, where a tin ear is the substitute for vision. The Peacock Network is the Autopen Network.

Even in a divided America, this is something most everyone can agree on: NBC during 2004 proved painfully instructive in letting viewers down.