The Golden Age Of Television And Innocence Is Long Gone

By Timothy D. Naegele[1]

 

We had the first television in our neighborhood: a black-and-white from Packard Bell.[2]  My mother had gone through a debilitating illness[3], and was essentially confined to my parents' bedroom on the second floor of our home in Westwood, a mile or so west of the UCLA campus in Los Angeles.

Thirty or so friends gave it to her as a gift; and she watched Arthur Godfrey and other talent of the times.[4]  Often I would watch it with her, when I wasn't in school or playing with my friends in the neighborhood.  It was heady stuff.

Fast forward to today, and most everything globally can be watched on a cellphone.  YouTube is terrific.  Films can be watched for free, if one "Skips" past periodic commercials.  The "legacy" TV networks (e.g., CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox) aren't worth watching, because of their political biases in one direction or the other.

Our news cycles change in a nanosecond.  Charlie Kirk was just assassinated in Utah; and a lovely young Ukrainian woman named Iryna Zarutska was killed by a total wacko on a train in North Carolina.  Yet, attention is focused today on late-night's uber-Leftist Jimmy Kimmel, and his on-again, off-again TV show.[5]

Who cares?

 

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© 2025, Timothy D. Naegele

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[1]  Timothy D. Naegele was counsel to the United States Senate’s Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and chief of staff to Presidential Medal of Freedom and Congressional Gold Medal recipient and former U.S. Senator Edward W. Brooke (R-Mass).  See, e.g., Timothy D. Naegele Resume-21-8-6  and https://naegeleknol.wordpress.com/accomplishments/   He has an undergraduate degree in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), as well as two law degrees from the School of Law (Boalt Hall), University of California, Berkeley, and from Georgetown University.  He served as a Captain in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War, assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency at The Pentagon, where he received the Joint Service Commendation Medal (see, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commendation_Medal#Joint_Service).  Mr. Naegele is an Independent politically; and he is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Law, and Who’s Who in Finance and Business. He has written extensively over the years (see, e.g., https://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/articles/ and https://naegeleknol.wordpress.com/articles/), and studied photography with Ansel Adams.  He can be contacted directly at [email protected]

[2]  See, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packard_Bell ("Packard Bell")

[3]  See https://naegeleblog.wordpress.com/2024/05/12/legacy ("Legacy")

[4]  See, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Godfrey

[5]  See, e.g., https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-15129375/Jimmy-Kimmel-trump-monologue-mark-halperin.html ("Why late night applause for Jimmy Kimmel's teary non-apology proves the Left really is living in an alternative universe: MARK HALPERIN")