Dear CBS: Please Don’t…

I penned this week’s Outside Voices column for CBSNews.com’s Public Eye blog. In it, I ask CBS not to copy cable news tactics in pursuit of a younger audience:

Mr. Hartman, my request to you and your colleagues is this: Please don’t interview Natalee Holloway’s mother about every tiny twist and turn in her daughter’s case (Dozens of times since June, 10 p.m., FNC).

Please don’t cover the murder of a dancer with a “secret double life” (Tuesday, 6 and 9 p.m., MSNBC).

Please don’t cover teachers who have sex with their students (Monday, 10 p.m., FNC).

Please don’t cover “inmates on the loose” (Monday, 8 p.m., HLN).

Please don’t tease a story about a student handcuffed on a school bus (Tuesday, 9 p.m., FNC).

Please don’t spend several minutes stressing out about the ACLU’s “radicalism” (Monday, 8 p.m., FNC).

Please don’t try to scare viewers about “broken borders” (Five nights a week, 6 p.m., CNN).

Please don’t cover Nick and Jessica (Monday, 7 p.m., HLN).

Please don’t give PETA free public relations for advertisements titled “Your daddy kills animals” (Tuesday, 11 p.m., MSNBC).

Please don’t waste an hour chatting with Hugh Hefner and his three live-in girlfriends (Tuesday, 9 p.m., CNN).

Please don’t obsess over arrests in a California liquor store robbery (Tuesday, 7 p.m., CNN).

Please don’t pretend the arrests are breaking news (Tuesday, 8 p.m., CNN).

And please, please, please don’t cover the “War on Christmas” (Virtually every day, FNC).

Here’s the full column…