Another test post while coding away, as usual in bed and watching TV: Is it in their genes, or why can “ordinary” Americans who have never been in the media in their entire lives deliver 50 minute press conferences, in front of dozens of cameras, just like that? Fill you in with all the details of the brother / husband / friend that has just frozen to death on a mountain, and almost effortlessly give you the bigger picture, how it all relates to God, how it was all meant to be, how the unfolding events made the family members better people, and, come to think of it, really all of us?
Somebody explained to me that this may be because the journalists are perfect in setting people up before they go live. But I am not convinced. A typical German would simply freeze in front of all those microphones, let alone be as camera savvy as many Americans prove to be when they are on national TV for the first time. So it comes down to genes, or perhaps to greater doses of daily TV (however, we might want to set up a study in Italy, a country of unsurpassed TV consumption) that prepare you for your 15 minutes. I’d really like to know.