UFO Mania Was Nuts the First Time Around--Why Revive It?

It's depressing to see the massive promotional blitz ABC TV is mounting for the upcoming Peter Jennings "investigation" into UFOs. With all the truly important neglected stories that TV news could be covering, from Guantanamo to the depradations of the proposed Bush budget, it's appalling that ABC is devoting time to this crazy stuff. In combination with the growing repressiveness of the popular media, multiplying outbreaks of religious hysteria, and steady political drift toward rightwing extremism, the idea of Peter Jennings giving people's apocalyptic fears another irrational boost makes it seem as though we're reviving many of the worst features of 1950s.

If this is just a bad dream, someone please wake me up.