2000 British readers of the Radio Times voted Homer Simpson for President. The cartoon character tops a list of several fictional TV characters, which UK tellly viewers would prefer as US president. According to the BBC, “The West Wing’s” “real” fictional US President, Josiah Bartlet, polled second, only slightly ahead of radio therapist Frasier (link via Pulpmovies blog).
While it is true that executing such a poll is utterly bizarre in itself, I must applaud those interviewed for assembling such a supreme cast for a fictional replay of the 2004 Presidential race. British humour at its best.
Naturally, the German ZDF television is not quite as subtle: The title of tonight’s feature about the President and the Senator was only slightly biased: “Cowboy vs. Gentleman.” Just another example of what Christoph Amend wrote about in last week’s “Die Zeit” (in German) – Fernsehweh (impossible to translate, the word means something like “it hurts to watch what is actually broadcast given our desire to watch something better” – true, German can be very concise at times).
Let’s not go overboard with the translation — Fernsehweh is a pretty normal headline pun. Literally it means “TV pain”, but it’s meant to remind us of “Fernweh”, the longing for what’s distant.