Tastelessness in the news media and comedy

What is the world coming too? How did we get to the point that tastelessness and tackiness are the norm in comedy and news media?

I have been struck speechless two nights in a row over this very point.

The first is a tasteless "joke" made by David Letterman about Sara Palin's 14-yo daughter regarding an incident that happened at a Yankee baseball game. As I understand the story, the girl and her mom were at the game when Alex Rodriguez went after a fly ball and fell into the stands hitting the young girl. On Monday night David Letterman made a joke about Sara Palin's daughter getting "knocked up" during the 7th inning of the Yankee game. Here is a link to a youtube video of the joke.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5g8kE_g-YA

Now tell me, does this not sound like he is making the joke at the expense of the child who was actually at the game?

Of course, now Mr. Letterman is backpedaling after being called on his atrocious behavior, justifying it by saying the joke was about Governor Palin's older daughter, who had a baby last year. Seriously, am I to believe that makes it any better? I am disgusted. I am angry. I am this close to writing angry letters to the powers that be at CBS, the Letterman Show, etc. Please someone tell me, how is any of this funny?

The second appallingly tasteless event was on tonight's local news broadcast. Most people have heard of the sad, senseless loss of life at the Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. I am saddened for the people this event effected. I feel awful for the family who lost a father/husband/son. I am feel for the people who were going about their business, trying to enjoy their vacation and had to witness this heart wrenching event. So the news media felt that the appropriate thing to do in reporting about this story was to go find the child of the guard who died and stick a camera and microphone in his face to ask him how he felt when he heard the news. Seriously??? This is what the news producers thought was appropriate? A child lost his father today. He has not even had time to assimilate that information and he has a camera stuck in his face? I don't care who gave permission for this, it never should have been sought. There is a line here and the news crew bypassed it by a mile. I started to look for a link to the video proof of this but then I stopped. I refuse to perpetuate this travesty by posting a link for more people to watch it.

Enough is enough. It is time to return some sense of human decency to news stories, late night comedy, etc. I am so sick of this kind of thing. These are only two recent incidents. So many times lately I hear something in a news story or on a comedy show and think to myself, "what a tasteless thing to do/say". If these things are okay now, where is the line not to be crossed? Is there one anymore?

I am disgusted and angry. I don't think I will be any less disgusted and angry for a long while to come.