Is frantic TV coverage giving us the business?

Fox Business Network anchor Alexis Glick says the network got caught up in the minutiae of the crisis. (Fox business network)

We're conditioned to turn to our television sets in times of crisis - to get our news updates in visceral, visual real time - and more often than not, TV delivers. It's a live-action thrill on election night, a collective way to experience the start of a war or the path of a hurricane. So it seemed natural to turn to the television this past week or two, as the nation's finances rolled under a bus and Congress debated a bailout plan.

But one thing became clear amid the breathless, wall-to-wall financial coverage: business news isn't regular news. Watching a financial crisis play out on TV isn't the same as watching an anchor in a slicker getting buffeted by high winds. Because in this case, the anchor can affect the direction of the storm. Or speak in a language you may not understand. Or get so caught in the market's momentum that it's hard to tell political analysis from panic.

Comedy Central's Jon Stewart has made great fun of anchors and reporters who struggled to explain the crisis to the common man: He scoffed when CNN declared that $700 billion would buy each American 2,000 McDonald's apple pies. It was hardly the only oversimplified analogy to hit the airwaves; on the CBS "Early Show" last week, financial correspondent Vera Gibbons set up a row of giant dominoes with labels like "Credit Crunch," "Home Values," and "Panic," then proceeded to knock them down. "That's depressing," was the commentary from host Julie Chen.

If the networks reduced things to kindergarten level, the cable business networks often had the opposite effect. Between the technical jargon, stock tickers and crawls, and as many talking heads as could be crammed into one screen (the top count appeared to be eight), a fairly straightforward credit crisis came across as something that requires an MBA to understand, and a jug of Pepto-Bismol to survive. Monday's precipitous Dow Jones drop brought doomsday talk. A full day later, a CNBC graphic trumpeted joy: "DOW'S BEST DAY IN SIX YEARS."

That fixation on the markets is a weakness of TV business channels, says Dean Starkman, managing editor of The Audit, the business-press section of the Columbia Journalism Review.

"They don't really cover business news," Starkman says. "They basically cover the stock market. One is a subset of the other. But to equate the two is insane."

To the average viewer, the frenzied coverage of highs and lows can erase much sense of meaning, says Andrew Leckey, director of the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University.

"The events of the last week were so fast-moving that just keeping up with what was happening was enough for television," says Leckey, a former TV business reporter. "It tended to be a little bit like being embedded. When you're riding in a tank taking over Iraq, it's a different feeling than if you're thinking about it a week later."

Of course, there is some comfort in seeing that the business reporters knew what - and who - they were talking about. On Wednesday, CNBC anchor/reporter Becky Quick was on the air, describing Warren Buffett's deal to invest in General Electric, when she suddenly announced that she had to take a phone call. From Buffett. Who was on an airplane at the time. The camera lingered on her, talking into her receiver.

A few minutes later, CNBC managed to get Buffett's voice on the air, and Quick exhorted him to pitch the bailout to average Americans. "It's a rescue plan for the American economy, not for Wall Street," Buffett said.

Most anchors and reporters seemed to agree, but translating that message proved a challenge. Fox Business News anchor Alexis Glick, the network's vice president for business news, said that by mid-week, she had learned lessons about how to translate financial ups and downs into practical terms.

"Sometimes we've been caught up in the mechanics of this story," Glick said by phone on Wednesday from New York. "We just get too inside the minutiae of the arguments that are going on internally between Wall Street and congressional members and economists. Our job is to deliver this to every single taxpayer . . . and maybe if people like me, just as much as people on Capitol Hill, did a better job describing this 12 days ago, maybe things would have moved a bit more quickly."

The line between business and politics has been a tricky one, too - particularly for the year-old Fox Business News, which can't always escape the reputation of its sister news channel. On Monday, after the House rejected the bailout package, anchor Neil Cavuto tried, unsuccessfully, to goad a White House economic adviser into blaming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Later, he gave billionaire Republican Steve Forbes a friendly ribbing about his support for the bailout: "I love you dearly, but I think you've sold your capitalist soul."

But FBN has also tried to position itself as the "Main Street" business channel, in opposition to the more insider CNBC. The network touted its decision to go live last weekend to cover the developing bailout package while CNBC aired reruns. (A triumphant ad declaring "We Own This Story" ran in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and on CNBC itself.) Glick has talked about the crisis on ABC's "The View" and "20/20," and on Barbara Walters's satellite radio show, emphasizing questions about personal finance.

FBN contributor Eric Bolling says viewers have "flooded the system" with questions and complaints about the bailout package; he received 2,000 e-mails during an unscheduled weekend special. "It's our job to say, 'Hey, look, whether you believe it's tied to you or not,' " the financial crisis affects you, he said. "The expansion in your town may not be able to take place because they can't afford the financing."

CNBC, too, has worked to cater to its expanding audience of financial neophytes. As viewership rose, Quick and her two co-anchors on the morning show "Squawk Box" started getting e-mails by the thousands from viewers, asking questions that a professional trader would never broach, such as, "What is LIBOR?" (It's the London Interbank Offered Rate, which helps to determine credit card and mortgage rates.) At times, to avoid oversimplifying the show, Quick has e-mailed answers back while on the air.

Many viewers are clearly appreciative; Quick's co-host, Joe Kernen, says some have e-mailed to say that after watching for a few days, they now understand much more of the business language they're hearing. It's a fringe benefit of viewing, at least, and more enlightening than watching dominoes fall.

Joanna Weiss can be reached at weiss@globe.com. For more on TV, go to www.boston.com/ viewerdiscretion.