OK, It’s Been A Week, Maybe The McDonalds Lottery Ticket Lady Isn’t News
Hey, remember Balloon Boy? You know the story. How the Heene family started a media frenzy when they said their young son, the creatively named Falcon, was trapped in a balloon flying above the sky and then how it all turned out to be a hoax. Well, what if that balloon hadn’t landed? What if it just kept floating long after it was clear to nearly everyone that there probably wasn’t any boy in it? Would the media have just kept filming it day after day after day? That’s the question I was having while watching the ongoing news coverage of Mega Millions lottery “winner” Mirlande Wilson.
In case you’ve been blessed enough to miss this story, here’s the basic details. Wilson, a woman from Haiti living in Baltimore, went in on a group ticket buy with her McDonalds co-workers. She then claimed that she had won the big jackpot but with a ticket she had bought herself. However, she didn’t show the ticket. The media swarmed. McDonalds lady was everywhere. There were press conferences. Everything. Wilson is now claiming that she lost the ticket but is still looking. Meanwhile, all along there’s been the possibility that Wilson never had as much of a ticket as that balloon had a boy.
Yet, the media doesn’t care. Megyn Kelly just discussed the story for a whole segment of Kelly’s Court and, since no one has any actual information, the entire segment was just the panel making up ways Wilson could secretly hide the ticket from her co-workers by waiting a month, giving it to a friend, and then changing her name and going to Rio.
Don’t get me wrong, this wasn’t an unpleasant segment. In fact, it was kind of charming. It was like watching a group of friends day dream about the lottery.
…because that’s what it was. But the thing is, is that really news, per se?
Then, just an hour later, Shepard Smith did a whole segment on the hat Wilson was wearing at her press conference yesterday.
Look, I understand that it’s Friday. I understand the appeal of lottery stories. And I, like everyone else, find Shep Smith talking about swine hats to be hilarious. However, it’s seeming more and more likely that this woman is just lying. And, even if she isn’t, then she’s likely just trying to take money she’s supposed to split with her friends.
Either way, isn’t it time the media just turns their cameras off and slowly backs away?
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
