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2/6/11

USA: Reality of storms and Egypt unrest trumps Super Bowl - by TOM MAURSTAD

This might be remembered as the week that reality trumped the Super Bowl. In ordinary times, the week before the Super Bowl is all buildup to the big game. The media is abuzz as national and international press descend on Super Bowl City to generate colorful features about fashion, food and celebrity-filled fun.

But this past week has been anything but ordinary. Look out your window and you see evidence of the extraordinary times North Texans have been slip-sliding through — ice and frigid temperatures for several days, topped by a blanket of snow on Friday. And instead of Super Bowl frivolity filling television screens all week, news broadcasts have been a continuous stream of images of Egypt erupting in street warfare. That is, when they weren’t showing the snow-swept effects of the “monster storm” that blew over 30 states and 100 million people, shutting down airports and burying city streets.

The result: Reality has upstaged the showiest show of the year in America, the Super Bowl. Not the game itself, which, pitting two tradition-rich teams, has all the makings of a classic match-up. What has been upstaged is the Mardi Gras-style, made-for-media event of the days building up to the Super Bowl. If there are 12 days of Christmas, there are at least five or six days of Super Bowl. “In the best of times, the Super Bowl is a national obsession,” said Adam Hanft, social trends expert and co-author of Dictionary of the Future. “But we’ve been in this huge, intense news cycle — not just Egypt and the storm but also the shootings in Tucson, the debate over health care.

For more: Reality of storms and Egypt unrest trumps Super Bowl | Super Bowl XLV News - Sports News for Dallas, Texas - SportsDayDFW

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