Celebrity obsessed culture killing Democracy?

Is our celebrity-obsessed culture is killing democracy as we know it? My husband said today that he thinks "real" news gets overshadowed by drama daily, and as a result regular people don't really hear about things going on in the world unless they are really dramatic.

This week's TIME discusses how the tragic flooding in Nashville got lost in the coverage of the NYC bomb scare and the oil spill in the Gulf. And it's pretty dramatic--the whole city is under water.