Dogs have often been called man’s best friend, and the Obamas’ new Portuguese water dog Bo is no exception. However, publishing a series of books (see Bo: America’s Commander in Leash by Naren Aryal) based on this new addition to the presidential family is simply excessive publicity. Mass exposure in the media has turned what began as a harmless human interest story into full-blown commercialism.

While this example of an over-reported story has not directly hurt anyone yet (then again, who knows, maybe the paparazzi will be after the presidential canine next), there are other cases where the media has clearly been at fault for directly harming their subjects.

Paparazzi photos managed to expose Jon Gosselin’s supposed affair may have contributed to his pending divorce with Kate Gosselin. News coverage also managed to completely destroy Chris Brown’s squeaky clean image of being and transformed him into Rihanna’s violent boyfriend almost overnight. After the two were reunited, fans reacted with horror and shock–how could Rihanna give this abusive upstart another chance? Yet it’s clear that the media have skewed the facts here. Besides, the majority of us shouldn’t care enough about celebrities’ personal lives for this “news” (or more like snooping) to belong on the front pages of our papers. Celebrities don’t deserve to be treated in such an inhumane way either—after all, how would you like the entire world to know what you were doing every minute of the day?

This pattern of blowing stories out of proportion needs to stop. When information about the Obamas’ dog is reported on more often than news about swine flu (a search of “Obama dog” on the Google search engine comes up with 84 million results, while “swine flu” only generates 9.3 million, as of May 28), the priorities of news media need to be addressed. Obsessing over how cute the Obamas’ dog is will not help people learn about Obama’s policies, and uninformed voters lead to irresponsible governments.

To solve this problem, incoming journalists should be taught the clear distinction between what is real, hard news versus petty gossip. And while the media may be at fault for reporting such insubstantial stories, the public also needs to avoid indulging in such news. Instead of squandering our money on cheap magazines, we should be supporting the struggling journalism industry. So next time you see a magazine cover criticizing an actress’s “scandalous” weight gain, skip over it and pick up a newspaper instead. Who knows? You might learn something.