Transatlantic cleavage.

The author compares the reactions of the U.S. and the British media to the baring of singer Janet Jackson's breast on live television during the Super Bowl half-time. Competition, this newspaper believes, has beneficial effects pretty much everywhere. This week's British newspapers may lead higher-minded readers to disagree. On February 1st, a breast belonging to Janet Jackson, a singer, escaped during Super Bowl half-time. High-brow American papers reported the incident, but with no photo. Low-brow papers pictured the recapture, but not the breast. Michael Powell, head of the Federal Communications Commission, called it a "classless, crass and deplorable stunt". There is to be an official inquiry. This seems odd to Britons, whose smaller broadcast channels keep themselves afloat on a sea of smut. Not only tabloid newspapers, but also the Times and even the Daily Telegraph (average age of reader 55) showed the star's spangled nipple, waving joyfully in the wind. Why the difference? Maybe because secular Britons are no longer shockable, while Americans have clung to their religion and associated puritanism. The Economist, of course, deplores the degradation of the British press. As a service to American readers, who should know how low it has fallen, we reprint the picture below.