ABSTRACT
The couch potato, that creature who has taken up residence in so many American homes, channel surfing and blind to the world around him, is also gaining a foothold in the ranks of broadcast reporters covering the US Congress of the '90s. The broadcasting technology that blanketed Capitol Hill in miles of fiber-optic cable has helped to transform work for the men and women who report on Congress. The newcomers to Congress were media smart, computer literate, fax crazy and eager for "face time," especially with network cameras. But newspaper reporters, who usually cover the beat without the presence of producers, technicians, researchers and occasional interns, could not be everywhere all the time. So they too began to rely on watching one key hearing televised on C-SPAN while waiting for congressmen to return their phone calls on other issues.
