Sure Leni Riefenstahl deserves to be honored at the Oscars, but so does Penny Singleton. Maybe not so many people these days familiar with her but during the time they both impacted audiences in different ways.
These days we have thousands of channels, the internet, and a million other entertainment opportunities. Movies are simply another option. During WWII most people had a few clear radio stations if they were lucky and usually a single screen theater in town. "Going to the pictures" as some of the older folks call it was a
big part of American social life. It was their TV. People often went several times a week to watch serials, cartoons, features and it's where they got to "see" the news. The movie theater shaped the American public opinion as the more efficient TV & internet systems do today. Kazaa is full of facinating bits of America's own propoganda during WWII that was piped through the movie theater system.
Heck, Penny was involved in a little reverse propoganda with Blondie For Victory (1942) where she joins the Housewives of America for the war effort
Blondie was our grandparent's version of a hit sitcom. As we look to our sitcoms to provide comic relief from nasty world events, so did they. She brought comic relief to millions.
I still think it's tremendously tacky of them not to include her.