“What destroyed the present generation of journalism was not just that they live in coastal corridors of progressive groupthink...not just because they almost all graduated from liberal journalism programs that still regurgitate ossified Watergate psychodramas of investigative reporters as comic book heroes...over the last 20 years, marquee journalists saw themselves as wannabe celebrities who were to make news, not to report it, to massage stories in such a fashion to serve their social justice agendas, and to virtue signal their superior morality, as many revolved in and out of government.
What have they become instead? People with enormous self-regard, but with little experience with the public whom they were supposed to serve...” [from the original column at the American Greatness website]
Right on target, as far as it goes. I’d go farther: not only do today’s journalists know little about their public, they know little (or less) about anything.
But VDH has omitted key parts of the total story - strangely enough, noting his thoroughness, intellectual honesty, and current outlook.
Stranger still, conservatives prefer to ignore lapses like his.
There has never been a time in American history when newspapermen (nor, over the last century, their counterparts in broadcast media and online) promised to be objective, bias-free reporters of news. Applies to Colonial history before the founding.
Newspapers were founded to flack a political viewpoint, to attack or defend particular political candidates, officials, appointees, policies - not to report news.
Over time, publishers began to squeeze actual news in around the political screeds. They learned it helped pay the bills. And they became somewhat more accurate and objective when it suited.
Today’s execrable media hacks self-righteously point to the libel trial of John Peter Zenger, in New York in the 1730s, justifying all they do (or fail to do) by its outcome, favoring “freedom” of the press. But they cutesily neglect to point out that the offense Zenger was charged with - libel against the royal governor - was not an isolated incident, but just one incident in a long-running squabble between Zenger and the governor. “Truth” did not appear in print all that often.
As conservatives, we draw plenty of ire from the failings of the media, so many of which are outrageously offensive to the wider society, and provably damaging to the national interest. But we cannot claim that the media entered into any social contract, to behave as honest reporters, in return for lack of interference.
Here's what he said to someone who complained that he should censure his critics:
Put that paper in your pocket, my good friend, and when you hear any one doubt the reality of American liberty, show them that paper, and tell them where you found it. You cannot have a better proof of its existence.
Sir, the country where public men are amenable to public opinion — where not only their official measures, but their private morals, are open to the scrutiny and censure of every citizen — is more secure from despotism and corruption than it could be rendered by the wisest code of laws or best formed constitution.
Party spirit may sometimes blacken, and its erroneous opinions may sometimes injure; but, in general, it will prove the best guardian of a pure and wise administration. It will detect and expose vice and corruption, check the encroachments of power, and resist oppression.
Sir, it is a greater protector of the people's rights than arms or laws.
Thanks for your posts. The truth is refreshing.