Posted on 01/05/2009 11:45:44 AM PST by AIM Freeper
Here’s an idea so atrocious that that it should send shivers down the spines of those who are fighting media bias — forcing taxpayers to subsidize said bias.
Many newspapers are in serious financial trouble, due to a number of factors — including alienating former subscribers with bias so blatant that it leaps off the pages.
The New York Times saw its ad revenue fall 16.2% from October 2007 to October 2008. Last year, its stock lost 66.8% of its value. The paper is planning to take out a $225-million mortgage on its Manhattan headquarters to cover operating deficits.
No surprise, then, that one of the bright boys in the mainstream media wants a bailout for the liberal press. A Reuters story, “Government Aid Could Save U.S. Newspapers, Spark Debate,” is a trial balloon.
Former Miami Herald editor Tom Fiedler, now the dean of the Boston University School of Communications, thinks it’s a capital notion. “I truly believe that no democracy can remain healthy without an equally healthy press,” Fiedler confides. “Thus it is in democracy’s interest to support the press in the same sense that the human being doesn’t hesitate to take medicine when his or her health is threatened.”
If the public must subsidize failing newspapers, why not television news shows, radio stations and Internet news sites as well?
Of course, Washington can’t provide a bailout to every newspaper that’s on the verge of going under. So which newspapers get bailed out and which are allowed to close? Clearly media outlets favored by the political elite will get the subsidies — The New York Times and not The Washington Times, The Washington Post and not The New York Post.
Instead of promoting democracy, newspaper bailouts would short-circuit the democratic process. Every time you buy (or subscribe to) a newspaper, you’re voting with your dollars for those you trust to report the news accurately and objectively.
Just as it is intent on overriding consumer choice regarding talk radio (by resurrecting the Fairness Doctrine), the left wants to force consumers to bailout its pet press.
http://boycottnyt.com/take-action
Sink or swim, Let them sink!
Never.
Thanks for posting the link. We’ve got to take action.
Actually, it should be called a “payoff” not a bailout.
We're with you, and the public will be with you. But then, the public opposed the Wall Street bailouts, so there is reason for concern.
My money is on a disguised newspaper bailout under the aegis of an "arts" bailout.
I fondly remember what Ann Coulter said about the NYT in the aftermath of 9/11.
The market has decided NOT to purchase the New York Times or advertisement there in. I'll be damned if my tax dollar will be spent on a NYT bailout. Who do I call to stop this?
And (giggling), we should bail out “move on.com, the DNC, and Clintons ltbrary.
Who do we fax in the government to stop a NYT’s bailout.
Try God or Col. Colt
You been to all those places Chgogal?
This is what happens when you torque off half your potential customers.
Don’t know when I have seen a more unfit industry. Apparently there are morons at the helm of every major newspaper in the US.
“My money is on a disguised newspaper bailout under the aegis of an “arts” bailout.”
I wouldn’t be surprised they’d be bailed out with some sort of tie to PBS/NPR.
The NYT is a Communist kamikaze, destined to die in flames on the deck of the “USS Bush Derangement Syndrome!”
And this should surprise anyone? With a lazy, gutless, do-nothing public and the arrogance of the left, why wouldn’t they prop up their own biggest cheerleaders. Using taxpayer dollars to scam, fleece and intimidate taxpayers. It’s the leftist way!
Which was...?
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