[conservatism_IS_compassion]

The money in the business of journalism is in entertainment, not truth. It is that imperative to entertain which produces the perspective of journalism.

I like to think that, after almost six years, the replies on [this thread] are closing in on some reasonably satisfactory answers.

I will try to get to the replies but I did read your article and I have to say it didn’t jibe with my instincts. The journalism as entertainment angle. Right off, I asked myself after reading it, if I were to rate print, tv and talk radio in order of entertainment value, print media is the least entertaining yet the most liberal. How would you answer that?

I instantly grant that I do not find journalism to be nearly as entertaining now as I once did. My daughter was stunned to learn that I used to listen to News Radio -

"You give us 22 minutes, we'll give you the world!"

But of course, that is not what you actually get. My daughter was stunned to learn that I used to listen to that drivel because for almost all her life I she has seen me treat "The News" like an ad for a product I wouldn't buy on a bet.

But more directly on point, consider the "News" dictum, "'Man Bites Dog,' not 'Dog Bites Man.'" The journalist (and the "liberal," who by journalistic convention is merely someone who, having no higher principle, reliably goes along and gets along with journalists) will tell you that journalists "objectively" apply that rule in deciding what stories they will emphasize. But what is that rule about? Will it inform the journalist that there is a rabid dog biting people, and the public must be warned? Au contraire! What it does is tell the journalist that dogs do bite people fairly regularly - and a headline announcing just one more case of a common occurrence will not succeed in attracting the reader's attention.

Now, as noted above, it's possible that the public interest requires that the public be warned about the dog - but the public interest may not be what interests the public. Indeed I would go so far as to assert that that is the normal state of affairs - that, for example, stories about Anna Nicole Smith (may she rest in peace) actually convey next to nothing relevant to the public interest.

I will make my case even stronger. The interest of journalism is to interest and impress the public. But journalism doesn't do things, it only talks. Therefore journalism exists to promote talk above action. And the easiest way to do that is to second guess the people who do do things. That would include businessmen, and a proclivity to second guess businessmen certainly matches up with the "liberal" mindset. Indeed, socialism is simply the setting up of authorities over businessmen whose credential is that they are good at criticizing businessmen and that they have no experience in actually doing business. But the military and the police also do things, and guess what - the fact that the military and the police are sine qua non essentials to the government that "liberals" supposedly love does not protect them from merciless second guessing by journalists, and by "liberal" fellow travelers thereof.

Again, consider the journalism rule that "you always make your deadline." Deadline pressure ineluctably causes reporters and editors to put out stories which actually deserve further investigation, or which actually do not deserve the attention which the journalists give them. Deadline pressure is a tendency of journalism toward superficiality. And the deadline is nothing more or less than the show business dictum, "The show must go on." Entertainment.

The Fairness Doctrine: A Brief History and Perspective

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

The Holy Order of the Sky Is Falling

. . . is the natural condition of a unified Big Journalism establishment. Journalism doesn't do anything, it only tries to attract attention and impress people with big talk. So naturally journalists will promote anyone who criticizes people who actually get things done. And the environmental movement is simply a reactionary criticism of the people who provide our SUVs and our gasoline. Hey, it's a lot easier than organizing efficient production of vehicles, or figuring out where there is oil . . .

"It is not the critic who counts . . . the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena - Theodore Roosevelt

The (il)logical conclusion of promoting criticism of anyone who does anything essential is to put critics - people who have zero track record of getting anything done - in charge of the economy. It's called "socialism" and, oddly enough </sarcasm>, it doesn't result in efficient production of anything but criticism and scapegoating. >