Why Broadcast Journalism is Unnecessary and Illegitimate

The framers of our Constitution gave carte blance protection to “speech” and “the press”. They did not grant that anyone was then in possession of complete and unalloyed truth, and it was impossible that they should be able to a priori institutionalize the truth of a future such human paragon even if she/he/it were to arrive.

At the time of the framing, the 1830s advent of mass marketing was in the distant future. Since that era, journalism has positioned itself as the embodiment of nonpartisan truth-telling, and used its enormous propaganda power to make the burden of proof of any “bias” essentially infinite. If somehow you nail them dead to rights in consistent tendentiousness, they will merely shrug and change the subject. And the press is protected by the First Amendment. That is where conservatives have always been stuck.

And make no mistake, conservatives are right to think that journalism is their opponent. Examples abound so that any conservative must scratch his/her head and ask “Why?” Why do those whose job it is to tell the truth tell it so tendentiously, and even lie? The answer is bound and gagged, and lying on your doorstep in plain sight. The money in the business of journalism is in entertainment, not truth. It is that imperative to entertain which produces the perspective of journalism.

And that journalism does indeed have a perspective is demonstrated every day in what it considers a good news story, and what is no news story at all. Part of that perspective is that news must be new--fresh today--as if the events of every new day were of equal importance with the events of all other days. So journalism is superficial. Journalism is negative as well, because the bad news is best suited to keep the audience from daring to ignore the news. Those two characteristics predominate in the perspective of journalism.

But how is that related to political bias? Since superficiality and negativity are anthema to conservatives there is inherent conflict between journalism and conservatism.. By contrast, and whatever pious intentions the journalist might have, political liberalism simply aligns itself with whatever journalism deems a “good story.” Journalists would have to work to create differences between journalism and liberalism, and simply lack any motive to do so. Indeed, the echo chamber of political “liberalism” aids the journalist--and since liberalism consistently exacerbates the issues it addresses, successful liberal politicians make plenty of bad news to report.

The First Amendment which protects the expression of opinion must also be understood to protect claims by people of infallibility--and to forbid claims of infallibility to be made by the government. What, after all, is the point of elections if the government is infallible? Clearly the free criticism of the government is at the heart of freedom of speech and press. Freedom, that is, of communication.

By formatting the bands and standardizing the bandwiths the government actually created broadcasting as we know it. The FCC regulates broadcasting--licensing a handful of priveledged people to broadcast at different frequency bands in particular locations. That is something not contemplated in the First Amendment, and which should never pass constitutional muster if applied to the literal press. Not only so, but the FCC requires application for renewal on the basis that a licensee broadcaster is “operating in the public interest as a public trustee.” That is a breathtaking departure from the First Amendment.

No one questions the political power of broadcasting; the broadcasters themselves obviously sell that viewpoint when they are taking money for political advertising. What does it mean, therefore, when the government (FCC) creates a political venue which transcends the literal press? And what does it mean when the government excludes you and me--and almost everyone else--from that venue in favor of a few priviledged licensees? And what does it mean when the government maintains the right to pull the license of anyone it does allow to participate in that venue? It means a government far outside its First Amendment limits. When it comes to broadcasting and the FCC, clearly the First Amendment has nothing to do with the case.

The problem of journalism’s control of the venue of argument would be ameliorated if we could get them into court. In front of SCOTUS they would not be permitted to use their mighty megaphones. And to get to court all it takes is the filing of a civil suit. A lawsuit must be filed against broadcast journalism, naming not only the broadcast licensees, but the FCC.

We saw the tendency of broadcast journalism in the past election, when the delay in calling any given State for Bush was out of all proportion to the delay in calling a state for Gore, the margin of victory being similar--and, most notoriously, the state of Florida was wrongly called for Gore in time to suppress legal voting in the Central Time Zone portion of the state, to the detriment of Bush and very nearly turning the election. That was electioneering over the regulated airwaves on election day, quite on a par with the impact that illegal electioneering inside a polling place would have. It was an enormous tort.

And it is on that basis that someone should sue the socks off the FCC and all of broadcast journalism.

Journalism has a simbiotic relation with liberal Democrat politicians, journalists and liberal politicians are interchangable parts. Print journalism is only part of the press (which also includes books and magazines and, it should be argued, the internet), and broadcast journalism is no part of the press at all. Liberals never take issue with the perspective of journalism, so liberal politicians and journalists are interchangable parts. The FCC compromises my ability to compete in the marketplace of ideas by giving preferential access addresses to broadcasters, thus advantaging its licensees over me. And broadcast journalism, with the imprimatur of the government, casts a long shadow over elections. Its role in our political life is illegitimate.

The First Amendment, far from guaranteeing that journalism will be the truth, protects your right to speak and print your fallible opinion. Appeal to the First Amendment is appeal to the right to be, by the government or anyone else’s lights, wrong. A claim of objectivity has nothing to do with the case; we all think our own opinions are right.

When the Constitution was written communication from one end of the country to the othe could take weeks. Our republic is designed to work admirably if most of the electorate is not up to date on every cause celebre. Leave aside traffic and weather, and broadcast journalism essentially never tells you anything that you need to know on a real-time basis.

Journalism is free. Therefore journalism can please itself. What would please a journalist is simple - to be important and to be paid. Journalists seek to accomplish those ends by promoting the talk of the journalist over the action of the businessman, the policeman, or the soldier.
In that endeavor journalism has many allies, many fellow travelers. And, quite naturally, journalism gives positive PR and positive labeling to such people. Journalism calls them "progressive," "moderate," or - and oldie but a goodie - "liberal."
Journalists do not, however, call each other by those labels. They call each other "objective." But that is a distinction without a difference. Anyone whom journalists call by those other positive labels can get a job in journalism - and instantly obtain the label "objective" for the duration of the gig. But no one who does not merit the other positive labels will under any circumstances ever be labeled "objective" by journalists.
Can You Trust The National Media?
IBD ^ | Oct. 17, 2006 | IBD

Who says that the exercise of free speech must be used to argue or state the truth? The First Amend. means what it says---''no law'' ---It is intended to protect the speech we hate, that is untruthful and hateful for which the remedy is more speech and posts like your that exposes the speaker's fallacy and lack of candor. Today we hate, and thus supress the speech we find offensive or grossly false, tomorrow someone determines that your FR post is vengeful and generates a disruptive environment and, to prevent trouble in the streets, decides that your speech should not find a public outlet.

Passion, dissent, distortions, fabrications and outright lies are the speech to be most vigorously protected. Righteous, truthful, friendly and politically popular speech doesn't need protection. Thus, the ''right'' of free speech and its entitlement to immunity would be meaningless.

History is full of instances where righteous and truthful speech was squashed.

As to "politically popular", if that didn't need protection too, then a leftist could deny a conservative's right to speak on the grounds that the conservative view is politically popular among those who support the Bush administration.
24 posted on 10/18/2006 1:11:34 AM EDT by Dave Olson

Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin
Considering that what is not said can be as important as what is said, it is daunting indeed to reflect on what it would take for the government to suppress tendentiousness. It is only in that perspective that we understand the wisdom of the First Amendment's blanket ban on censorship.
The great problem I see with implementation of the First Amendment is the fact - alluded to in the article - that broadcast "speech" is actually the product of censorship. That is, if you were to disestablish the FCC with its restrictions on who could transmit at what frequency and where, broadcasting as we have known it would disappear. It would cease to be possible to rely on receiving a given signal in a given location. The government consorship which creates broadcasting is now compounded by McCain-Feingold which - predicated on the fatuous conceit that journalism is not tendentious - censors speech by others at the time when freedom of speech is most significant.
It is bad enough that the government is deciding who has "free speech" in that venue and who does not. The egregious problem is that the government promotes a multimedia establishment in journalism. Whatever is in the newspaper becomes truth acceptable to be said in broadcast news. The journalism establishment routinely performs the "newspeak" trick of defining words such as

"objective,"
"moderate,"
"progressive,"
"liberal,"
"reform,"
"society,"
"public," and
"the press"
- and probably other words which don't instantly come to mind -
in terms of its own interest.
"freeSpeech" on CBS News is Tantamount to Propaganda
The New Media Journal ^ | October 17, 2006 | Grant K. Holcomb

American forces said that the communists suffered a devastating military defeat. And most historians agree. But that was not the way Americans at home viewed it.

Because that treacherous communist bastard Walter Cronkite LIED about it.

Yes. But the fundamental of the situation was that we-the-people were credulous. And our children are credulous even now.
The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing . . . It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. - Adam Smith
People simply don't think through the implicications of having the government license journalists. You would think that that would produce conservative journalism, just as government control of Soviet journalism produced conservative (of the Soviet system) journalism. But in America that is not the case - no more than the BBC is conservative.
Or is it?! It depends on what you think is "conservative" here. In America, journalism comports itself as an Establishment, and part of the way it establishes itself is by implementing Newspeak word meanings:

"objective" means "tending to make journalism seem important" - usually at the expense of the reputation of people who work to a bottom line, such as police and the military, or businessmen. Applies to journalists only.
"liberal" means the same as "objective," but is never applied to journalists but only to people who are fellow travelers for journalists. A "liberal" becomes an "objective journalist" the moment he accepts a job as a reporter.
"moderate" means exactly the same as "liberal" does, and is applied the same way.
"progressive" means exactly the same as "liberal" does, and is applied the same way.
"society" means government.
"public sector" means government.
"conservative" means "working to a bottom line; accepting the real world and not PR as the measure of reality." That is the opposite of what the journalist means by "objective" (or "liberal" or "moderate" or "progressive").

What has happened in America is that broadcast journalism has allied itself with the journalism ofThe New York Times et al to create the Establishment of "objective" journalists and fellow travelers thereof.
Iraq: Shades of the 1968 Tet Offensive?
ABC News ^ | October 18 2006 | JOHN COCHRAN

It's undeniable that the doleful influence of journalism is what sustains the Democratic Party to the extent that it is even a strong minority, let alone a threat to gain control of Congress this year and of the WH in '08. I understand that people think that way; I yield to no one in my commitment to the idea that journalism has a leftist perspective - yet I myself was 35 years old before I became assured of the fact that journalism was slanted toward the Democrats.
Yet it is pathetically easy to show, logically, that we should expect that journalism would be leftist. It is only necessary to analyze journalism's incentives and admitted behavior, and the facts are there in plain sight:
Journalism doesn't do anything but talk. Therefore for journalism, and journalists, to be prosperous and influential journalism must promote talk over action.
Journalism promotes talk over action when it focuses on bad news, as it admits it does. Classic example: journalists criticize the administration because the news from Iraq is bad. The administration replies that journalism only reports the bad news, and not the good, from Iraq. Journalism replies, "Nothing unusual about that. Bad news sells." Then journalism repeats its criticism of the administration because the news from Iraq is bad! Journalism will argue that it always criticizes the government no matter who is in power but that is not true. Journalism second guesses action. An administration which takes no risks avoids criticism, and the Clinton Administration is the exemplar of the post-Vietnam Democratic Party - risk aversion and symbolism rather than substantive action.
Journalism second guesses corporations for not making enough product (i.e., for the "excessive" price of the product) and for using too much resource and polluting too much, and for not hiring enough people and paying them enough money.
Journalism criticizes the police for ineffectiveness and for brutality, and criticizes the military for those sins and for spending too much money.
Journalism promotes the State Department and the UN because, like journalism, they only talk and do not act. Ditto for trade unions and plaintiff lawyers and Civil Rights activists and liberal arts professors.
In short journalism promotes exactly the same things that the post-LBJ Democratic Party promotes, and journalism is critical of the same things the post-LBJ Democratic Party criticizes. But since the incentives and behavior of journalism didn't change after Vietnam and the behavior of the Democratic Party did, it is the Democratic Party which is in the pocket of journalism and not the other way around.
Journalism defines "objectivity" as whatever is in the interests of journalism, and positively labels anyone who accepts that definition. Thus while only journalists are labeled "objective," fellow travelers are labeled "moderate" or "progressive" or - the old favorite - "liberal." Those who do not accept those definitions journalism labels "conservatives," even though such people favor progress of by and for the people, while "progressives" oppose drilling in ANWR and building refineries and genetic engineering and so forth.
That is of course the height of arrogance, but journalism considers itself to be the definition of the public interest and is supremely indifferent to the charge.
Why Broadcast Journalism is
Unnecessary and Illegitimate
I have used "journalism" as a singular noun, treating it as a single entity. This is appropriate because ABC News and NBC News are competitors only in the sense that the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox are competitors - they try to defeat each other within the white lines of the ball field, but both promote attendance at MLB ball parks. And all journalists promote journalism first and their own journalism organ second. Journalism could not maintain its unity as the Establishment in America otherwise.

'The BBC is not impartial or neutral. It's a publicly funded, urban organisation with an abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people. It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias.'

Rush Limbaugh has expressed two main goals - to attract an audience and be able to charge "confiscatory advertising rates," and not to retire "until everyone in the country agrees with me." In their motivations - attracting an audience for influence and profit - journalists are no different from Rush. And like Rush, journalists don't do anything but merely talk about things.
IMHO the signal difference lies in the fact that Rush is far more open about his motivations and does not claim to be objective, as BBC in particular and big journalism in general - at least in America - do. The other difference between Rush and Big Journalism lies in the wider scope which Rush's program encompasses. That is, Rush discussess everything that journalism talks about - including Rush Limbaugh - but Rush also talks about the foibles and predilictions of journalism.
Big journalism's unwillingness to address the foibles journalism itself is the signal "bias" of big journalism. To particularize that statement, the unwillingness of any particular journalist to question the objectivity of any other journalist is the glue which makes Big Journalism cohere as an entity. And the resulting unchecked propaganda power of Big Journalism makes it the Establishment in America. That is what makes it possible for Big Journalism to float, as the most natural thing in the world, fatuous notions which boil down to the conceit that "What is good for Big Journalism is good for the country."

The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing . . .
It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. - Adam Smith

Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin
We are biased, admit the stars of BBC News
Daily Mail (UK) ^ | 10-21-06 | SIMON WALTERS

promote ourselves and our own interests.

Kind of a hard wired human trait.

My point exactly - if you assume that journalists are not the paragons of virtue which they present themselves as but rather are selfish and cowardly, you can understand their behavior far better than if you try to start with an ideological assumption that "they say that because they are liberals." No, they say that because they are self-centered and cowardly, and the result is what gets called "liberal."
Because they are cowardly, they have no interest in fighting a fair fight with someone else who "buys ink by the carload." Far better to cooperate - "I'll call you objective if you call me objective" - than to take up the challenge of actually trying to be objective. Do that, and first thing you know you will find yourself in the uncomfortable position of having to point out that the emperor isn't even wearing BVDs.
Cowardice and self-centeredness explains why journalists criticize not only the "capitalists" who provide our food, clothing, shelter, and fuel but also the police and military without which the socialist's beloved government could not exist as an effective institution. The defining characteristic of the target of the journalist is that they are competitors with journalists for the respect of the public but

targets are vulnerable to journalistic attack because they do not buy ink by the carload, and
targets don't defer to journalists when journalists (inevitably) project their fantasies onto the reality in which the target functions under a bottom line discipline.

See? What Did They Tell You?
Rick's ^ | 10/22/06 | Rick Horowitz

some enterprising person out there . . .......... [should] start up a national newspaper like USA today, and print the truth. Something on the lines of a FOX news channel only in print form . . . there is a huge block of newspaper readers out there who would love a source of truth on paper . . . that did not make you sick or feel like you were supporting lefty propaganda.

The rules of the news business - I mean the actual rules, not the codes of ethics that they frame and hang on the wall - run directly counter to that project.
The first rule of journalism is that journalism as an institution is important. Under that rule journalists as a class are more important than the farmers who provide our food, the water company that provides our water, the retail stores that provide our food and clothing and fuel and appliances and hardware, the preacher who stabilizes our society and culture with enduring perspective, the soldier who protects our polity and the policeman who enforces our laws.
The first implication of that rule for journalists is "solidarity uber alles" - nothing is more important than avoiding flame wars within journalism. Just as Reagan (of blessed memory) said of the Republican Party, journalists obey the "Eleventh Commandment" - "Thou shalt not speak evil of a member of your own." And the second implication of that rule is that anyone who does not respect the rule that talk is more important than reality and the bottom line - is neither a journalist nor a fellow traveler thereof (such as a leftist politician, plaintiff lawyer, unionist, or other professional complainer) - is the target of merciless criticism and second guessing.
Thus, whole cities can be built with less fanfare than accompanies the accidental destruction of a factory building by a fire which kills a dozen people. Thus, Iraq can be invaded, its infrastructure rebuilt better than new, and a more liberal (not in the Newspeak sense) polity can be instituted there with less fanfare than accompanies a paltry handful of abuses by individuals in the US military. And so forth and so on.
What you propose is the institution of a journalism which doesn't limit itself to what institutional journalism defines as news. That is an exact description of talk radio. Institutional journalism sniffs that "Rush Limbaugh is not a journalist, not objective," when what it means is that conservative talk radio focuses on things that institutional journalism ignore - especially the foibles of institutional journalism itself. And that, for a journalist, is taboo, a violation of the eleventh commandment. It is, by institutional journalism's definition, not journalism.
INVISIBLE HEROES Why Iraq war seems almost devoid of heroes
chicagotribune.com ^ | Nov 5, 2006 | E.A. Torriero

The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing . . . It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. - Adam Smith

Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin

We tend to believe all the threads in FR about the demise of the MSM. They are alive and well and more powerful than ever.

Not more powerful than ever, no. But definitely a major influence on people who can't, don't desire to, read between the lines (I dislike the term "MSM"; it is the Journalism Establishment that we are discussing).
Establishment journalism was what did in Joe McCarthy, though historically McCarthy was in the right and was far more sinned against than sinning (thanks, Ann! Just reread Treason. Absolutely amazing that journalism can still stonewall that issue, with the historical record in plain sight). Establishment journalism is what turned Nixon out of office for things which other presidents had done far more than he. And Establishment journalism is what protected Clinton after he went to court to try to keep justice from being done, and lied to the judge under oath.
You would think that senators with defending that malfeasance would have to answer to the voters for it, but never a peep was heard of it, ever. And that is what justifies fear that our knowledge of the unbridled corruption of Hillary will have no effect in '08.
But the Internet does have some influence, primarily through its amplification via Rush and talk radio - and that is where we can expect to see the effort of Establishment Journalism to be focused next year. IMHO the establishment will attempt to suppress Rush by resurrecting the "Fairness" Doctrine. "Fairness" being defined, as in the bad old pre-Reagan days, as "conforming to the consensus of establishment journalism."
When that happens, it will go to SCOTUS, where the 5-4 majority which upheld the unconstitutional McCain-Feingold law no longer sits. It is now 4-3-2, with Roberts and Alito having not yet ruled. If Kennedy holds and Roberts and Alito rule correctly, not only the Fairness Doctrine but McCain-Feingold will be overturned. I would have them go further and rule that print journalism and the Internet, which are open to entry of new newspapers/web sites, are unambiguously protected by First Amendment. But that does not mean that they are not tendentious, but that they have a right to be tendentious - and that the government has no authority to award any journalist, or all of them, any presumption of objectivity. They are not under oath, and they are not subject to laws against perjury.
OTOH broadcasting, being a creature of FCC censorship of entrants into the field of radio transmission of speech, merits strict scrutiny to assure that the government (FCC) is not serving as a megaphone for a particular political POV . . . which is most assuredly what the FCC now in fact does by allowing licensees to promote the conceit that establishment journalism is objective.

The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing . . . It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. - Adam Smith

Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin

God help us if this scary woman (and her husband) returns to the White House
The Daily Mail ^ | 10th November 2006 | Ann Leslie

the "journalists", have NO constitutional role in the Federal Government because the constitution does not define who is a journalist (or Talking Head or pundit) beyond the guarantee that congress shall make no law abridging their right to free speech (which we all have) and to go beyond mere speech, printing and publishing freedom is specifically spelled out. As Dan Rather found out the Pajamahadeen have as much right as he does to speak to the masses. If the press had a place at the table there would be a specific balance beyond mere libel laws.

Agreed. The conceit that journalism is objective is supported only by, and supported by no less than, a massive propaganda campaign by journalism and fellow travelers thereof. "Fellow travelers" of journalism? Yes, because Objective Journalism^TM is best understood as a political party, and "liberals," "progressives," "centrists," and "moderates" are all mere labels for people whose political attitudes qualify them to be journalists but who do not actually have a job in journalism. And "objective" is the label reserved by journalists for journalists alone.
Notice if you will that all the above labels are virtues. Moderation is a classical virtue, and objectivity is a near synonym for another classical virtue, wisdom. Centrism is a near synonym for moderation. And "liberal" and "progressive" are American virtues. And to the extent that progress is an American virtue, conservatism - the label assigned to opponents of the Objective Journalism^TM party - is a vice.
There is a remarkable symmetry between the Objective Journalism^TM party and the classical Sophists. Sophists argued from the assumption of their own wisdom (indeed the Greek "soph" meant "wisdom"). Their logic went something like this:

I am wise.
You are not wise.
Therefore you are wrong and I am right. QED.

The philosophical school reacted to that sophistry by saying that it is arrogant to argue from the assumption of your own virtue, and they did not call themselves wise but lovers of wisdom (philo = love, sophy = of wisdom). Just so we must insist on, as Rush puts it, "a relentless pursuit of the truth." We resist the propaganda pressure from Objective Journalism^TM to cow at the claim that journalists are above the people.
"The people," as the Constitution refers to us, have freedom of speech and freedom of the press. At this point in history every Tom, Dick, and Harry can exercise not only freedom of speech but freedom of the press by use of their computer. Journalists refer to themselves as "the press" as a way of conflating journalism and "the press." But not only is journalism a mere subset of "the press" (which includes book and magazine publishing and, in modern circumstances, Freeping), not all journalists have freedom of the press. Absurd, you will say? Well, just try to transmit a news report on the radio waves without a license, and see where it gets you. Broadcasting is a creature of government, and specifically of government censorship. The First Amendment has nothing to do with the case.
Giving newspapers breathing room (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™)
Christian Science Monitor ^ | November 14, 2006 | Staff

Being a product of the Fifties, I remember when the media reported the facts and the American people made up their minds.

I was in HS in the mid 1950s. As such I can remember when I thought that journalism "reported the facts and the American people made up their minds."
And yet when Ann brought out Treason, discussing Sen. Joseph McCarthy, it reminded me of my contemporaneous thoughts about the controversy surrounding him. Namely, that it didn't make a whole lot of sense for people who were talking to the entire country to be complaining about being censored. If they were able to talk about this "right wing censorship" on nationwide TV networks, that just proved that if it was "censorship," it was not particularly effective censorship.
But there was censorship going on back then - and the same censorship is going on right now. Not government censorship, but self censorship of, by and for the Establishment which is Big Journalism. It is what requires journalists - faced though they may be at a given moment with incontrovertible evidence to the contrary - to claim that all other journalists are "objective." And it is the possibility of being placed in that untenable position which assures that "objective journalists" don't spend much time talking on conservative talk radio. That self censorship is not required by law. But it is what holds the Big Journalism together as the establishment, and what keeps any given journalist within it. Journalists play by that rule, or they are "not a journalist, not objective."
For example, Rush Limbaugh would seem to qualify as a journalist in every respect - except that he does not abide by the rule against questioning the objectivity of establishment journalists, and he has the humility to refuse to claim that he himself is objective, openly admitting that he has his own perspective. So he is "not a journalist, not objective."
The truth of the matter is that journalism's topical nature systematically restricts the field of truth which journalism is willing to address, or at least to emphasize. And since, as Benjamin Franklin put it, Half the truth is often a great lie, the "system" of that systematic restriction matters a great deal. Journalism selects its facts (not to mention the occasional fiction) on the basis of

how unusual the occurrence was, and

how recent the occurrence was (thus, how likely it is that the reader hasn't "already heard this one").

It is true that those criteria are perfectly sensible from the perspective of journalism's business need to attract attention. But, freedom of the press considerations notwithstanding, the public interest is not identical to Big Journalism's business interest. It should not be necessary to point out that wars and natural disasters make "great copy" - and cause journalists to work overtime - precisely because they are inimical to the public interest.
Journalism's goal is to interest the public. Journalism conflates "interesting the public" with "the public interest," even though the former is often inimical to the latter. A topical example of this is the news from Iraq - actually the "newses" from Iraq for there are really two different sources for such news:

News reported by the US military. Such reports include bad news but they also include good news - heroism among the troops and good deeds done by them such as constructing public works there.

Big Journalism's reports from Iraq. There is not a dime's worth of difference between the various organs of Big Journalism; if you've seen one you've seen them all. The hallmark of these reports is negativity; they contain no or next to no good news. A debate which begins and ends with the fact that news from Iraq as reported by Big Journalism is all bad is a sham.

Since it is Big Journalism which labels political opinion, Big Journalism's (homogenous) opinion gets positive labels and opposing opinion gets negative labels. Labels such as "objectivity" (which reporters reserve for reporters only) and "moderation" (a.k.a. "centrism") are clasic virtues; "liberalism" (as in "liberty") and "progress" are American virtues. If you wish to be given one of those virtues as a label by journalism, it is easy to obtain - simply go along and get along with the arrogant, negative, superficial perspective of Big Journalism.
If you are unwilling to cheer while the people with the positive labels mercilessly second guess those who actually do necessary things (like providing food, clothing, shelter, and security), you will have to content yourself with convincing yourself that a negative label such as "conservative" (the opposite of "progressive, hence an American vice) is really good since it connotes a respect for tradition (which is BTW true).

The way to understand the First Amendment, and to understand which government policies violate it, is to ask questions about newspaper publishing:

Does money invested in a printing press have to come only from an existing print operation? Can it be illegal for a newspaper to incorporate and sell stock to people who are not journalists? To the contrary, money to be invested in a newspaper can come from a poor man frugally saving his money, or from a shipping tycoon or from a gas station owner.

Does a newspaper have to earn a profit, and does it even have to charge a fee for its product? No, a newspaper can be free, and it can operate at a loss - may become a sinkhole of money for its investor(s), and may finally go bankrupt.
Is a newspaper required by the First Amendment to be objective? To the contrary, the First Amendment means that a newspaper does not have to be objective.

If the government did attempt to require newspapers to be objective, would it be possible for any newspaper to meet that standard? No - for the simple reason that
Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin
Since nobody ever can know, much less print, the entire truth, it would be impossible to ever prove the negative than any given report was not tendentious in omitting some fact from the report.
If there is no restriction on the source or quantity of money which may found a newspaper, and if requiring newspapers to be objective would be unconstitutional and absurd, by what logic is it possible legally to prevent a newspaper from being associated with a political party, being sponsored by a political party, or even being a political party?
To operate a newspaper is to exercise a constitutional right, and in no sense a duty. I cannot be required to found a newspaper, and I cannot be required to continue to operate a newspaper if once I have founded or otherwise acquired it. I can sell it, to anyone. Including, to the only other newspaper in town. Newspapers are free to collude with each other; it cannot be legally prevented. One newspaper can conspire with another to each assert that the other is objective, without evidence. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. If newspapers have any motive to do so, they can operate in league with each other just as much as two major league baseball teams do - competing within agreed boundaries, and otherwise colluding with each other. They can form a joint operation to share rights to news stories amongst themselves. They can all join one guild. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. If each of them has the same motive to select the same sort of story for front page emphasis, for inclusion in the body of the paper, or for systematic omission from any mention, they all can behave in the same way - and and if the result is that they all exhibit the same political tendency, they can do so without restraint. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. They can compose, or subscribe to an existing,
Code of Ethics
which they publish and/or post on their office walls. They can even make an effort to adhere to such, if they choose. Or not. Newspapers are free.
If newspapers are free to do all of the above, and if they have motives to do any or all of the above, there is not the slightest reason to be surprised, or offended, at any evidence (no matter how strong) that they actually do so. In fact, if they have motive as they have opportunity, it is only rational to assume that they will routinely do it. Just as bears are in the woods, and bears have motive to drop excrement - and probably do so there.
The proofs of newspapers' political tendency which Ann Coulter presents in her books - Slander certainly, but also in Treason and Godless - should not surprise us. The only reason it does, is because we have been taken in by a massive propaganda canpaign.
What does that mean in relation to Campaign Finance regulation? It means that all such regulations are unconstitutional. But it also means something else. It means that when broadcasters ape - nay, amplify - The New York Times and other newspapers in order to produce broadcast journalistism which is putatively "in the public interest" appeal to such example is no evidence at all of conformance with the public interest. It may interest the public - and since that is a motive of The New York Times, it probably does - but that is different from, and often antithetical to, the public interest.
Broadcasting exists because of censorship of the many so that the transmissions of the few can be recieved over a broad area. Broadcast Journalism is illegitimate.

McCarthy became a pariah because he fell into a trap common to people who become passionate about an agenda.

Some times "the medium is the [real] message," and the medium denies the nominal message. That is illustrated by a story by the B&W TV standup comic Herb Shriner:
A man walked up to my sister in the lobby of a hotel once and handed her a note. It read, 'You are the only woman I have ever loved. Please come to me in room 216.'
She wasn't sure it was sincere, though - it was mimeographed!
(For those of you in Rio Linda, a mimeograph was the kind of duplicating machine people used before there were Xerox machines. The markings it produced on paper were a distintive blue color).

In the spirit of Shriner's joke, Leslie Fiedler in 1954 captured the essence of the smear perpetrated on (not by) Joe McCarthy thusly:
From one end of the country to another rings the cry, 'I am cowed! I am afraid to speak out!', and the even louder response, 'Look, he is cowed! He is afraid to speak out.'
You cannot, after all, scream on nationwide TV that you are afraid to speak out, without having the medium of the message drown out the nominal message. If you are so afraid to speak, how come you're on TV speaking??? If you tried to speak out like that on TV in Iraq under Saddam, you would go into the plastic shredder before you got near a TV broadcast studio. Allowing Saddam appologists to point out that you never heard anyone complain. And that Saddam got essentially all of the (public, not secret) ballot.
Yet it is just this sort of "proof" that liberals rely on to convince people that McCarthy was censoring people for no reason. But mostly, they depend on not having to prove their smears. Ann documented this thoroughly in Treason - but although she was able to get a book tour, she was always "balanced" by a liberal critic as well as the "neutral" moderator who was in fact as liberal as the "balancing" critic.
Religious McCarthyism
Wine Skins ^ | 2005 | Keith Roberts

The tenor of the main stream media is more positive since the election because the members of the press feel better. They feel better not only because their guys won, but because they feel (correctly) that they had a big hand in the victory. And, in the end, the news coverage we get from the press is all about them.

This is why it is important to have partisans of both stripes in the press. The problem today is that all we have are democrat partisans in the main stream press.

First paragraph dead on; second paragraph has a hitch. Exactly because "it's all about them" with journalists, and journalism does nothing except criticize, condemn and complain, it is impossible for journalism to be anything other than socialist.
Because socialism is exactly criticism and second guessing, Big Journalism is a political party of the left. And, since the Vietnam era, the Democratic Party has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Big Journalism. And since second guessing makes you look smart when you are out of power but doesn't qualify you to be dog catcher let alone POTUS, the logical result of Big Journalism in power is the Clinton "symbolism over substance" "continuous political campaign" presidency. Unable to actively take risk, but doomed to take the enormous risk of paralysis and inaction.
A New, More Prosperous Black Friday For the New Democratic-Controlled Age
Tonwhall.com ^ | 11/25/06 | Mary Katharine Ham

The drumbeat of collectivism—the submission of the individual to the state—was the 20th century’s most characteristic political feature, and each new form was nearly as appalling as the last. Even today, the world has not learned this lesson. The siren song of autocracy—the forging together of a nation, a religion, a race to increase its collective power—relegates society to near-perpetual adolescence.

Big Journalism is the establishment in America. It coheres as an entity by assigning positive PR to its components and its acolytes. It is an entity in the same way that Major League Baseball is an entity - even though its components, such as the Yankees and the Red Sox, are bitter rivals between the white lines.
Big Journalism coheres in its mutual-admiration-society promotion of self by promoting other society members, and it coheres in its ideology. The ideology of journalism is, simply, that journalism - not the taking of necessary action but the reporting of the bad things which happen, and the second guessing of even the good things which are done - is the important thing.
The ideology that criticism trumps action is a "symbolism over substance" virtual reality in which PR is the only thing that matters. It is an ideology in which no good deed is ever good enough, and therefore no risk is worth taking. It is an ideology which promises greatness but delivers only scapegoating and indecision. It is in short the ideology of the Clinton Administration, the ideology of adolescence. The ideology of socialism.
Milton Friedman, the Father of Economic Freedom
Heritage Foundation ^ | 11/20/06 | Tim Kane, Ph.D and Bill Beach

The rule of law, equality before the law, moral individualism, capitalism, federalism, the invalidity of racism but also the dangers of pomo-style (judgement-free) multiculturalism, the necessity for strong families... so many foundations of our society are firmy & safely rooted in the objective reality of human nature. All these principles have been evolved, some of them over centuries, because they work here in the real world. No, not every truth is "self-evident", unfortunately. Many truths need to be learned & re-learned in many permutations before they're fully understood and appreciated, and this can be a long, painful process indeed. But objective truth is out there, waiting for us to discover even more of it than we have already.

I respect your desire to think so. But the truth is that you are arguing for an "objective truth" which deifies history and cultural memory. The things you say we have painfully learned are still highly controversial in the Democratic Party in this country and just about universally worldwide. If we have learned anything it should be the rueful lesson that we do not easily all learn the same things from history.
George Washington also respected your desire to think so - enough to rebut it:
Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.
Washington goes on to assert,
It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government.
. . . and then to ask,
Who that is a sincere friend to [free government] can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?
Thomas Sowell points out that slavery (which we can agree is, from the POV of the slave, indisputably the antithesis of "free government") was an accepted institution worldwide and throughout history - until Christianity became hostile to the institution of slavery as such. That opposition only really congealed in the Nineteenth Century. And it was most effective through the English speaking peoples: the British Empire and the northern US.
Obviously Southerners, although Christians, were not in the vanguard of that particular program - but nobody other than Christians - not pagans, not Confuscians, not Hindus, not Animists, not Muslims - was in the vanguard of that movement. Even the Republican Party did not become abolitionist until halfway thru the Civil War. And even that, ultimately, traces to the exaggerations and distortions in the South of Lincoln's and the Republican Party's actual intentions regarding the "peculiar institution" in the South. Exaggerations and distortions which tragically led the South to secede.

the invalidity of racism

is a recent lesson. South or North, racism still exists some. That's smog from the past, but it carries over into attitudes which still affect behavior, and create cultural frictions, today. Even with the ugliness of our past, we have not descended into the sort of genocides here which, alas, are still a feature of the African landscape. But it does result in the traditional targets of that racism taking political attitudes which run counter to what you would consider the lessons of history.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1732037/posts?page=113

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.