In the founding era journalism consisted of notoriously independent printers, and newspapers were weeklies. In the middle of the Nineteenth Century, the telegraph network was built up, and the Associated Press united the printers, even tho they remain nominally independent. The crucial independence which printers gave up in joining the AP lies in the assumption - essential to the exploitation of the telegraph - that all reporters within the AP network are objective. If that isn’t taken for granted, the printer has no basis for trusting reports from journalists in distant cities whom he has never even met, let alone vetted and hired. That explains the massive propaganda campaign promoting journalistic objectivity as the default assumption. The public has been subjected to that propaganda barrage since the memory of living man runneth not to the contrary.Whatever happened to that guy who wrote on this site, “soon the networks will be just a few of millions of urls on the web. Shortly after the 08 elections the network newscasts will go dark...” Who was that guy and is he still here?But if you look at all critically at the “journalistic objectivity" assumption, it crumbles of its own weight. The reality of journalistic perspective is quite distant from objectivity. The perspective which inheres in journalism is that the things which happened recently are important, and that the things that changed quickly are more important than those which change slowly, or not at all. Things which happen rarely are important, while things which usually happen are of no significance. And bad things are more important than good things.
The fundamental fact is that nobody can be certain of their own objectivity. That being the case, the most that can be expected is a good-faith effort at objectivity - and any such effort must begin with an open examination of the reasons why one might not be objective. The problem with that, tho, is that openness about the reasons you might not be objective would tend to negate the claim that you actually are objective. Any claim of actual objectivity is incompatible with any good-faith attempt at objectivity. And membership in an organization (e.g., the AP) which you know will claim objectivity for you is tantamount to claiming objectivity for yourself.
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Yes, I’m still here, but I don’t spend as much time here as I used to. I spend a lot of time on my own newsblog trying to do what I can to change the complexion of news reporting in my local area.
Everyone here on FRee Republic pretty much is in agreement on what is conservatism and why it is a good thing. It’s really a waste of our time to stay in the echo chamber reinforcing each others worldview.
It’s the rest of the electorate who needs educating.