Why is there still an NPR? .. or PBS?
There shouldn’t be an Associated Press, either - the very name cries, “conspiracy in restraint of trade in news.” People of the same trade seldom meet together . . . but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or some contrivance to raise prices - Adam SmithThe AP “wire” is a virtual meeting of all its members - and it’s been in continuous operation for over a century and a half. Don’t you think we should be a little suspicious?
What would “a conspiracy against the public” by journalists look like? Obviously, it would promote the interests of journalists. What do journalists want to do? Attract attention and influence people. How do journalists do it? By promoting bad news, and by having the image of being objective. How do journalists gain the image of being objective? By going along and getting along with each other, claiming that all journalists are objective - and by expelling with prejudice anyone who claims to be a journalist but who does not go along. But nothing like that is happening with journalists today . . .
</sarcasm>
Because Establishment journalism claims to be objective in full knowledge of the fact that they are negative - that “if it bleeds, it leads,” and “no news is good news” (because good news “isn’t news”) - journalism betrays its own cynicism (only a cynic could believe that “negativity is objectivity”). Establishment journalism needs to be brought to book. The wire services are engines of conspiracy against the public, and - given that their only virtue is economy of transmission of news, at at time when that costs bupkis - they aren’t “too big to fail,” but simply “too big.”
We the people have a right to ideologically competitive journalism which is free of governmental favoritism of any kind. And that means that talk radio, which is nothing more than meta journalism - journalism about journalism - must be on equal footing with any other journalism in every respect before the law. In reality, because of the propaganda advantage Establishment journalism has enjoyed, talk radio hosts have had no choice but to be, in classical terms, “philosophers." They cannot claim to superior objectivity or wisdom - that would be arrogance - they have to be candid about their political perspective. And, since Establishment journalism completely fills the niche for socialist propaganda, talk radio hosts have to be conservative (always understanding that “conservatism” is a poor description of advocacy of liberty and of progress of, by, and for the people).
We the people have a right to ideologically competitive journalism which is free of governmental favoritism of any kind. But in fact “campaign finance reform” exists at the behest of the journalism Establishment, and not of the people. The FEC shouldn’t exist at all. The FCC is heavily inclined to promote Establishment journalism by insinuation of governmental imprimatur. Some restraint on that must be imposed. And SCOTUS should put the kibosh on any thought of abolishing talk radio.
In a strict de jure sense, New York Times Co. v. Sullivan - which was a 9-0 SCOTUS decision in 1964 - was unexceptionable. It stood four-square for the freedom of the press. It makes it very difficult for Democrat or Republican politicians to sue for libel. The only problem is that Republicans are libeled at the drop of a hat, and Democrats are not libeled at all, ever. And whenever a Republican is libeled by one newspaper, the rest of Establishment journalism piles on. SCOTUS must be brought a case which raises antitrust issues against the AP in particular and wire services in general, which gives SCOTUS a chance to level that playing field. Lowering the standard of “actual malice,” at least incrementally, would be a big step in the right direction.