Continuing a locked thread. Why do I think that some people will be allowed to do this?
for the irritability of its participants.
The problem with the print medium, as opposed to radio and television is its lag-time and the fact that it should be properly researched, which can involve days, or weeks, or months viz. Watergate.
Television has ruined that consideration, that perspective. 30 years ago, no that's wrong, 40 years ago even television wouldn't have made the Dan Rather mistake, but in the succeeding 10 years, the speed of reporting demanded by the corporations that run the news as a profit center instead of a public service has eroded care. This has now infected the print medium leading to mistakes.
This is not the first time the print medium has made mistakes. It is generally agreed that the robbery in Braintree, Mass was pulled off by the Morelli gang under Joe Morelli, and whose brother wrote a biography confirming this. All of this is available via Wikipedia.
Newspapers, almost without exception called tor their execution, because feeling against them had been whipped up by the police and politicos in search of a quick solution. Newspapers pandered just the way talk radio does now to certain constituencies, but some few of them like the NYT and the Washington Post for a few decades struggled to fulfil higher standard and sometimes succeeded.
When CBS news first turned a profit in the mid 50's under Ed Murrow, Murrow himself said the equivalent of "There goes the ball game". He knew that they would soon be held to the entertainment standard, the ratings standard, and not to the standards of accuracy and probity that he held as important in a news organization.
I think we're due for a massive consolidation of newspaper organizations. Whether there is an equal emphasis on getting it right remains to be seen. It would make sense should they attempt to become the medium of sober second thought. God knows somebody needs to think intelligently and without partisanship about issues, but in the wake of Weyerhauser's support organizations for right wing voices, it seems unlikely to me.
Sorry but I'm deeply skeptical about all of this; there is too much money pushing one particular agenda not to have money pushing back. Money and truth or even accuracy are enemies.
Rob