Is the News

finished for good?

If so, it's a tragedy for what's left of our democracy.

I'd say the beginning of the end of it was during the Reagan years, with deregulation and especially with the end of the Fairness Doctrine. When the Fairness Doctrine died, the emergence of right-wing filth began in earnest with the rise of Rush Limbaugh:

An even more consequential, though much less visible, change took place in 1987, with the abolition of the Fairness Doctrine. Introduced in 1949, this rule required TV and radio stations to cover "controversial issues" of interest to their communities, and, when doing so, to provide "a reasonable opportunity for the presentation of contrasting viewpoints." Intended to encourage stations to avoid partisan programming, the Fairness Doctrine had the practical effect of keeping political commentary off the air altogether. In 1986, a federal court ruled that the doctrine did not have the force of law, and the following year the FCC abolished it.

At that point, stations were free to broadcast whatever they wanted. In 1988, several dozen AM stations began carrying a show hosted by a thirty-seven-year-old college dropout named Rush Limbaugh. Advertising himself as "the most dangerous man in America," Limbaugh attracted listeners by combining political jokes, thundering polemics, and outrageous overstatement. He spoke, he said, "with half my brain tied behind my back, just to make it fair, because I have a talent on loan from...God. Rush Limbaugh. A man. A legend. A way of life."

Limbaugh's program would never have existed if the Fairness Doctrine had been in place. He would have been obligated to present opposing viewpoints on his program.

While it's easy to pick on Limbaugh, his rise does mark the beginning of the end of responsible media and the beginning of wholesale propaganda by the radical right.

Blogs also come under scrutiny in this piece. It's true the most popular political blog right now is Daily Kos, but it is no longer a true blog but instead is a hybrid discussion board in a blog format. Outside of it, most of the major blogs are to the right politically and are little more than outlets for political operatives. And these blogs have the advantage of having connections to the larger network of right-wing think tanks, media, and all of the rest. The liberal bloggers do not and thus have much less impact.

Mary Mapes in her book Truth and Duty (a book I seriously doubt Jonathan Alter actually read, as his review linked below makes pretty obvious) hits hard against the blogosphere, which isn't accountable to anybody, and in the case of the phony Memogate, caused a great deal of damage to CBS, Dan Rather, Mapes, and others by peddling lies about the Killian memos. What we saw there was a classic case of propaganda at work by political operatives.

Just think of it: Anybody who strays from the right-wing script will be shouted down, have his or her reputation destroyed, while these thugs get away with their filth.

And there's no end in sight to it.