Not Waiting For The Asteroid

Rolling Stone has researched and published far more about about the criminalization of the financial industry, than The Wall Street Journal or any other traditional media.

The mutation of the old line newspapers into leftist pamphleteers allowed them to be absorbed by the con artists, the social lunatics, and the white-collar criminal elements of society.

Should doctors operate on themselves? Should journalists write about themselves?

Self inflicted wounds. When the MSM stopped reporting on what happened and started telling us what we should think about what happened they jumped the shark.

When they simply stopped reporting some stories because they don't fit the narrative they lost all credibility.

When they started planting stories to further the political agenda of related interested parties they became corrupt.

Those of us who want the unvarnished truth no matter who it offends started to look elsewhere.

Ezra Levin nails it.....

"The Media Party"......

Welch believes that too many in the legacy media just can't understand how their businesses are being beaten by consumers-turned-'journalism creators', bloggers and outsiders, and he makes a good argument. He contends that the internet has brought an onslaught of competition to the once scary media empires (that he predicted, of course). But I'd expect at least a brief mention of those in the legacy media that have held or gained circulations, like the WSJ, and why. In avoiding that question, he misses the point that content matters, too.

Media
As long as we are trusted, we protect Democracy.
As long as we are trusted, we shape Democracy.
As long as we are trusted, we lead Democracy.
As long as we are trusted, we CONTROL Democracy.

General Public.
Sorry but we haven't trusted the media in a very, very long time.

Oh they'll always have their limited role.

For example, they can gather and report the basic information that there was an earthquake and tsunami. Then we the information consumers can seek out appropriate analysis elsewhere, from competent sources, leaving the Media Party behind to speculate to their cretinous followers about the oil industry or the Jews causing the earthquake.

The media wouldn't know anymore how honest people live or make a living. They are to politically cloned, as well, monetary walled off from reality.

In 2004 an amazingly obscure typewriter history nerd with a blog catches Dan Rather and CBS's 60 Minutes -forging- documents about the incumbent during a Presidential election, and blows them all out of the water with The Truth. Dan Rather resigns in disgrace and is never seen on TV again.

That was the .50 caliber bullet to the giant Newsosaur's tiny walnut sized brain that finally killed it deader than a mackerel.

It's @ss still hasn't got the message, its still pumping out the same old...

While the internet has increased the ability to create, publish and read OPINION pieces, it has not done so for investigative journalism. Independents with computers do not have the connections or the finances to dig deep, only to troll the internet for background.

What we commonly see now as "news" is more hearsay or gossip than anything else. This is the worrisome aspect of the loss of mainstream journalism. We learn quickly of a governor's infidelity, but not of the practical ramifications of his policies. The collapse of the solar panel companies in the States, for example, shows up as a scandal for the politicians without it being the initiator for a review of solar energy economics, technologies, practicalities and ideology.

The blogosphere is developing niche specialists with a core of writers, but as long as it is not financially worthwhile to work fulltime in investigative pursuits, it cannot replace those who followed subjects deeply and seriously.

Jullian Assange has showed up what the future of investigative journalism is: a dump of information that others can worry at and pronounce on with respect to their particular agenda. An embarrassment of dirty laundry, perhaps, but no expose of any lasting value of how the laundry gets dirty by design.

Doug Proctor please see my post at 9:24am immediately above yours. Also see countless pictures of barbecues next to NOAA surface station thermometers on this very blog. For years. See also the debunking of global warming in general, Monica Lewinsky scandal, the end of the gun control "debate" including the recent Fast&Furious unpleasantness, closer to home Caledonia, etc. all done primarily on the web with the MSM scrambling to keep up when they aren't trying to spike it.

-All- current investigative journalism is done by private individuals on the web. Half of it involves fact checking the BS in the media, the other half is telling the stories the media deliberately suppress.

Unless it makes the CPC or the Republicans look bad, MSM has that covered like ugly on a wart hog.