February 28, 2025 (Vol. 19 No. 10) - There has always been a tension - and sometimes open hostility - between the American government and the journalists who cover it. No less than George Washington was subject to blistering attacks by Benjamin Franklin's grandson, who wrote in the anti-Federalist newspaper Aurora after Washington's Farewell Address that "if ever a nation had been debauched by a man, the American nation has been debauched by Washington." Under the short-lived Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, a New Jersey tavern owner was fined $150 for suggesting that a cannonade in honor of President John Adams should have been fired into the Second President's butt. But even during Watergate, when Richard Nixon developed his infamous "Enemies List" that included prominent journalists, the government has largely kept its hands off the media. In fact, the greatest threat to the independence of the American news media has come from within. While media companies have been loathe to self-criticize from Day One, we began to see significant movement toward self-censorship in the 1980s, when America's transformation to a digital economy motivated big corporations such as Viacom, General Electric and Disney swallow up not only the content producers (publishers and film/TV production companies), but the means of distribution (newspapers and television networks). This was especially felt in broadcast news, where the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine by the Reagan Administration led to the rise of conservative talk radio and the traditional "hands-off-the-news division" ethic was abandoned in favor of a more intrusive "how-does-it-affect-our bottom-line" approach. Recently, it has been implied threats from the openly hostile Trump Administration that has forced digital media such as Facebook and even traditional media like The Washington Post to abandon their editorial functions for a safer harbor to avoid content that may offend Felon 47. As I have been observing this disturbing trend - on top of all of the daily atrocities that are coming out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue - it has occurred to me that I have heard this all before.
Let me take you back to June 1, 1998. It was my first full day of my first of what would be four trips to St. Petersburg, Russia on behalf of the U.S. State Department to the newly-minted Russian Federation. These were the Boris Yeltsin years before the rise of Vladimir Putin. I was attending a "Free Press - Fair Press: Europe Conference" sponsored by the American-based Freedom Forum. (Photo above.)The attendees were grappling with the role of a free press in the less-than-decade old democratic Russia. In what I found strange to my American sensibilities, the Russian journalists in the room seemed more comfortable with government control of the media than the prospects of media owned by giant corporations. This was a period when the so-called "New Russians" benefited from a more open - and often corrupt - unregulated economy. To quote from a 1971 song by "The Who," it was a case of "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." After the thousand years of repression, the Russian people had gotten adept at reading between the lines no matter who was delivering them. And it was easier to decipher the many shades of gray when it came from just one instead of multiple sources. That's why Russian media are, for the most part, "All Putin, All The Time." In the context of today's perilous times, I am reminded of that song I heard in a hot, sweaty hall in St. Petersburg just before the turn of the century. Now, it seems that today's corporate American media - once priding itself on the diversity of voices in the marketplace of ideas - is reverting the to Russian model. (No surprise, considering who our President is.) Out of fear for retribution - Trump's word, not mine - and a threat to their bottom line - American media, especially broadcast media, are backing away from their traditional "public service comes first" position. We are not being well served by our news media at a time when we need them most. However, that is not entirely the media's fault. We, the people, have chosen to abandon many of our most basic America values of free expression, justice and compassion for the less fortunate to pursue short-term political gains. The Irony is that many of the people who have bought into the so-called "Make America Great Again" movement are the ones who will most victimized by the MAGA agenda. We are substituting the imagined oppression of the Obama/Biden years for the real thing we have today. It seems as if the new boss isn't the same as the old boss. He's much worse. And unless we openly challenge him and the media who are too scared to oppose him, the new boss will be living in Moscow or wherever the hell Elon Musk hangs his goofy hat. That's it for now. Fear the Turtle. Photo Copyright David W. Guth, 1998
February 28, 2025 (Vol. 19 No. 10) - There has always been a tension - and sometimes open hostility - between the American government and the journalists who cover it. No less than George Washington was subject to blistering attacks by Benjamin Franklin's grandson, who wrote in the anti-Federalist newspaper Aurora after Washington's Farewell Address that "if ever a nation had been debauched by a man, the American nation has been debauched by Washington." Under the short-lived Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, a New Jersey tavern owner was fined $150 for suggesting that a cannonade in honor of President John Adams should have been fired into the Second President's butt. But even during Watergate, when Richard Nixon developed his infamous "Enemies List" that included prominent journalists, the government has largely kept its hands off the media. In fact, the greatest threat to the independence of the American news media has come from within. While media companies have been loathe to self-criticize from Day One, we began to see significant movement toward self-censorship in the 1980s, when America's transformation to a digital economy motivated big corporations such as Viacom, General Electric and Disney swallow up not only the content producers (publishers and film/TV production companies), but the means of distribution (newspapers and television networks). This was especially felt in broadcast news, where the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine by the Reagan Administration led to the rise of conservative talk radio and the traditional "hands-off-the-news division" ethic was abandoned in favor of a more intrusive "how-does-it-affect-our bottom-line" approach. Recently, it has been implied threats from the openly hostile Trump Administration that has forced digital media such as Facebook and even traditional media like The Washington Post to abandon their editorial functions for a safer harbor to avoid content that may offend Felon 47. As I have been observing this disturbing trend - on top of all of the daily atrocities that are coming out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue - it has occurred to me that I have heard this all before.