Bill Moyers, Doubleday
I wish I could say that journalists in general are showing the same interest
in uncovering the dangerous linkages thwarting this democracy. It is not for
lack of honest and courageous individuals who would risk their careers to speak
truth to power -- a modest risk compared to those of some journalists in
authoritarian countries who have been jailed or murdered for the identical
"crime." But our journalists are not in control of the instruments
they play. As conglomerates swallow up newspapers, magazines, publishing
houses, and networks, and profit rather than product becomes the focus of
corporate effort, news organizations -- particularly in television -- are
folded into entertainment divisions. The "news hole" in the print
media shrinks to make room for advertisements, and stories needed by informed
citizens working together are pulled in favor of the latest celebrity scandals
because the media moguls have decided that uncovering the inner workings of public
and private power is boring and will drive viewers and readers away to greener
pastures of pabulum. Good reporters and editors confront walls of resistance in
trying to place serious and informative reports over which they have long
labored. Media owners who should be sounding the trumpets of alarm on the
battlements of democracy instead blow popular ditties through tin horns,
undercutting the basis for their existence and their First Amendment rights.