a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment

That's the issue, isn't it. Corporations don't exist to make cars, provide mortgages, or report news. Corporations exist to make money, and making cars or providing mortgages are simply ancillary to that goal. News is supposed to be different. ABC, NBC, et al get to use our airwaves at a discount so long as they provide the 'public service' of new broadcasting. That was the deal. Unfortunately they never made it a non-commercial operation, and news became very entrepreneurial. Fox's and MSNBC's goal is to get eyes on the screen. There aren't any consequences for being wrong. Journalistic ethics are all that separate us from fantasy at this point, but it seems like Fox is pushing the envelope there more and more every year. MSNBC will follow, because they're followers of Fox's lead. Pretty soon if nothing changes we'll be in a world where the facts aren't just presented differently with different editorials on the stations, but rather where each can just make up what they think might have happened and report that. Why not? Entrepreneurship is the American Dream, no? What easier product to peddle than fantasy?