People only like stories about themselves when they are complimentary; any other version is fake, biased, and sourced by an enemy.
A free press is often the only entity standing between humankind’s endless capacity for unbridled corruption and the hapless individuals who suffer the consequences, who are legion.
Now with President-elect Donald Trump and his minions constantly asserting the press is not free but bought and paid for by the liberal left, and the low-information supporters buying into it because the coverage doesn’t suit their own biases, the press is under continuing and unjustified attack.
The fact is many people don’t read newspapers anymore, getting their ‘information’ from unreliable and even fake news outlets.
The job of the press has never been to please the reader or win the admiration of the powerful.
The job of the press is to be unflinching and unrelenting in searching out the truth of the matter.
Without a free press, the water we drink would be dirty, the Everglades would be drained and developed, no one would be held accountable for just about anything. Bad drugs and lax lab employees would endlessly get away with everything.
All the more reason to redouble the reporting staff at every major newspaper in the country, knowing the critical importance of their role in keeping a flawed and damaged United States steady on its just feet.
Here are a couple of facts for press bias accusers to chew on: The editorial and reporting sides of newspapers are separate. Editorial opines. Reporters report.
Another is that any good reporter is often frequently exposed to the victims of malfeasance and, once witness to that, reporting may look liberal, but is in fact more fair, more inclusive of previously unknown information.
And out comes the bias accusation of anyone now being held accountable.
Susan Russell,
Coconut Grove
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