Journalism's Suicide

The FDA just issued Emergency Use Authorizations two pill-form treatments (Pfizer's Paxlovid and Merck's Molnupiravir) for COVID-19. Prior to these meds, treatment choices were either monoclonal antibodies or Remdesivir, both of which are administered intravenously and therefore are 'resource intensive,' as in you gotta see a doctor in a medical setting. That the FDA dragged its feet for weeks in issuing these EUAs is a grotesquerie I recently blogged about.

Columnist Matt Taibbi shared, back in October, a disturbing analysis regarding Molnupiravir. Not of the medicine itself, but of its subordination to COVID politics.

First, that the release of the drug may have been delayed by as much as six months, because it would help the unvaccinated, and our culture's treatment of the unvaccinated is analogous to the medieval treatment of heretics.

Second, that the initial positive coverage following Merck's announcement turned on a dime, presumably when the press realized that saying anything positive about a treatment might (gasp!) give the vaccine hesitant an excuse not to get jabbed (for the record, and per my record, I favor vaccinating and oppose mandates).

The calculus is thus laid bare:

The lives of the unvaccinated do not matter.

They won't say it that way, but they'll come pretty damn close, and they'll deliver the message via many tacit ways.

We all know the reality. The mainstream press has taken upon itself the role of social dictator, arbiter, and gatekeeper. Reporting is driven by policy goals, not by what's actually happening. News should be highlighted, or suppressed, or conferred favorably, or presented in a negative and suspicious light, or outright ignored based on the desired public reaction. Editorial opinion, long "walled off" from news reporting by responsible journalists (including the legendary Abe Rosenthal of the New York Times), is a necessary component of any story nowadays.

Note, for example, that the words "herd immunity" have disappeared from public discourse, other than dire warnings that having had the bug is no excuse for not getting the shot (again, I favor vaccination, but infantilizing the public discourse is stupid). Ditto for monoclonal antibody treatments, which also reduce the risk of death from COVID-19 infection. The only reason I've even heard of this is a series of commercials I saw during baseball games - offered not by the NYC Health Department, which ran *constant* public service ads urging people to get vaccinated, but by a pharma company.

A good part of all this can be attributed to the anti-social effects and tribalism-inducing of social media, but a lot of it is simple arrogance. This crowd has decided, to put it simply, that it knows best. That it is smarter and better informed than everyone else, and that everyone else is best served by being managed. And, when people don't cooperate willingly, the next step is coercion. For their own good, of course, and even when what's demanded makes no sense.

Mainstream news has turned into just another form of entertainment. People pick the channels and pundits that please them, listen to and read the content they prefer. That's fine - it's a free country. But, journalism - real journalism - serves a vital purpose in a free society. The Fourth Estate can be a powerful force for liberty and against corruption, or it can be as big a part of the problem as the wrong-doers it's normally tasked with watchdogging.

When the Press becomes an extension of a political party, it doesn't matter if that party is the one you like or the one you hate. Your life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness will *not* benefit.

Fortunately, a recent Gallup poll reports that only "7% of U.S. adults say they have "a great deal" and 29% "a fair amount" of trust and confidence in newspapers, television and radio news reporting," a figure reported as the second lowest on record (the lowest occurred during the 2016 election).

The mainstream press has lost the public trust, a loss entirely of its own doing.

Unfortunately, the vacuum that has created remains unfilled. There are some small bits of hope, notably the handful of liberal pundits who have recoiled at the Left's turn to authoritarianism, censorship, and everything-control. But, it remains that the sources for trustworthy news are few, and mostly washed out by advocacy pretending to be news. The public's growing distrust has not taught these *Best-and-Brightest* any positive lessons, but instead continues to motivate them toward coercion and authoritarianism.

Even the most cursory look at history shows us the sorts of nations where the press and a political party are allies rather than adversaries. None of them are good.