According to some people, the fundamental purpose of the news media in a democracy is to report on the doings of government, particularly unelected bureaucracies like the CIA and NSA.
But here's the thing. The Republicans are completely right when they beat up on traitorous media organizations like the New York Times. Brittany Spears is right when she says we should just trust our President. So, it's high time to shut down all independent newspapers, and, just so we have something to read when we're in the bathroom, let's replace the Times with a Republican newsletter.
First of all, the NY Times ran
this story yesterday, alleging that crack cocaine had been found on the Discovery space shuttle. Patently false, and an obvious attempt to discredit one of America's greatest achievements -- space travel.
But the biggest reason Republicans have to beat up on the NY Times is the story by Eric Lichtblau and James Risen about the questionable methods by which the administration monitored worldwide financial transactions in an effort to track funding of groups the government considers terrorist.
Although most experts on terrorist groups say that the article did not have any information that the terrorists didn't already know. Still, the decision by the editors to run the story led to a massive, coordinated tidal wave of criticism from Republicans. Saying that the article helped the terrorists, President Bush and Vice President Cheney both singled out the New York Times for blithering criticism. The House of Representatives, on party lines, actually passed a resolution condemning news organizations. Senator Jim Bunning of Kentucky insisted that the NY Times get investigated for treason.
The Times' public editor put up a weak defense this week, saying that the Times did nothing to harm national security while carrying out their duty to inform the public. But this is clearly wrong.
The independent media are going to get us all killed. This is a time of war. We don't need to know that the Republicans wanted to tap American phones before 9/11. We don't need to know that Schwarzenegger's Homeland Security office even exists, much less that they collected information on anti-war protest groups. We don't need to know the names of the US servicepeople who have died in the line of duty in Iraq. We don't need to know that the Supreme Court ruled against the Republican plan to keep people at Guantanamo Bay indefinitely.
Basically, we don't need an independent media. Obviously, Brittany Spears and our President are both right. It's the media that's hurting America, not the Republicans.
From The Courage Campaign