How can one not read this as a lament by an industry insider that they are no longer relevant. He thinks that powerful people need the mainstream media. They clearly seem to think otherwise. He thinks that the Washington Post is both critical and ethical. Others think otherwise.This month we learned that Tesla, a $400 billion public company run by one of the richest people in the world, has done away with its media relations department—effectively formalizing an informal policy of ignoring reporters. Though we should all be grateful for the chance to hear less about Tesla, we should also recognize this for what it is: one more glaring data point showing that powerful people no longer think they need the mainstream press, especially critical and ethical outlets like the Washington Post.
We are living through a historic, technology-fueled shift in the balance of power between the media and its subjects. The subjects are winning. The internet in general—and social media platforms in particular—have destroyed one of the media’s most important sources of power: being the only place that could offer access to an audience. When Musk can say whatever he wants to 40 million Twitter followers at any time with no filter, it is little surprise that he does not feel compelled to listen to unpleasant questions from some reporter who wants to know why he busts unions and wildly accuses people of pedophilia.
Curiously ambiguous wording. "Subjects?" Possibly Freudian. The media and its subjects? Perhaps "The media and its targets" might have been more accurate. He is assuming a battle between the media and those the media wishes to investigate and is assuming that the media must hold the moral high ground in that battle. Fair enough, but that is assuming facts not in evidence. It is a discordant argument to make at the very moment that major media outlets are arguing that their opinions and judgments supersede those of ordinary citizens and that they are allowed to not only ignore but actively suppress news which is disadvantageous to their causes.
The desire to be "the only place that could offer access to an audience" is simply the plaint of a monopolist. He is not wrong. Formerly a handful of TV and print news organizations did have a near monopoly on the publication of news. It was an immensely profitable period in the history of the press. They dramatically overpaid star employees, built empires of workers, spent money wildly. And then it all collapsed with competition made possible from the internet manifesting as both local producers (bloggers) as well as social media platforms.
Who gives credence to the woes of a former monopolist yearning for the old days when they had a monopoly to make money and wield power? Who is especially concerned by a former monopolist who cannot find a means of providing enough value to a free-to-decide audience to fund their own activities?
Most discordant of all? The totalitarian anger over the free speech of a citizen. "Musk can say whatever he wants to 40 million Twitter followers at any time with no filter." Nolan is angry that Musk has 40 million readers who value his commentary. How does this not come off as wanting to deprive Musk of free speech in order to restore the fortunes of a former monopolist?
Nick Rummell reports on the 2019 Pew research charting the declining fortunes of the former monopolists/oligopolists. Musk has 40 million readers interested in what he has to say. How many readers are interested in what the Washington Post has to say?
There is not a direct comparison but the total circulation of the top 50 US newspapers is barely 75% (29 million) that of Musk's followers. But that is apples and oranges. Circulation is paid for and followers do not pay for Musks thoughts.
Not a perfect comparison given that some newspapers charge for online access and others do not but "the top 50 U.S. daily newspapers saw 11.6 million monthly unique visitors, similar to 11.5 million monthly visitors during the last quarter of 2017 and 11.7 million monthly in 2016."
Back to Nolan's self-serving jeremiad. Again, the whiff of totalitarian hunger for power is more than a whiff.
As journalists, we all view this as a horrifying assault on the public’s right to know, and on our own status as brave defenders of the public good. And that is all true, for what it’s worth. But this is about power. We need to take some back, lest the rich and powerful run away from one of the last forces restraining them.
Because journalism, particularly at the highest level, is about raw power. It is about bringing important people to heel, on behalf of the public. Politicians and officials and business leaders don’t want to talk to the press, subjecting themselves to the possibility of being made to look bad; they do it because they have always felt they had no choice. They felt that way because papers like the Post could offer the carrot of great exposure to those who needed it, but also, always, the stick of negative coverage to those who spurned it. There is nothing devious or ignoble about this; a powerful press, for all its flaws, is good for democracy, and tends to promote equality by holding the big shots in check. Anyone who has ever negotiated to land a contentious interview with a famous person knows that you only get those interviews when your subject fears what will happen if they don’t do the interview. Today, that fear is disappearing. We all need to figure out what to do about that.
If the public's right to know is the foundation of the argument, then, again, Nolan is choosing a peculiar time to make this argument. A cascade of evidence is emerging in terms of emails and texts, none of which have been denied by the Biden campaign, that links Biden to corrupt deals via his son Hunter with dubious counterparts in both Russia and China. Former business partners are also coming forward affirming those emails and text messages. The evidence for this is apparently far better documented than the Steele dossier on which the Washington Post spent the better part of four years despite an early debunking of its contents via multiple avenues. The Washington Post wanted to push the Steele dossier not based on its evidentiary merits but based on its possible effectiveness at bring down a politician reviled by the Washington Post. Correspondingly, the Washington is now suppressing much better sourced information simply out of concern about the damage it might do to their preferred candidate.
The public's right to know is a reasonable position to take (within the law). But it is not what the Washington Post is practicing. They are functioning as a political advocacy organ, suppressing some information and exaggerating other information.
And the clear desire for the mainstream media to have "raw power" in order to bring its targets to heel is just off-putting. How could he have written those words and why would the CJR editors not advised against such a self-defeating plea.
"It is about bringing important people to heel, on behalf of the public." Well, in an ideal world. But when the mainstream media is not serving all the public but a mere fraction, then how robust is this argument? Again with the lamentation over the passing of olden times. The Washington Post once upon a time had a profitable oligopoly position, made a lot of money providing valuable news to its readers and was sufficiently powerful for them to quell the mighty. Nolan wants those times again. But his intolerance of free speech and anger at lost prestige, power, and relevance and his inability to generate new reporting of sufficient worth to sustain his ambitions is evidence against the argument he is trying to make.
Now we get to perhaps the real issue. The loss of status and prestige. Perhaps that is what this incoherent piece is about.
The Washington Post and its competitors—the elite level of national news, the places that have traditionally set the agenda—are the most vulnerable to this shift. They are the relatively small portion of the media that is able to command both access and editorial independence. Politicians feel that they must deal with the Post, but the Post still feels like it can say what it wants, critical or otherwise. That state of affairs, which has been taken for granted for decades, is evaporating.
Donald Trump, unfortunately, looms large in this. His imperviousness to the usual blows from the press was evident five years ago. . . . Trump himself, a pure creature of the New York tabloids, is too vain and dumb to realize that he could probably ignore the normal elite press altogether. But his incredible accumulation of power in the face of countless well-documented scandal stories in the Post and the New York Times and elsewhere—stories that would have brought down earlier presidents—is a proof of concept that will surely be used by smarter characters in the future.
Nolan, an editor of the Washington Post, wanted a different outcome to the 2016 election and is put off by an electorate which did not buy what the prestige media was selling. He more and more clearly is arguing that he and his ilk ought to be able to determine the outcomes of elections without interference by free citizens. He is not concerned that the Washington Post has not been able to make a persuasive argument against the President among the voting public. He is not concerned about the quality of his enterprise as measured by revenue and profit and public engagement.
Nolan doesn't want to have to make the argument at all. He wants to determine the outcome. He concludes that Trump's continuing popularity with the public is something threatening. He doesn't go to the conclusion that perhaps the "countless well-documented scandal stories" were not persuasive at all to voting citizens. Nolan wants power, he doesn't want to have to earn it the way most people do. By persuading others.
His closing paragraph is perhaps the most stark illustration why Nolan and his ilk are a poison in the system. Dismissive of the voting public. Desperate for former power and glory. An overweening desire to determine outcomes. An incomprehensible aversion to individual freedom of speech. Prey to anger, spite and violence. Woof!
Was this a well considered argument for prestige media or a subtle condemnation of it? Trump's team could have hardly produced a better indictment of the unfitness of the prestige media than that made by Nolan against himself.
Despite being in the middle of the prestige media, daily wrestling with the nature of that business, what are his thoughts for returning to relevance, utility and value to the public? He doesn't know. Again, emphasis, this time for metaphorical violence.
I must admit I do not know the answer. All I know is that there is only one way the press maintains its power in society: By metaphorically putting the heads of powerful people on pikes. If the Post and all the other respectable media outlets lose their ability to do that, powerful people will, by extension, stop caring what the well-informed segment of the public thinks. Democracy dies in dumbness.
Insulting his subscribers, dismissing the wisdom of the public, expressing wishes of violence against those he hates and desires for power over others. Not a paragon of clear thinking or persuasion.
And I don't know what it says about the journalist bubble that anyone thought that it was appropriate to express these thoughts so transparently.
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