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Dialogues@RU is published
annually
by the
Writing Program at
Rutgers, The State
University of New Jersey
Volume 4
Fall 2005
Polemical Hacks, Bastardized Gonzo,
and the Death Of Democracy - Page 7
By Eric Kaufmann
In their complete form, these functions are: existing as a forum and marketplace of ideas, providing citizens with information necessary to perform their civic responsibilities, serving as the public's agent in communicating with government, providing an outlet for public expression of minority views, and acting as the public's agent in monitoring government misconduct. In order to truly be a marketplace of ideas, media must come from a diverse set of sources, and must be prepared by a diverse group of people in order to provide citizens with the ability to access a multitude of ideas. This is not the case, unfortunately, as print and electronic media are becoming concentrated further, resulting in a homogenization of news content. The ten largest newspaper chains control over one-third of the market, eighty-five percent of the television audience in the United States is exposed to programs created by three major networks, and the news magazine business is controlled by three publications. Ninety-nine percent of the news sources in the United States with daily publication schedules are served by either the Associated Press or United Press International wire services (Graber 260). Such a concentration keeps smaller outlets, and dissenting voices, out of the market because they cannot attract the advertising revenue necessary to expand their operations, advertising revenue that flows freely to the large, national conglomerates.
Even a press corps focused on negative coverage and scandal avoids actively monitoring government, declining to systematically examine political affairs. According to Graber, "newspeople have pushed ahead with stories only under two conditions: when the factual situation was relatively clear so that extensive probing, costly in time, effort, and loss of valuable news sources, was unnecessary; and when the story promised to be enthralling to media audiences" (270). For instance, the press actually played a smaller role in Watergate than credited for:
[W]ith few exceptions, it did not really put its muscle behind the investigation of executive branch misdeeds until the presidential campaign was nearly over. Only when the story could no longer be disparaged as normal election propaganda, but could be featured as an issue of pervasive corruption and dishonesty at the highest levels of government, did the media pick it up en masse. (Graber 271).
Once again the public's need to know has fallen victim to commercial success, emphasizing quick results, sensationalism, and a lack of investigation. The end result is a new mindset among citizens that calls for an injection of common sense into democracy by putting aside expertise and politicians in favor of direct rule. The problem with this view is that it is held by a "disgruntled and largely amorphous citizenry" that does not recognize the complexity of politics because of the simplified context in which issues are now presented (Durrant 27).
The current situation in California vividly exemplifies how warped public policy becomes when disaffected citizens circumvent political parties, legislators, and lobbyists. Originally conceived to remove moneyed interests from politics, the referendum process in California has actually spawned an entire industry based on collecting signatures for petitions and mounting expensive, multi-faceted public relations campaigns. "In California, in 1996 alone, more than $141 million was spent on initiatives, which was 33 percent more than was spent by the much-maligned candidates for the state legislature" (Zakaria 196). The net result of unencumbered access is a gaggle of propositions lacking bipartisan support, with policy more inclined towards creating mutual hostility than a utopian participatory democracy.