Good morning, Netizens...

In this morning's David Horsey cartoon from the Post-Intelligencer, he asks a question perhaps no one in the Blogosphere wants answered, that being what will the press conferences of the future look like when all the newspapers have closed and shuttered their doors? Will there be a band of bloggers asking the questions? Will any newspaper reporters survive the economic downturn to perform the hard research and ask the hard questions?

So much of the news we read in this blog comes from well-established traditional news sources such as the Associated Press, McClatchey and various other news wires. Even the news we obtain about our City Government comes traditionally from local and regional sources. If, as the Seattle Post-Intelligencer closes its doors in March, as it appears possible, who will stand up to ask the hard questions?

I submit that perhaps President Barack Obama is too quick to embrace the alternative forms of the news media, for inherent in the existing news media, even a cursory examination of its history, bespeaks decades of experience, acumen and the absolute adherence to the principles of good journalism that formulate the basis for news reporting as we once knew it to be.

As more major news sources shutter their doors for good, who will stand and ask the relevant questions of the future? It is both sobering and a sad commentary on our lives that there was no economic aid for failing newspapers in the Economic Stimulus Package. The news, particularly the print news media, it seems, cannot compete with the list of crooked bankers, dismally-performing auto manufacturers and mortgage companies, all of whom will receive handouts from the Stimulus Package.

Don't look now, but our national priorities are on review, and I submit they are tragically wanting.

Dave

---

---