The Insider Press

 Everybody wants to be Woodward and Bernstein, and it shows. The press takes itself too seriously and for that reason is a tool in the hands of real masters of information. This is really huge. In my most paranoid days of 'manufactured consent' I never quite figured how something of this nature might go down. Now I see it clearly. This is very likely something that information officers like Larry Kolb, author of Overworld,  understood very well.

What’s now coming to light is another tale: about the moment the Press had decided to become a political player in itself: it would not only report the news, but make the news. Stratfor believes that many problems grew from than momentous decision which have not ended to this day. If doesn’t fully disclose where the information comes from and the purposes it serves even when it is aware of an underlying agenda, it’s become like some of the auditors of the failed Wall Street firms; no longer outsiders but insiders.

I've argued that this is what the mainstream press wants to be. Long ago I advocated for some ideological transparency, but we've got worse, which is partisanship masquerading as neutrality. Of course it took independent and partisan bloggers to demonstrate this. Hurray for PJM and Stratfor, allies in truth.