What Happened to Journalism in America?

For quite awhile I've been deeply troubled by, what seems to me, the extremely biased attitudes of most media reporters covering this presidential race. I just read an article by Michael Malone, one of the nation's best known technology writers, posted on http://www.abcnews.com/. The beginning of his article states

Oct. 24, 2008 —
"The traditional media are playing a very, very dangerous game -- with their readers, with the Constitution and with their own fates.
The sheer bias in the print and television coverage of this election campaign is not just bewildering, but appalling. And over the last few months I've found myself slowly moving from shaking my head at the obvious one-sided reporting, to actually shouting at the screen of my television and my laptop computer.
But worst of all, for the last couple weeks, I've begun -- for the first time in my adult life -- to be embarrassed to admit what I do for a living. A few days ago, when asked by a new acquaintance what I did for a living, I replied that I was "a writer," because I couldn't bring myself to admit to a stranger that I'm a journalist."

He points out, quite eloquently, that most journalists have lost their way in trying to report objectively and fairly and have instead been drinking the kool-aid of biased, one-sided reporting by promoting the cause of one candidate while ravaging the other. He gives reasons for this spectacle which I won't eloborate on here except to say that this unwarranted and unpardonable behavior is a travesty of American journalist expression. If the media is to remain the watchdog of American life and politics it has to return to its roots of impartial reporting. To do less risks the very freedoms we hold dear...

I encourage you to read Mr. Malone's commentary in its entirety. You can access it at http://abcnews.go.com/print?id=6099188