And, in the process, itself. Fallows is not the first to note that, institutionally, the Washington press corps isn't working. But he is one of the smartest and best-placed, working as he does in the belly of the beast. Fallows crackles when he dissects the structural and ethical problems of the Washington press. His remedies for the ills he identifies so well are fuzzy, problematic and unconvincing.
Civic life has to prosper for the press to do well, and vice versa.
So journalism has a vested interest in helping to promote, rather than break down, healthier civic discourse. The idea, already bitterly controversial within the press, emerged from meetings promoted by New York University professor Jay Rosen, a respected media critic and scholar. It is being studied or practiced in some form, Fallows says, by more than 170 newspapers. The proponents of public journalism want to do something about the fact that the agenda of voters is radically different from that of the media or of most politicians, who work together in a symbiotic, self-referential way that has little bearing on what people really care about.