Unburden journalism from what has been

Trust in media starts in rural America with a full overhaul of the Fourth Estate

Traditional journalism went out the window with Obama in 2008. Chasing down fact patterns was out, White House narratives were in.

The reporter’s sacred “5 W’s and H” – Who, What, Where, When, Why and How – were cast aside in favor of a “hero’s journey” defined by the “McGuffin” – a literary device that endlessly asks, “What does the hero seek?” For a generation of journalists, every story flowed from there… how will the hero get what he wants? When will he get it? What’s getting in the hero’s way?

With Covid, mysterious “fact checkers” suddenly appeared to approve or deny all public information with Obama still the hero and Fauci the front man. The obliteration of political enemies was the McGuffin and social disruption was the “How.” A weakened Trump was “What” was in the way, and 2020 was “When” the hero and his henchmen got rid of him.

If only that last crop of journalists had been a bit braver in challenging social media gatekeepers – or just a little more curious to ask “Why” more often – they might have woke up to the fact that McGuffins live in fiction and reality always wins.

And thus, with the hero’s epic fail after the last election, the curtain was pulled on the once great and powerful wizards of legacy media. In a tragically out of touch Axios editorial, Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei trumpeted that Trump is raging in payback mode and profiting from power – all while defying the Democratic Party’s “religious devotion to norms and institutions that Republicans simply don’t share.”

Though our left-leaning friends may agree with this “we’re-the-normal-ones” routine, most regular folks are taken aback by the stink of political deception and fake “journalism” that can never be trusted. Such tone-deaf delusion coming from pundits who fancy themselves objective and fair defines the divide between urban elites and the rest of the country outside The Beltway.

There’s a huge problem with national journalists never leaving their desks, binging instead on polls, reports, studies and other unverified sources of moral outrage that are then regurgitated into the cloud. The best way to save journalism from this cultural rot at the top starts with a grassroots revolution from below, on the ground where people walk, drive, meet, see and feel things.

The small town and mid-market newspapers that weren’t lost to digitalization are some of the last places where old school journalism still clings to life. Survivors out here on Colorado’s Western Slope include the Grand Junction Sentinel, Telluride Daily Planet, Montrose Press and the Durango Herald where news gatherers still track down leads, check facts and go places to get the stories so the average citizen doesn’t have to.

Rural media fights for relevance across vast geographies and wide demographics and, unlike most digital and streaming outlets, can’t afford to simply zero in on micro audiences that think like they do. Professional journalists on the ground feel out their communities to inform their next headlines, root out corruption, debate contentious issues, and scoop the competition.

Running a free press between regional and far-flung niche audiences always requires an instinctive “local” knowledge that exercises perceptive intellect, skepticism, curiosity, inter-personal relationships and sixth-sense intuition.

The rebuilding of trust in media starts in rural America with a full overhaul of the Fourth Estate. From here, refreshed editorial ethics and best practices can inspire big city reporters to start wearing out more shoe leather to get all sides of the story and national news bureaus to start sending more stringers into the wild – like to a red state maybe.

Traditional, independent journalism keeps everyone honest and free, seeks truth over political persuasion, comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable. It’s on the ground and in your town. A better-informed public makes America great, and a rural media revival, one that truly speaks truth to power, can unburden journalism from what has been.