I wonder if this is an example of one of C. Norhcote Parkenson’s laws at work?

I would love to think it was. I will not live to see the end of the vile New York Times, but I very stongly hope that others here do.

Don't forget he is big in getting the government to take property by ED for his projects. As far as I am concerned he is thef.

>>It is no suprise that this rent seeker is asking for government money to bail out newspapers.<<

Especially since the new headquarters for the New York Times was one of his most recent projects. Yes, he steal the land for that too. Ever wonder why the Times never protests against ED takings? Now you know, because they are on the take.

If the trolly cars and so on of what was (at the time) the biggest system in the world had been left under the control of their private owners (i.e. no regulations) they would still have been profitable (in spite of the Great Depression) and the owners would not have sold out to G.M.

It was a similar story in many other cities. First the government made the mass transit systems unprofitable (by a mixture of free road building for cars and massive direct regulation of the privately owned mass transit systems) and then they either closed down – or where taken over by the government (as in New York City).

This was also true with the railroads. First the Federal government undermined the railroads with price controls and other regulations (and by pro union laws) then (in 1971) it took over the passenger railroads closed most of them down and ran the rest as a political game. This does not even mention the massive Federal road building program.

There was nothing inevtiable about the modern “car society”, the government made it happen. Whether individual politicians and administrators knew what the effects of their actions would be I do not know – but this was the effect their actions had.

Your comment raises an interesting conundrum, how to let market forces get at traffic congestion. It would be an interesting debate to see what the most free market solution is.

Problem, delivery companies want quick and open access to a city. They are willing to pay a premium to get it.

But less urgent travellers are apparently content to tie up traffic with their vehicles because of accidental subsidy of inefficient use. That is to say, they are not paying a free market price for access. The access is, in effect, socialized.

It seems like one possible solution would be to auction vehicle access to the highest bidders. A form of free market congestion charge.

The more collective solutions include allowing equal (inevitably) subsidized access to all (the present system), or providing ‘free’ subsidized road use optimizing services like buses.

In America, it is interesting that the government maintains strict control of the electronic media through the FCC, when we have thousands of radio stations, hundreds of television stations, and hundreds of cable systems (all offering scores of channels). There is no scarcity of spectrum space anymore, so it makes no more sense to license broadcasters than to license newspapers or magazines. It is high time that the electronic media receive its long overdue protection as “free press” under the Constituition, with government no longer acting as gatekeeper to decide who gets the “privilege” of using the airwaves.

People such as Bill O’Reilly make a living pointing out how the mainstream media (especially most of the newspapers) do NOT expose the-powers-that-be. For example, Judges let child rapists walk? No story, just do not print it – and attack (as dishonestly as possible) anyone who draws public attention to it.

Of course they attack President Bush endlessly (he is a Republican and a Christian – two great crimes in the minds of the establishment), but they do NOT attack him for such things as creating new entitlement programs (such as the medicare extention and no-child-left-behind).

As for wrong doing – newspapers are normally in-the-tank for local and national power elites (the above example was just one of many).

Stories that show these elites in a bad light are either spiked (remember the motto of the New York Times “All the news thats FIT to print”) or so distorted as to be opposite of the truth.

Even basic facts in newspapers are likely to be wrong (see all the websites dedicated to pointing out the direct lies in the New York Times alone – and remember that most other American newspapers see the New York Times as their great guide).

The American press is (with a few exceptions) boring, left wing and dishonest.

There was a time when all the great cities of the United States had newspapers expressing different points of view. But then the “Progressive” movement came along demanding an “objective”, “scientific” journalism, written by special people educated in “schools of journalism”.

It has been down hill from there. “Scientific”, “objective” (and so on) where always in the minds of the “Progressives” really just their particular political philosophy (of ever more government programs and regulations) – and this has become gradually more blatent as the decades have past. Nor is just the news and current affairs pages. For example, how many American newspapers employ a conservative as a television critic? “A conservative can not do a cultural job” – oh sure, how open minded.

These days most American cities (New York is a exception) have one great near monopoly newspaper – linked to local advertisers (such as the city and State governments and politically connected corporations), printing “news” stories to create a demand for more government spending and regulations – and supressing or distorting anything that does not fit.

Being de facto monopolies the newspapers are also mostly very boring.

It is not really the rise fo the internet that is destroying American newspapers (although it does not help them) – they are destroying themselves, because they are crap, so fewer and fewer people are paying money to read them.

May they go bankrupt soon.

Newspapers used to argue that their sheer volume set them apart from TV. I would often be told at college that for a news programme on television to match the output of a single issue of a newspaper, that programme would have to be 70 hours long. If this is correct, then how big would a single newspaper have to be in order to match the wealth of info available at any given time on the internet?

Eamon

Since the man who pays the fiddler calls the tune, each magazine is the mouthpiece of the foundation’s board of directors, hence that of he who chose those directors. At least once a year the Atlantic showcases the socialist proposals of the New America foundation. Harpers devotes a lot of ink in its monthly issues to the leftist views of Lewis Lapham, Thomas Frank, and Barbara Ehrenreich. You won’t get far at Reason Magazine or the Heritage Foundation by writing an article in favor of socialized medicine.

Unfortunately, magazines with an editorial slant designed to reflect elite opinion instead of popular opinion will be inherently unpopular hence permanently unprofitable. What Ratner is really suggesting is that newspapers follow the maqazines’ example and throw in the ink-stained towel.

He’s obviously been studying the BBC’s business model.