In a letter to the editor of Outlook, the Albuquerque Journal’s twice-weekly business insert, a fellow named Bob Herrington of NTS Communications, does some neat reporting on Qwest’s efforts to persuade us (regulators and the public) that it faces competition in local phone service.
The result of his inquiry is clear - Qwest retains its monopoly in that field.
I cite this because a reader, not Outlook, did the research. Like an overwhelming number of daily newspapers, the Journal boosts business rather than scrutinizing it.
Oh, the newspaper will carry debate on business issues. It will even publish syndicated reports on business wrong-doing. But you will find almost no hard local reporting on business. (The "almost" is a nod to Winthrop Quigley. He doesn’t investigate, but does a fine job otherwise of keeping tabs on the health business in New Mexico.)
Again, I do not mean to single out the Journal. Boosterism is the rule in the newspaper business. You probably know the exceptions –Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, perhaps a few others with which I’m not familiar.
(WSJ’s accomplishment is truly extraordinary. It is, after all, the newspaper of the nation’s business/financial sector. While no longer psychotic, its editorial page, under a new editor, remains pretty far out. Yet WSJ reporting sets the standard.)
The normal state of affairs is easily explained. Calvin Coolidge surely was correct, in some sense, that "The business of America is business." Local newspapers are businesses. They prosper by carrying advertising placed by other local businesses. The newspaper business and its advertisers have in common the desire for local prosperity. This often produces fine things for the community – cultural institutions, notably – but it makes reporting on local business a dicey task. So it’s understandable that local papers take a pass.
Still, this is something to remember the next time you hear that the press is "liberal," whatever that means.