What’s missing?

We no longer have news coverage that actually informs our citizenry.

The market seems to be promoting two things: unintelligent news coverage concerning events that has little or no effect on people’s lives but are titillating (high-profile trials, celebrity news, etc…) or news coverage that panders to their audience’s already existing political views.

Is it too much to ask that with thousands of news outlets that there is not a market for an intelligent news network that challenges the audience rather than pander to it? Is it unprofitable to inform the public? Is this inevitable?

And if it is inevitable, it isn’t the media’s fault; it is the fault of our citizenry. If that’s true, the next thirty years of political discourse, where people receive news from those who condescend to their prurient interests or pander to their political beliefs, will be much more divisive and destructive than the last twenty.

I’m interested in what you have to think. Honestly, I don’t know if there’s a solution to this problem or if I’m being overly pessimistic.

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Chris R

Ezra Klein is a former Prospect writer and current editor-in-chief at Vox. His work has appeared in the LA Times, The Guardian, The Washington Monthly, The New Republic, Slate, and The Columbia Journalism Review. He’s been a commentator on MSNBC, CNN, NPR, and more.