A free and independent press no longer

Let’s face it — journalism is dead. It started to fail under the Bush administration and its last breath was taken sometime during 2007. I’m worried for our democracy and all democracies. Campaigns and elections will never be free and fair without an honest and independent press.

Consider it — do we know what is happening in Iran? How can we? Who won the election?

Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama went into the Democratic convention essentially tied for nomination. Obama led in pledged delegates and Clinton led in popular vote. And, considering that Obama’s delegate lead was obtained by disenfranchising FL and MI, Democrats should have gone into the convention with an opportunity to pick the best candidate for the presidency. If the press hadn’t made the decision that Obama was to be the nominee and repeatedly portrayed the nomination battle as a landslide victory for Obama, we would have. Instead, we were told that the nomination selection was obvious, and clear, and unanimous, and overwhelming, we were told that Obama won before the votes were even counted.

Is that any different from what is happening in Iran, or what has happened in any number of democracies in recent years?

Without a free and independent press there just elections are a challenge and accountability impossible. Without accountability democratically elected leaders become despots and there’s nothing we, the people, can do about it.

We need the press…we need a renaissance of journalism. That’s the hope and change we desperately need.

Ah, the job is done.

I’m doing the happy dance. I just completed revising my second novel and, thanks to my agents revision notes and the magic of nanowrimo, it’s much better than I ever imagined it would be or that I could write. That’s the bizarre thing about writing for me — I don’t know the stories I want to write until I write them.

It’s exciting to read and write at the same time. Problems are easy to spot when I’m so bored that I’m perfectly happy to end the story right where I am. It’s a sure sign I need to increase tension and mystery and heighten the stakes for the characters.

This moment is short lived. I need to work on promoting Running for My Life (thanks to those who have purchased a copy and written reviews. It’s terribly difficult to create buzz.) and my wonderful students to attend to, but for right now I feel complete, satisfied and relieved. What a feeling.