Timothy Birdnow

Daniel Greenfield tears the elitism of the Fourth Estate a new one.

From Canada Free Press:

The Fourth Estate is a European concept. There’s no room in America for a special status for the media (or any other estates). Sanders ignores what the constitution actually says about the press. The First Amendment prohibits Congress from making laws "abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

Freedom of the press doesn’t bestow a special status on the press. It springs from freedom of speech.

That is even more obvious in Madison’s original words, "The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, to write, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty shall be inviolable.” A free press is an expression of everyone’s right to speak out. It is not a special institution that represents the public interest. It is the actual public.

When the Framers wrote of a free press, they meant printers like Benjamin Franklin and his brother, and anyone who wanted to distribute a pamphlet, as well as the small number of larger papers. Their idea of the free press looked a lot like a low-tech internet and had nothing in common with a handful of giant corporate monopolies declaring that they are a journalistic priesthood serving the public interest.

Read the whole article; he nails it!

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:28 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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