The Mainstream Media's "Come to Jesus" Moment

How can someone say something 46 years ago and – as if he was staring into a crystal ball – accurately predict events a half-century later? I honestly don’t know the answer to that question, but I do know that Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn pulled off that impressive feat in his commencement address at Harvard University on June 8, 1978. In fact, his powerful and prescient words sound as if they were ripped unedited and unvarnished from today’s headlines.

Here is what the renowned author and Soviet dissident said about the American press and the media in general…

“The press, too, of course, enjoys the widest freedom… [but] there is no true moral responsibility for distortion or disproportion. What sort of responsibility does a journalist or a newspaper have to the readership or to history? If they have misled public opinion by inaccurate information or wrong conclusions, even if they have contributed to mistakes on a state level, do we know of any case of open regret voiced by the same journalist or the same newspaper? No; this would damage sales. A nation may be the worse for such a mistake, but the journalist always gets away with it. It is most likely that he will start writing the exact opposite to his previous statements with renewed aplomb.”

Sounds to me like Solzhenitsyn was referring to the mainstream media hiding the truth about Joe Biden’s diminishing mental faculties since before the 2020 election, only to have a “come to Jesus” moment in 2024 when his re-election chances are dwindling. Hypocrisy at its best!

Solzhenitsyn went on to decry the shallowness of modern-day reporting as the media tries to keep up with the increasing demands of a 24/7 news cycle that doesn’t allow for in-depth analysis. Instead of sitting on a story until they have all the facts, the press all-too-often airs or publishes an unverified and unsubstantiated account knowing that their audience is looking for superficial sound bites rather than hard news.

Here is how Solzhenitsyn summarized the dumbing down of today’s journalistic standards…

“Because instant and credible information is required, it becomes necessary to resort to guesswork, rumors, and suppositions to fill in the voids, and none of them will ever be refuted; they settle into the readers’ memory. How many hasty, immature, superficial, and misleading judgments are expressed every day, confusing readers, and are then left hanging? The press can act the role of public opinion or miseducate it. Thus, we may see terrorists heroized, or secret matters pertaining to the nation’s defense publicly revealed, or we may witness shameless intrusion into the privacy of well-known people according to the slogan “Everyone is entitled to know everything.” (But this is a false slogan of a false era; far greater in value is the forfeited right of people not to know, not to have their divine souls stuffed with gossip, nonsense, vain talk. A person who works and leads a meaningful life has no need for this excessive and burdening flow of information.)”

I especially like Solzhenitsyn’s last point in which he bemoans the information overload that bombards listeners, readers, and viewers every day. Such a constant barrage of often useless “news” allows little time for anyone to digest it, let alone analyze its value and veracity.

Or, as the great Russian author put it…

“Hastiness and superficiality – these are the psychic diseases of the twentieth century and more than anywhere else this is manifested in the press. In-depth analysis of a problem is anathema to the press; it is contrary to its nature. The press merely picks out sensational formulas.”

Finally, Solzhenitsyn questions why our society has chosen to bestow so much power and influence on a group of unelected “journalists” while denouncing their herd mentality that suppresses dissenting opinions.

“Such as it is, however, the press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, exceeding that of the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary. Yet one would like to ask: According to what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? In the Communist East, a journalist is frankly appointed as a state official. But who has voted Western journalists into their positions of power, for how long a time, and with what prerogatives?”

“There is yet another surprise for someone coming from the totalitarian East with its rigorously unified press: One discovers a common trend of preferences within the Western press as a whole (the spirit of the time), generally accepted patterns of judgment, and maybe common corporate interests, the sum effect being not competition but unification. Unrestrained freedom exists for the press, but not for the readership, because newspapers mostly transmit in a forceful and emphatic way those opinions which do not too openly contradict their own and that general trend.”

Ouch… tell us what you really think about the media, Aleksandr!

Just how long-lived the media’s sudden interest in Joe Biden’s deteriorating medical condition will be is anyone’s guess. If I were a betting man, I would lay odds that they will keep unearthing more damaging information in an all-out effort to remove him from the Democratic ticket… after which they will loudly – and in unison – start singing the praises of his replacement.

How do I know? Because I looked into Solzhenitsyn’s crystal ball.