Last week saw a new attempt to dismantle independent journalism, and it was the most dispiriting kind. The assault came from within.
Jeff Bezos, owner of The Washington Post, declared that he was changing the newspaper’s opinion section. Opinion pieces that run alongside or opposite the Post’s editorials – so called op-eds – will no longer present an array of opinions. Now they will focus daily “in support and defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets.”
Free-market capitalism and individual freedom are venerable American values. They are easy to cheer for. Most people believe in them. But a free market in ideas, which is what journalism needs to provide, cannot be encapsulated in simplistic directives that do not acknowledge the complexity and contradictions that exist within Jeff Bezos’ platitudes.
“I am of America and for America,” Bezos said in his social media post, “and proud to be so.” It is not much of a stretch to think that Bezos is hoping to inoculate himself and his core business – the aptly named behemoth enterprise Amazon – from censure or retribution from the Trump administration.
His attitude echoes the long-ago proclamation, “What is good for General Motors is good for America.” This bit of wisdom was uttered by Charles Wilson, who was at the time the company’s president and CEO.
Bezos can wrap himself in the American flag, but not sufficiently to cover up the naked truth about the damage that his volte-face does to his newspaper, and to journalism principles more generally. One wishes he surrounded himself with advisors who knew the history of the profession he chose to enter when he purchased the Post from the Graham family in 2013.
Journalism has been an ever-evolving profession. The Boston Daily Advertiser, which thrived in the early 19th century, is credited with pioneering regular editorial comment. The editor who drove this was Nathan Hale, nephew of the American Revolution hero by the same name. The first named “editorial page” appeared mid-century in Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune. The idea was – and remains – that owners may use the page to argue for whatever side of current debates they favor.
The op-ed page concept sprang from a different motivation, namely, to expose readers to a wider range of views. Herbert Bayard Swope, who pioneered the concept at the New York World in the early 20th century, put it this way: “It occurred to me that nothing is more interesting than opinion when opinion is interesting.” The best minds lined up to write for the celebrated page.
But there was more than this behind Swope’s decision to start his op-ed page.
World War I, which Swope experienced as a war correspondent (and, later, as a U.S. Navy officer) was a wake-up call for the press. The Wilson administration’s systematic, pervasive propaganda overwhelmed journalists. Wilson’s opinion-molders swept aside alternative ideas for pursuing the war – for instance, seeking a negotiated peace that would have ended the conflict more quickly – with the same tactic politicians dismiss criticism today by calling it “fake news.” In Wilson’s time the phrase was “enemy talk.” Journalists such as Swope worked for the administration and were complicit in its propagandizing.
Following the war, journalists were also concerned that war propagandists were turning their experience to create a skilled profession with the brand-new name “public relations.” Frank Cobb, editorial page editor of the New York World and also a Wilson supporter, regretted that government propaganda had “goose-stepped” public opinion and led to the proliferation of “private propaganda.”
“How many there are now, I do not pretend to know,” Cobb said, “but what I do know is that many of the direct channels to news have been closed, and the information for the public is first filtered through publicity agents.” He added, “God forbid, that our supreme achievement in the War should be the Prussianizing of ourselves.”
Other papers followed the New York World in curating a wide range of views for their readers. The first to use the term “op-ed” was The Washington Post in the 1930s, around the time that another wealthy businessman, Eugene Meyer, rescued the newspaper from bankruptcy.
Philip Geyelin, editor of the Post’s editorial page from 1968-1979, is remembered for the page’s fierce criticism of the Vietnam War, for which he won a Pulitzer Prize. Yet he remained committed to presenting a smorgasbord of opinion from which readers could nourish their minds – and form their own views. “While people may not mind being told what a newspaper thinks,” he said, “they don’t feel the need to be told what they should think.”
Bezos claims that providing wide-ranging opinion in his newspaper is an antique concept. People can easily find it for themselves elsewhere. “Today the internet does the job,” he said when announcing his new directive. He is wrong. It is precisely because of the Internet that the Post should have stayed the course.
The Internet is loaded with bogus information disguised as fact or news. Much of it is controlled by people who are or want to be politicians. This applies to Elon Musk and his social media outlet X, and it applies also to Democratic Party loyalists who put out local ink-on-paper newspapers that are publicity sheets for their side. This latter endeavor is especially pernicious because legitimate local newspapers have been disappearing.
Of course, citizens should seek out opposing views on their own. But most people are busy with many other things besides combing through an array of news outlets. Readers need help from full-time journalists at responsible newspapers. Editors with deep news experience are equipped to find thoughtful opinion on all sides – and protect us from seeking confirmation of our biases and feeding our half-baked fantasies. The Post has had a decent record of performing this service. Bezos could have reasonably called for a few more libertarian voices, if that is what he favors.
But is that what Bezos wants? That is unclear, and his lack of specificity and nuance is a sign of how poorly he has thought through his new edict. If the emphasis is on “personal liberties,” as he says, how far would he go? He personally supports women’s choice, but does he see limits to how long a pregnancy can run before termination is unethical? How much control should government have over what schools teach? What does he mean by promoting free markets? Does he think taxes should be cut to promote entrepreneurship? Does he believe that we need an agency in place of the soon-to-be-defunct Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to ensure that lenders do not bilk creditors? Does he think monopolies should exist or that business should have the “freedom” to collude on setting prices? The Washington Post has a long history of supporting big business while recognizing – as far back as 1905 – that men like tycoon John Rockefeller “sow demoralization throughout the land.”
When Bezos made the last-minute decision in late October 2024 to kill an editorial supporting Kamala Harris for president, he said it had nothing to do with politics. It was simply principle. He thought newspapers should not be weighing in because it showed bias. “We must,” he said, “work harder to control what we can control to increase our credibility.”
With this latest directive he has, instead, offered up patriotic pap unworthy of a serious newspaper. He and his publisher, William Lewis, say not to worry. The rest of the newspaper will remain as relentless as ever in the pursuit of balanced reporting. He might be sincere. But once one guardrail is down, others more easily fall. By hazily calling for only certain opinions that are easily twisted, Bezos risks turning the Post into a propaganda sheet, which is what Swope and Cobb, and many other great journalists who followed them, wanted to avoid.
Many commentators think they know what motivates Bezos: He wants to curry political favor. These critics see a pattern. Bezos donated $1 million to President Trump’s inauguration. He basked as he stood near the president during his swearing-in on Capitol Hill. He fed the president’s ego by traveling to his Mar-a-Lago estate for a dinner that included Elon Musk. Amazon paid $40 million to license a documentary on Melania Trump, which has been estimated to put as much as $28 million in the Trump family pocket.
The critics assert that notwithstanding Bezos’ assurances, his actions speak louder than words, and that he is trimming the newspaper’s sails (and sales, since his actions have cost many readers) in order to be on the right side of those currently holding the upper political hand. Or maybe Bezos just doesn’t really care about strong journalism. Perhaps he does not know what independent journalism is.
Whatever the reason, the proprietor of the Post is selling out his news enterprise at a moment when strong independent journalism is more necessary than ever. We are going through a major shift in the priorities and conduct of our government. Bezos has now given a gift to those who think the best press is one that puts itself out of the business of helping the public decide for itself what ideas are best for the country.
There is a good case for change but not for change that goes untested by vigorous debate.
