“Whether you read a newspaper,
watch TV or follow the news online,
only 14 percent of the stories you hear were
developed by journalists defining an issue and pursuing it.
A staggering 86 percent of the stories were fed
to broadcasters by official sources and press releases.
In 1960 there were only three-fourths as many PR people
as there were journalists. Today the ratio is 5 to 1.”

– The Death and Life of American Journalism,
   by John Nichols and Robert W. McChesney

We now have 5 times
as many PR people as journalists.
And 86 percent of what you think is news is actually just
an edited press release written by a public relations person
whose job is to sell you a perspective, a belief, an opinion.

Wait a second… isn’t that essentially the definition of propaganda?

-Indiana Beagle