OPINION
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Drudge Loses Juice as Media Swing Left
Tough competition drives Fleet Street-style sensationalism, bias
By Gabriel Winant
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Posted Oct 30, 08 9:38 AM CDT
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(Newser)
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The Ashley Todd hoax was as good a symbol as any of the decline of the Drudge Report, writes John Gapper in the Financial Times. Liberal blogs, cable TV, and, indeed, newspapers themselves have invaded and occupied Matt Drudge’s sensationalist niche. Tough competition and falling circulation are “pushing newspapers back to a scrappier, more plain-spoken and partisan ‘yellow press’ past.”
Many old journalism hands are shocked by the newly prevalent bias. But this is actually how things have always been in Britain, and how they were here, too, until relatively recently. “The US media have shifted left for a time, to mimic what they judge to be the country’s mood,” Gapper writes. "When that mood swings back, so will the media."