By Michael O'Brien - 09/20/09 04:24 PM ET
The president said he is "happy to look at" bills before Congress that would give struggling news organizations tax breaks if they were to restructure as nonprofit businesses.
"I haven't seen detailed proposals yet, but I'll be happy to look at them," Obama told the editors of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Toledo Blade in an interview.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) has introduced S. 673, the so-called "Newspaper Revitalization Act," that would give outlets tax deals if they were to restructure as 501(c)(3) corporations. That bill has so far attracted one cosponsor, Cardin's Maryland colleague Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D).
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs had played down the possibility of government assistance for news organizations, which have been hit by an economic downturn and dwindling ad revenue.
In early May, Gibbs said that while he hadn't asked the president specifically about bailout options for newspapers, "I don't know what, in all honesty, government can do about it."
Obama said that good journalism is "critical to the health of our democracy," but expressed concern toward growing tends in reporting -- especially on political blogs, from which a groundswell of support for his campaign emerged during the presidential election."I am concerned that if the direction of the news is all blogosphere, all opinions, with no serious fact-checking, no serious attempts to put stories in context, that what you will end up getting is people shouting at each other across the void but not a lot of mutual understanding," he said….http://www.thehill.com/blog
Comment by: Barbara
The new news media is the blogs; journalist that are doing the hard core investigative reporting are the bloggers, ie: This goes back to Drudge exposing Clinton/Monica thing and recently Matthew Vadum of Capital Research exposing Acorn. Let's not do the bailout instead let's insist newspapers starting reporting the news fair and balanced.
OUTRAGEOUS!!!
WE NEED TO FIGHT BACK AND SUPPORT GLENN BECK. HE IS A NATIONAL TREASURE!!!
They are doing an EXCELLENT job to help Glenn against the vicious attacks from the liars, Commies and left wing extremists. I learned that State Farm was considering pulling their advertising because of fear from the intolerant racists that are promoting this boycott. I have five single family homes insured by State Farm. I called their corporate offices in Illinois on Friday and spoke to the most senior manager/ I was on the verge of cancelling all five of my homeowner policies with them. He assured me they were not about to drop advertising.
I will follow up. He said they had gotten many calls from Americans who learned of this from the defend glenn web site. DO YOUR PART GO TO http://www.defendglenn.com/
All Out War Against Glenn Beck by the Anti-Americans !!
Sunday, September 20, 2009, 11:52 AM
Never forget the saying: You know you are over the target when you are taking heavy flak.
Glenn and our entire CONSERVATIVE movement are definitely hitting the target!!
The criminals are petrified their gig is about up! They know ultimately they
are no match for the American people. Same feeling King George
must have been getting in 1776!! No wonder Pelosi looks like she's going to cry! They never envisioned this mass uprising of The People! stopxxspp@gmail.com
Comment by Barbara: When is Congress going stop shredding the Constitution? I predicted this way back when all this bailout bull shit started this would be in the works, I was wrong I thought he would go for the airlines before the newspapers. Industry, Banks, Healthcare is 16-20% of the economy, Newspapers, trying to ban guns, after the internet, talk radio. Closer and Closer to Socialism!!!! THIS AIN'T GOOD
