“If you disbelieve everything, you’re liable to believe anything.” 

Our Proposal:

• Certify journalists and news organizations
• Assign a quality rating to both, as well as to the content they produce
• Create a “National Press Fund” to help support certified journalists and news providers

The Goal:

• Restore faith in our press
• Make a career in journalism attractive and viable again

Explanation:

Democracy requires freedom of the press, but that in itself is not sufficient for it to fulfill its essential role in a democratic society. The press must also be widely trusted, since a commonly-acknowledged set of facts forms the basis upon which voters can make informed decisions and hold elected officials accountable. Without general agreement among the public about what constitutes fact and what does not, bad actors and their “alternate channels” can spread damaging lies and misinformation, bizarre conspiracy theories can go viral, and even the scientific fact can become questioned. A free and trusted press is critical to safeguarding our democratic freedoms and enabling us to progress as a nation.

Ominously for our democracy, more than half of Americans have lost faith in our news organizations and journalists, according to a recent poll. This disastrous lack of trust is not an accident. There are at least two fundamental reasons for this:

1. Both foreign and domestic anti-democratic forces are assaulting our democracy, and one of the key weapons in this assault is to erode the public’s faith in the press. Widely-trusted sources of information and facts act as an anchor to the truth and as a check on emotional overreaction, and in their absence peddlers of falsehoods and animus from both within and without our borders thrive like invading viruses. Our democracy and our nation as a whole are weaken as a result.  
2. Most news organizations are businesses that seek to earn a profit, and as such they go where the money is. Sadly, in the age of free—and often questionable at best—online news sources, the business model for the news industry in many cases now is to capture a dedicated (addicted?) group of listeners, readers, and viewers by dishing out one-sided, emotion-stoking stories and commentary.

Partially as a result of these two factors, our country has become divided into mutually-distrusting camps, each one believing (and emotionally vested) in largely different sets of facts, making meaningful dialog almost impossible. Seemingly no fact now—no matter how credible—goes unchallenged by unprincipled grifters on cable news, podcasts, and social media. As such, what constitutes “reality” becomes ever more subject to controversy. So extreme has become the situation that many doubt the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 presidential election, and climate change, among many other things. This is again not by accident—the first step to controlling what people believe, and hence their willingness to relinquish money and power, is to make them question reality, and then get them to trust that a certain individual or organization is the sole source of reliable information. As one prominent historian recently noted, “Every authoritarian leader eventually asserts himself as the only arbiter of truth.”

Restoring Faith in the Media:

The Solutions Party believes that the first step to restoring faith in our press is to put into place a system that 1) allows people to clearly distinguish between credible news sources on one side, and misinformation spreaders and emotion manipulating charlatans on the other, and 2) holds journalists and news organizations accountable for the quality of their reporting and commentary. 

The Solutions Party proposes that a first step to achieve this is to certify journalists, just as doctors, lawyers, accountants, and others are certified. Specifically,

1. Set up an independent certifying organization composed of respected journalists, journalism scholars, and other qualified individuals who represent a variety of political orientations
2. The criteria for initial temporary certification would be accredited training in journalism or sufficient relevant experience. After an initial probation period, a bona-fide certification would be issued based on the quality and objectiveness of reporting
3. The quality and objectiveness would be analyzed on an article-by-article basis automatically by multiple AI programs in combination with occasional random human-based reviews
4. If the AI programs raise a red flag, a more extensive human-based review would take place, and advice or warnings would be issued as needed
5. If red flags continue to be issued, a certification can be revoked
6. If an AI-generated false positive occurs (i.e. an unwarranted red flag), the AI program would be tweaked to correct the error

In addition to certification, a quality rating would be assigned based on factors such a reliability of sources, quality of writing, and fact-based neutrality. Commentary and opinion articles could be similarly rated, with adherence to principle also considered. Public comments on particular journalists, stories, and commentaries could also be considered when calculating quality ratings. The certification and quality rating would be analogous to a university degree (certificate) and GPA (quality rating), and would be applied to news organizations as well as journalists, and to the content they produce.

Reversing Journalism’s Decline:

While certification and quality ratings could help reestablish widespread trust in our news sources, by themselves they would only address part of the problem plaguing our press these days. Another issue is the devastating decline in the number of newspapers and journalists in recent years. Since 2005 over 2,000 newspapers have gone out of business, and over half of the journalists have lost their jobs. The effect has been most pronounced in smaller markets where the void as been filled by social media and “profit-above-principle” infotainment conglomerates.  

The Solution Party believes that independent and reliable local journalism, in both rural areas and elsewhere, must be considered an essential resource for the health of our communities and our democracy. Local journalism is indispensable in order to draw attention to issues of common interest to the community, including highlighting progress and development on one hand, identifying problems and shining a spotlight on corruption and other criminal activity on the other. Specifically regarding corruption, local newspapers have traditionally been on the front lines of exposing corruption in the areas they serve. The goings-on in smaller towns and rural areas usually are under the radar of larger newspapers in far-off cities, so without their own investigative journalists, smaller communities lose a crucial anti-corruption watchdog. 

To ensure that quality journalism thrives in every corner of our country, making the necessary investment so that journalism can be an attractive and viable career path is not only worthwhile, but also imperative for our nation and our democracy. We should aim to make it easier for people with an interest in journalism to enter the field and make a decent living. We should strive to make sure all of our communities have robust and quality journalism.

To address this, the Solution Party proposes the following:

1. Establish a “National Press Fund”, to which anyone (the government, private companies, and individuals) can contribute
2. This fund would help subsidize certified journalists and news organizations—especially in (but not limited to) less populated rural areas and other markets where a traditional advertising-based business model may not be viable
3. The amount of the subsidy granted to a certified journalist or news organization could be proportional to their quality rating
4. Special bonuses could also be given for particularly excellent work, such as exposing local corruption or doing valuable human interest stories

Since a variety of people and organizations would contribute to National Press Fund, those it supports would not be beholden to, and hence vulnerable to the whims of, any particular donor. With financial pressures eased, news organizations and journalists could focus on providing meaningful and quantity content, instead of trying to remain economically viable by serving up emotion-stoking nonsense, sensationalism and other click bait. 

The message to those considering a career in journalism would be “get certified, publish quality stories, and get a monthly stipend from the National Press Fund.” Through certification, quality ratings, and investment, let’s make our press the envy of the world, and an example for others to emulate. 

Simply stated: let’s make journalism great again!