2016: A Bad Year for Democracy, but "Best Ever" for Big Media

As we enter 2017 with a frightening new president-elect, American pundits have been discussing, with some urgency, various flaws in American democracy. Leaks from hackers allegedly collaborating with state actors, an archaic Electoral College, Donald Trump's hostility toward the press and Facebook's electoral news judgment have all been the focus of a great deal of discussion in the dominant media. But while pundits on cable news outlets argue about these issues, media executives who sign their paychecks are positively elated about the 2016 election, which thanks to $2.4 billion in political ad spending and record ratings, was great for Big Media's bottom line. "This is the best year in the history of cable news," said CNN President Jeff Tucker.

This jubilation is rooted in the two biggest threats to any semblance of democracy, both rarely examined by the media: (1) the pervasive role of corporate money in our elections, and (2) the fact that the media outlets that should be vigorously investigating this trend are owned by the same corporate interests that profit so much from it. This scenario is not merely a conflict of interest but a crisis of democracy.