The Daily Beast took a stab at one of the harder sciences of the media world last night, publishing a list of the top 25 most influential right-wing journalists in America. It is a pretty comprehensive list, with all the usual suspects - Matt Drudge, George Will, almost everyone on Fox News prime time - making appearances, and both conservative and libertarian columnists taken into consideration. "What unites them all, broadly," writes columnist Tunku Varadarajan, "is their influence on the public debate, and their place on the political spectrum—which is somewhere to the right of center." (more...)

While the freedom of the press guaranteed by the First Amendment has never been successfully challenged politically, it is now being challenged economically:  as a practical matter, the press is not so free.

In the hard new priorities of news management, dwindling resources struggle to keep coverage alive on essential routine beats, while the public-interest side of the business — investigative journalism,  the very heart and soul of journalism — is being unforgivably squeezed in the face of fiscal realities. (more...)