In his July letter, the estimable Graydon Carter, Editor of Vanity Fair since 1992, has some advice for newspapers:

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[...]Who has the patience to hear endless whining about someone else’s misfortune when your own fortunes are rickety? This is not to say that the health and vigor of the nation’s dailies are not vital to the intellectual health and vigor of the commonwealth as a whole, or that newspapers aren’t an essential force in keeping a watchful eye on corrupt politicians and venal corporate overlords—neither of which are in short supply these days. I would also hope you feel that the loss or even weakening of the nation’s principal daily, The New York Times, would mark an end to life as we know it. The Internet is partly to blame for all of this, and perhaps micro-pricing or gated content will be part of the solution. “Youthing” down a paper to attract 21-year-olds isn’t the answer: the only way you’re ever going to get the average 21-year-old to read a daily newspaper is to wait 9 years until he’s 30. My suggestion to newspapers everywhere is to give the public a reason to read them again. So here’s an idea: get on a big story with widespread public appeal, devote your best resources to it, say a quiet prayer, and swing for the fences.      [my bold]

Mr. Carter continues with the story of how the UK's The Daily Telegraph broke the story of the reimbursed expenses scandal in parliament. The story required a lot of dogged work. Many months of reportorial leg work and research had to happen in a secure location before they broke the story. The payoff? It was huge!

Carter continues...

As this column goes to press, the Telegraph had already devoted 120 broadsheet pages to the story, in a little more than two weeks. And although the paper broke the stories on its Web site, then fed them into the next morning’s print edition, sales of the actual paper exploded. On the Friday the story broke in print, the Telegraph sold out. Since then, the paper has sold an extra 600,000 copies. According to the paper, it was the biggest sales uptick for a non-conflict-related story since World War II. More letters poured in from readers than at any other time in the Telegraph’s history. The story was so compelling that competing papers were grudgingly forced to illustrate their reports on the affair with shots of the Telegraph’s banner headlines. There is now talk of a knighthood for Lewis for his part in uncovering the scandal.   [my bold]

And they say newspapers are dead.  

What a treasured piece of understatement. 

Like Mr. Carter, I, too, am weary of reading about newspapers whining about their financial circumstances. In fact, he writes: "Who has the patience to hear endless whining about someone else’s misfortune when your own fortunes are rickety?" I know that I  fall into that category. 

However, my own reasons for being so irritated with newspapers actually pre-date our current global- and country-wide financial crises. Papers had begun a number of years ago to cease delivering what their readers wanted. Book reviews. Sunday Magazines. Arts and Letters Sections. Mostly, those features are all gone, or else so diminished that they cannot justify the purchase of another piece of a tree... nor the addition to one's carbon footprint.

And then there is the  small matter of the lack of coverage during the run-up to our invasion of Iraq, and the stories about abuses to the Constitution that were so conveniently held up until after elections that might otherwise have been decided differently. Nor can I think of a politic way to mention the stories that were planted by a corrupt administration that then pointed to those very stories as justification for their corrupt actions. What happened to editorial oversight during this time?

In order to justify even a tiny increase in global warming-- recycling efforts aside-- one must find enough value in a newspaper to make it worth the effort to lay down a dollar or two... perhaps a bit more on Sundays. 

At the moment, I am so far from being able to consider forgiveness... that only decisive editorial action will rouse me to compassion for the present sufferings of newspapers... or to open my wallet to buy one regularly. 

I long for the day when newspapers are once again a vital force in our cultural, political and literary landscapes, but I honestly fear that I may not live long enough to see that happen. 

Perhaps The Daily Telegraph might consider sending a crew of reporters here to the States to do a similar story on the financial circumstances of our elite reporters and pundits (not the every-day working reporters-- they are not the problem!). I suspect that such a story would be highly embarrassing to reporters, pundits, publishers, editors... all of them.

That story would have to be a prerequisite to any story about government scandals, given our legacy media's penchant for the status quo. Yet, would a clean sweep, similar to what is happening in Britain's parliament, even be possible in our print (and broadcast?) media?

This is only a hunch, but I would give it 50-50 odds for that kind of success. 

Or... perhaps, Mr. Carter would consider having VF do the dirty work.