The "media" – as it's common to refer to it (singular, bear with) ought to have listened.

It is singular, in the first place, because it is all the same. There is the appearance of multiple news outlets but they are the equivalent of the badge-engineered vehicles sold by GM. A "Buick" is really a Chevy and they are both owned by GM. Just the same, the media brands are all owned by a small handful of interlocking corporate interests. To speak of the "media" – plural – is to use a term that may be technically correct but nonetheless highly misleading.

Speaking of that . . .

The "media" thought it could consolidate and thereby control what people thought by controlling what they were allowed to hear (and read). And for awhile, it worked – in part because most people had no idea that their local network (and paper) were part of the same much larger network, all controlled from afar by a kind of big ugly spider at the center of the web. And also because it didn't seem to matter. After the old Soviet Union broke apart, after the end of the Cold War, it seemed to most people that all was well and we could just watch Seinfeld and Friends and all would continue to be well.