Comedian Stephen Colbert’s banishment from CBS is a furtherance of the cycle of shame unfolding at the legendary news network. But even as CBS and its parent company, Paramount, fork over $16 million to settle a frivolous lawsuit, lose cornerstone news professionals, and now, shitcan a quick-witted comedy icon, all in the service of preserving Paramount’s merger with a company called Skydance, the voices of independent journalism survive.
The Trump Administration’s attempt to silence its critics using the federal government’s regulatory apparatus—the Federal Communications Commission must approve the Paramount-Skydance deal—will fail. Sure, many corporations—much like law firms and universities—will cave to directed pressure from the gilded oval office. But there are simply too many ways for the free press to reach a broad audience. These are not the days of television, radio and printing presses.
Many dispossessed journos have taken to Substack, an online platform where they can post their views for free, to a large audience, holding some or all of their content hostage behind a paywall. The platform also accommodates audio and video offerings.
Former longtime New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman posts daily to an audience of 400,000. He posts daily free columns and a longer Sunday post for paying subscribers. Krugman is one of many who post on Substack and a wide variety of other platforms. YouTube, Facebook Reels, Bluesky, X and many more platforms allow anyone with a phone and a following to get their message out.
Sure cranks, crackpots and Russian troublemakers have access to the same tools, but censorship of the kind Trump is looking for—intimidation through obnoxiously inappropriate wielding of government power—won’t work. And as the American people begin to feel the pain of Trump’s Big Bill, the Epstein Affair becomes less defensible and the unpopularity of the administration’s immigration policy gains weight, it will begin to be easier for the public to separate wheat from chaff.
One can hope.