Thankful I'm out of the media.

I'm going to parts of Sardinia I've never been to. Along the north and northeast coasts. We're gonna visit my true love's brother. He recently settled there. After living in Milano. That's his favorite city. But he's back in Sardinia. Because that's where he found a job. There's lots of unemployment in Italy. More than in the USA. Maybe I retired at just the right time. In 1998. When I was 62. I never had difficulty finding jobs. All of my life. I had many job choices. As a journalist. A writer for newspapers. But the newspaper business is on the decline. People get their news from other sources. Many newspapers have folded. In my younger days, newspapers thrived. And they were beholden to nobody. Which made reporting rather independent. One could alienate an advertiser, and a news source, and readers, and still get away with it. But that changed when newspapers had to act more like a business than a public service in order to stay in business. So very many papers sold their souls. And started feeding readers crap instead of real news. Because that's what so many readers wanted. Crap. Entertainment. That's what the news business has become. Entertainment. Because that's what sells. Much of the news today is fabricated. In order to be entertaining. One doesn't have to be informative in order to sell a 'news' program. It's exaggerated and biased and bombastic. Entertaining, above all else. Anyway, when I'm traveling in Sardinia over the next few days, I'll be away from the news of the world. I'll be on Mediterranean beaches. Listening to the peaceful sound of surf. Thankful that I'm no longer a member of the news media. --Jim Broede