Why, media, why?

Atrios has a good question. In fact, a few good questions. Why has the press rolled over so thoroughly for Bush? And why do they:

continue to internalize every right wing critique of them, all of which come from people who "have nothing but contempt for these people." Why did Bernie Goldberg get such a wide airing for his idiotic book? Why does CNN hire Bill Bennett who thinks journalists who report on the illegal activities of the federal government should be put in jail? Why are people like Hugh Hewitt and Assrocket, who simply believe that the news media should be entirely in service of a radical conservative agenda, regularly given a platform? Why is it in the "liberal media" there are so few liberal voices ever given an opportunity to speak? How was it that the New York Times, which spent years covering a land deal in which the Clintons lost money, decided to "discourage pieces that were at odds with the administration's position on Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction and the alleged links of Al Qaeda"?

I don't have the answer to this basic question. I wish I did.

So do I. I’ve seen lots of attempts at answering it, but none of them have struck me as particularly satisfactory. Mannion has suggested that the press’ hatred and resentment of Clinton and Gore segued, by means of comparison, into an appreciation of Bush, because it’s easier for them to like someone to whom they feel superior. I definitely think that’s part of it. But the rest? I’ve no clue. It’s like they don’t consider themselves Americans, like they have no personal vested interest in watching the country go down the shitter. They’ve twisted “objectivity” into what appears to my eyes to be apathy, indifference—just a collection of dispassionate spectators, laughing when it feels okay to laugh and lazily following the strongest current of opinion about what their jobs should be. Maybe they’re all just counting on jobs in the foreign press if this country becomes an authoritarian toilet. I dunno.

Thoughts?