Freedom of the Press...it's gonna cost you.

Another blow for freedom of the Press? That’s right, if you’ve got the money.

Remember when the Pentagon took heat for paying certain reporters to cover stories in Iraq?

The funniest comment is “But we don't do it here--not without getting punished, and fired, for it anyway.”

Well, apparently we DO do it here – without getting punished or fired.

This link will take you to this story.

In the latest blow to editorial credibility and the crumbling of the wall between church and state, nearly half of senior marketing executives (48.9%) said they have paid for an editorial or broadcast news placement, according to a PRWeek/Manning Selvage & Lee survey conducted by Millward Brown, BtoB Online reports.

See another, more in depth take here.

A Manning, Selvage and Lee report claims that almost 50% of marketing executives PAY for story placement…including, get this EDITORIAL placement. This is fantastic! Companies are paying for placement on the editorial page, where the connection between truth and reporting is often the weakest.

This is as opposed to paying reporters to cover your “good news” stories. At least there, you have facts that are verifiable. For instance, if we were to pay a reporter to cover a story about building three new schools, someone else could verify that there were…actually….three new schools that we had built.

With the MSL survey, companies are often (but not always) getting editorial placement. This means that they are getting stories that say, “This company is full of people who really have their customers’ best interest at heart.” This is somewhat harder to prove, isn’t it?

My guess is that these placements are in some of the same media outlets that were “outrage” when the U.S. government paid reporters to get off their lazy asses and cover some good news in Iraq.

Oh, wicked Harlot, oh shameful wench, thy name is Media.