Agreed. The romanticism of some golden age of journalism (Cronkite?) is cringeworthy. The primary complaint from the political class about the media is that it’s too hard to control. The genesis of fake news accusations comes from different political spheres. Fake news is anything a politician disagrees with. That’s it. Trump co-opted it for his own use, but he didn’t start the fire.
The ideal news framework for the political class would be 3 main networks, all spewing basically the same controlled narrative.
The idea that dissenting voices exist is the real problem for the state. The existence of outlets that will publish the most damning whistleblower findings is what they would love to get rid of.
Circling back to “fake news,” the problem is that SO MUCH of the news over the past 60+ years has turned out to be fake. The biggest stories of the 20th century that got us into major wars were all fake, or misleading or massaged for the purpose of manufacturing consent from the public.

It’s ironic to hear the HALLOWED media get up in arms when they get accused of fake news. That’s a bed they’ve been making for decades. They shouldn’t be so surprised when their political enemy makes them lie in it.

Every day we see new easily debunked mainstream media narratives trotted out. News is faked constantly. If you don’t realize it, then you’re just not being very observant. And if you catch someone lying to you once, you’re a fool if you think it just happens to be the first time they lied to you.