Boring professionalism. Joseph Pulitzer invented the idea of the journalism school before 1900. These institutions spread over time but didn't really take hold until the 1960s. By 1970, newspapers had begun to decline. Coincidence?

A sign quoting Pulitzer, posted at the Columbia School of Journalism as a kind of mantra, epitomizes the problem: "Our Republic and its press will rise or fall together. An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it, can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery."

The problem is the word "disinterested." It's the hallmark of journalism today and translates to bored and boring. Besides not giving a hoot about the story, the disinterested observer is often hoodwinked and subject to public-relations manipulations. Apparently, nobody sees this as a problem.

The disappearance of the paperboy. I was a paper­boy as a kid. It was good money, and my knocking on doors seeking subscriptions or asking to be paid put a human face on the paper. Circulation grew with the population, but now newspapers must offer free subscriptions to sucker the rubes to renew. These offers come from Mumbai by phone, usually when you're at dinner. The bean counters love it. Some middle-aged man now delivers the paper out of an old Chevy.

No sense of humor. Today's papers have no collective sense of humor or fun. This is partly because of the J-schools and the need to be "professional." I haven't seen anyone laugh in a newsroom for decades. This may come from political correctness, or perhaps from some public-guardian ego trip. Maybe too many of the people working daily news beats are just duds.

While recently perusing 1950s-era San Francisco Examiner issues, I was shocked to find that the paper was crammed with small and interesting stories, many of which now would go into the reject folder. The paper had real life to it then—life that is now missing. Let's not blame the Internet for this.

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