The 1st Amendment to our Constitution permits Americans to have both free speech as well as a free press. This right is of critical importance because if the government or its agencies determines what is or is not printed, than the public is not being served with the information that they need in order to formulate valid decisions. For instance, before our revolution, papers printing news that was damaging or critical to the government or its authorities were subject to the charge of seditious libel, which meant imprisonment or fines or both. Samuel Adams stated in 1768 that: "There is nothing so fretting and vexatious, nothing so justly TERRIBLE to tyrants, and their tools and abettors, as a FREE PRESS."
At the time our 1st Amendment was enacted, modern devices such as the radio, television, the internet, smart phones, and the like, didn't exist, and along with the fact that the transportation and distribution of newspapers or pamphlets was for the most part, both difficult and expensive, this meant that the news printed was typically local just within the community, and that therefore that news had to be both pertinent as well as accurate, because the readers of said paper would know the difference. That may have been then, but that isn't necessarily true today.
Today, we proudly proclaim that our press and mass media are still free and protected by our 1st Amendment, while the distribution of news throughout America is, in fact, range bound by the two dominant political parties of America, as well as having to be in accordance for the most part with governmental and corporate desires. While the NY Times proudly displays on its masthead: "All the News that's fit to Print," this statement is an absolute absurdity. The NY Times is known for its liberal bias and deliberately promotes this agenda in contradistinction to conservative viewpoints.
In fact, whether you get your news from a major television network or newsprint or a magazine, in all and each of these areas, there will be for a certainty a deliberate bias in favor of providing and confirming the political viewpoint desired by that particular media outlet. The business of the press at this point, is not at all to provide all the news that is fit to print, but to provide just the news that fits within the mindset of that outlet.
The information that we receive from the press today, is filtered and given to us in such a way, as to be most pleasing to the corporate ownership of the news organization, which needs to satisfy its advertisers in order to receive that much needed monetary boost from them, as well as the power brokers of its ownership, which must do its best to enhance its stock price, and ultimately sees the public that is buying into its wares, as mindless consumers, who must be and are easily manipulated.
For those that are truly desiring of a free press, unfortunately, you will not find that in any of the mass media outlets of today, who exist primarily for the purposes of selling you propaganda, but instead you must seek it through alternate sources, such as individuals that you respect, bloggers, some books, radio, and other print media, as well as a personal willful determination to both question authority and to dig beneath the surface.