Neal Boortz and I chatted about an issue yesterday that's much on my mind these days, the future of the newspaper industry.  I wonder whether the future is the news media's past.

When you look back at American political history, you quickly find that newspapers didn't so much report the news as they egged on one side or the other.

"Yellow Journalism" hit its peak in the late 19th century, with "Remember the Maine" and much more.

I really hope that we aren't going back to that, because I don't want to be a part of that future.

I was on the phone the other day with a buddy of mine who works for CBS and we were discussing the terrible state of our industry.

He's convinced that our next stop is the alignment of newspapers and other media with one party or the other.

When you look at the ongoing battle among CNN, Fox News and MSNBC, you see that being on the Right or Left wins you viewers.

And obviously, more conservative talk radio has carved out a pretty good living on AM and FM by catering mainly to one side of the political spectrum.

On cable television, CNN is trying to play the middle, and the ratings for the most part show that it's not working.  They are often now in fourth place in prime time, behind CNN Headline News, which features Nancy Grace.

Back over to newspapers, as I tell Neal, I do have great confidence that even if the newspaper industry goes down the tubes, something else will pop up to replace it.

But I must admit that I'm worried by what's developed up on the internet so far.  I love blogs.  I absolutely love all these people who are writing all kinds of stuff.

For the most part though, these political blogs are biased to one party or the other.

That makes them work fine on some matters, but on others, their blind party loyalty is disappointing.

One thing that I don't like about newspapers is their editorial page, especially their endorsements of political candidates.

I just think once you begin taking sides in elections, it is very hard to win some people back in terms of your independence and your credibility.

Hopefully, I'm not about to watch the news media collapse in coming years - though the business model of the newspaper industry will have to change dramatically.

I don't want to work for a news outfit that basically is an organ for one party or the other.

I want all sides to wonder what I'm going to write next. 

One of my listeners wrote me an email the other day in which they called me a "dinosaur" for my old line journalism habits.  I may be a dinosaur in more ways than one.