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The United States is one of the few countries where the government is specifically prohibited from licensing the press or reporters or otherwise shutting down a newspaper simply because they don't like the content. While the average Joe knows their rights are protected by the court case of ''[[Miranda Rights|Miranda v. Arizona]]'', most people are unaware of one of the pivotal cases denying press censorship in the United States: ''Near v. Minnesota'', which basically said the government can't shut down a newspaper no matter how much it finds its content objectionable. [[As You Know|Of course,]] [[All There in the Manual|freedom of the press is guaranteed in the first amendment to the Constitution.]]
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There are a few exceptions for "''national security''" issues, in that basically it's illegal to 'out' a hidden CIA agent; this was the case of the "Valerie Plame" scandal in the 2000s. So excepting this limited issue, it basically means the press has the (virtually) unlimited right to report any public fact without censorship or fear of prosecution.
That doesn't mean American reporters have ''[[Gratuitous French|carte blanche]]'' to do anything to report on a story. Depending on what has happened, if a reporter breaks a law covering a story, they sometimes will be prosecuted, especially if the incident is embarrassing. There was one case where a reporter showed how weak the Los Angeles County Welfare Department was in checking on the background of applicants that he was able to apply
Newspapers in the United States are printed in one of two formats. The most common for daily and weekly standard newspapers is a long format, roughly 11"x17", which is called a ''broadsheet'', and the type that half that size, about equivalent to the common paper format of 8 1/2" x 11", which is called a ''tabloid''. Because some very popular weekly newspapers in the U.S. which carried stories which were either total fiction, or were mostly pandering to people's interest in scandal and sensationalism were published in the tabloid format, the term ''tabloid'' has a negative connotation; calling a newspaper a ''tabloid'' is considered a smear as to the quality of the publication. To try to combat this, as these newspapers were typically sold in supermarkets, the term "supermarket tabloid" is sometimes used to refer to the less-reliable newspapers which are published in that format.
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National newspapers in the United States:
* ''USA Today''
* ''The Wall Street Journal''
** Incidentally, one of News Corp/Murdoch's biggest changes to the paper was adding color photographs on the front page.
** The Wall Street Journal has one very important ''feature''. Because any contract where one party pays interest on borrowed money where the interest rate can change must use a third-party to determine what the interest rate should be, with the exception of contracts involving government guarantees, typically any contract (a credit card, a mortgage, a car loan, etc.) will use the current interest rate of either prime rate or the London Interbank Rate (LIBOR) plus a certain percentage amount as published on the last day of the month in the ''Wall Street Journal.'' This means that the WSJ actually has more effect on what several million people pay in interest than the Federal Reserve Bank does.
* Some consider the ''Christian Science Monitor'' to be the third national paper in the United States. As it is published by the Boston-based First Church of Christ, Scientist, some may consider it a ''cult''-based newspaper like The Washington Times. This follows a standard rule most people use in thinking about religion: my religion is mainstream, any I disagree with or have never heard of is a cult or a ''trap of satan''. As it is run by a non-profit, it cherishes its independence from the for-profit model and as such, its non-religion articles are generally well written. (Only one proselytizing article per day runs.) Went from a daily printing model to a hybrid weekly printing/online all week model in 2009.
Most other papers are local, generally known as ''The [city name] [paper name]''. In practice, ''The New York Times'' is available nationwide and other major papers are available throughout their regions of influence: the ''Chicago Tribune'', the ''Omaha World-Herald'', and the ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' in the Midwest, the ''Los Angeles Times'' on the West Coast, ''The Seattle Times'' in the Pacific Northwest, etc. Most, if not all, hyphenated names are a result of mergers between two previously separate newspapers published in the same metropolitan area; for example, the ''San Diego Union-Tribune'', which were originally the morning-published ''San Diego Union'' and the afternoon-published ''San Diego Evening Tribune''.
States cannot license or regulate newspapers, thus there are no "official newspapers" for those governments besides internal publications. However, state governments often contract with a capital city paper or the largest newspaper in their state to publish legal notices and bills which take effect upon publication in that paper (for instance, laws are not in effect in the state of Wisconsin until a notice of them is placed in Madison's ''Wisconsin State Journal''). Counties and cities will also take the same direction and publish legal notices to become binding upon publication.
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Not officially national, but two papers with wide-reaching national influence are:
* ''The New York Times''
* ''The Washington Post''
These two papers are widely considered to be the top of the journalistic profession in America, and you can expect any young reporter in fiction to dream of working at either one. In general, the ''Times'' does better in reporting international news, as well as arts and culture, while the ''Post'' is considered to be the go-to for political news. Both are often cited as being proof of the "[[Strawman News Media|liberal bias]]" of the press. The accuracy of this accusation is extremely debatable, and many observers vociferously disagree with it. (The ''Times'' has several columnists, such as Paul Krugman and Maureen Dowd, who do tend to make conservatives' blood pressure rise; on the other hand, they also boast well-known conservative writers such as Thomas Friedman and the late William Safire, who in addition to his political column wrote a highly-regarded column on the American English language for the Sunday edition for many years. The ''Post'' generally steers a middle line in its editorial coverage, with the results that they irritate conservatives when a Republican president is in power and annoy liberals when a Democrat holds the White House.)
Other papers of note:
* ''Chicago Tribune''
* ''Chicago Sun-Times''
* ''The Detroit News'' and the ''Detroit Free Press''
* ''Boston Globe''—Major paper in the New England region; notable for its role in the exposure of the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal, as portrayed in the film ''Spotlight''.
* ''Los Angeles Times''
* ''New York Post''
* ''The Washington Times''
* ''The Denver Post'' and ''(Denver) Rocky Mountain News''
* ''The National Enquirer'' -- The king of the trashy supermarket tabloids. Its owner from 1954 to 1988 allegedly had [[The Mafia|Mob]] ties, and thus refrained from discussing anything pertaining to their activities. Unlike most newspapers, it will pay sources for tips, a practice that is frowned upon by journalists. Generally read for entertainment value, as little of what is inside can genuinely be classified as news, although they do occasionally break some major stories (the most recent being John Edwards' affair). Bizarrely, its publisher's Boca Raton offices were one of the targets of a anthrax attack in 2001, which killed a photo editor.
* ''The [[Weekly World News]]''
* ''[[The Onion]]''
* ''The New Hampshire Union Leader''
* ''Stars And Stripes'' is the newspaper of the [[Yanks With Tanks|US Armed Forces]]. It is published under the auspices of the Department of Defense, though it maintains editorial independence, and is generally available in and around every major US base in the world.
* ''The Baltimore Sun''
If you are in [[New York City]], there are probably a few more newspapers available than in most US cities. In addition to the ''Wall Street Journal'', ''New York Times'' and ''New York Post'' mentioned above, you can find:
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* ''Newsday'' is the newspaper for Long Island and Queens, but can be found in the metropolitan area. Was owned by Times Mirror, then Tribune, and currently owned by local cable company Cablevision (also owner of the Madison Square Garden and most of its tenants), with their website only available to paper and Cablevision subscribers and those who don't mind paying $40 a month to access it online. Has recently developed a self-important streak- articles on ongoing news stories are often accompanied by thumbnail-sized shots of their own covers illustrating "How Newsday covered the story". Then again, given how many papers on this list have been suffering in the economy, perhaps the public needs reminding that they publish more than a comics section and movie listings.
** Ray Barone of ''Everybody Loves Raymond'' was a sports columnist.
* ''The New York Sun'', which was founded in 2002 as an intentionally right-wing five-day daily, taking its name from an older paper that went under in 1950 (more known for the ''Yes Virginia, There is a [[Santa Claus]]'' editorial). Circulation was never high and the paper operated at a loss to try and build for several years. In a letter to readers published on the front page of the September 4, 2008 edition, it was announced that the paper would "cease publication at the end of September unless we succeed in our efforts to find additional financial backing." They didn't. Publication ceased on September
Further complicating matters, most newspapers (big and small) in the United States are owned by one of [https://web.archive.org/web/20100926024503/http://www.stateofthemedia.org/2004/narrative_newspapers_ownership.asp?cat=5&media=2 a couple dozen newspaper companies], such as Gannett, News Corp, McClatchy and MediaNews.
In addition to newspapers, there exist several national news and news-related magazines, of various political leanings. Typically, they are the go-to source for more in-depth reporting than what you will find in a newspaper, which is devoted primarily to stating the facts and, in the case of the op-ed and letter pages, the personal views of various writers.
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This type of American magazine can be divided into three subtypes; in order of depth, they are the weekly general newsmagazine, the weekly political newsmagazine, and the monthly political/cultural magazine.
These are general-purpose publications with no specific, identifiable editorial position. They tend to cover every topic from politics to the economy to health to culture from a fairly middle-brow, middle-wing, middle-class perspective, although they frequently publish opinion pieces from people with more overt political views. The print editions can generally be found pretty easily on
* ''Time'' is the largest news magazine in the world, with over 45 million subscribers worldwide, less than half of whom are in the US. It is published weekly. They are famous for their annual "Person of the Year" award, which goes to whoever they feel had the greatest influence on world events. The "person" may not necessarily be a living human
* ''Newsweek'' has traditionally played second-fiddle to ''Time'' in terms of both readership and respectability. From 1961 until 2010, it was owned by the Washington Post Company. After losing money for two years, in 2010 it was sold to Sidney Herman, the 90-year-old founder of a speaker company, and then was merged with ''The Daily Beast'', a poor man's ''Huffington Post'' and current pet project of Tina Brown. This has led to [[Magazine Decay|an increasing amount of pop culture stories]] (including cover stories) and opinion pieces in its pages. Most recently, it aroused controversy for publishing a [[Fan Service]]-y cover photo of [[Sarah Palin]] in form-fitting workout gear. Like ''Time'', it is a weekly magazine.
* ''U.S. News & World Report'': Alongside ''Time'' and ''Newsweek'', the third of the "Big Three" American news magazines. It tends to lean more center-right than the above magazines, while eschewing sports, entertainment and celebrity news. Originally a weekly, it went to a biweekly, then monthly format in 2008, before finally going online-only at the end of 2010 (though it still prints special issues). It is best known for its annual rankings of American colleges and universities.
Similar to these in format and widespread recognition, but not in scope of coverage, is ''Sports Illustrated'', which is focused on professional, Olympic, and collegiate sports. It is also published weekly and widely distributed.
==== Weekly(ish) politics magazines ====▼
These magazines have a strong focus on "hard news", presented with a definite political lean one way or another. They tend to eschew everything else, with the exception of "culture" -- books and the arts. These magazines are definitively more high-brow than the "Big Three", and thus have a correspondingly reduced focus on things like personal finance.▼
▲These magazines have a strong focus on "hard news", presented with a definite political lean one way or another. They tend to eschew everything else, with the exception of "culture"
* ''The New Republic'' is broadly center-left, having supported the Soviet Union in its early years, although it turned against it during the [[Cold War]] once Soviet policy became more aggressive (while maintaining a similarly oppositional stance against McCarthyism). It moved to the right during [[Gay Conservative|Andrew Sullivan]]'s tenure as editor in the '90s (including running an inflammatory article on race and intelligence at the height of the "Bell Curve" controversy), though it has since shifted back following his departure. Has generally supported a pro-interventionist foreign policy, to the irritation of many otherwise similar-minded liberals. Their editor from 1948 to 1956, Michael Straight, had worked as a spy for [[Moscow Centre|the KGB]] during the '30s. Originally a weekly magazine, it changed to a biweekly publication model in 2007.
* ''National Review'': A conservative biweekly magazine founded by William F. Buckley. It played a major role in shaping much of the policy of the "New Right" coalition that would eventually bring [[Ronald Reagan]] into power, while simultaneously helping to purge American conservatism of its more odious elements (the anti-Semites, the Birchers and, starting in the '70s, the segregationists). It remains one of the most influential conservative news outlets around.
* ''The Weekly Standard'': Another conservative magazine, this one published weekly and founded by [[Rupert Murdoch]] in 1995. During Murdoch's ownership, it lost over a million dollars a year, though Murdoch wouldn't sell it until 2009. Since then, it has become more successful.
* ''The Nation'': The oldest American weekly news magazine, founded in 1865 by abolitionists in New York. It is heavily left-wing in its reporting and editorial
* ''Mother Jones'': A left-wing publication, named after labor organizer Mary Harris Jones. It is the largest left-wing news magazine in the country, though its bimonthly model means that it prints far fewer issues than ''The Nation'' does. [[Michael Moore]] worked as an editor for it for a few months in 1986. During the '80s, it was notable for its staunch feminist stance and its support for various Central American leftist movements, including the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.
In addition, ''[[The Economist]]'', while published in Britain, has a large American following, possessing a circulation in the US [[Germans Love David Hasselhoff|three times higher than what it has in its home country]].
These are the deepest of the deep, the highest of the high-brow, and the most serious (and frequently depressing) of the lot. Their circulations tend to be quite small, and they can be quite hard to find indeed. These tend to not only include reviews of fiction, but also publish
* ''The New Yorker'': The classic journal of American culture and politics, with a definite lean to the former. Nevertheless widely respected as an outlet for journalism and analysis. Quite liberal, but not too. Dissimilar to other monthly magazines in that it has a substantially larger readership with over a million subscribers.
* ''Harper's'': Like ''The New Yorker'', but with less prestige and a ''way'' more
* ''The Atlantic'': Founded by no less than [[Ralph Waldo Emerson]] and [[Henry Wadsworth Longfellow]], ''The Atlantic'' today is known as a center-right outlet. Its precise political position has varied in the past.
* ''America'': Focuses on the Catholic experience in America; so heavy on investigative journalism and editorials that it's almost an academic journal. Which isn't surprising as it's published by the Jesuits.
A peculiar part of the newspaper scene in the United States are alternative weeklies. More likely to be published by independent concerns (although Village Voice Media is rising), these publications tend to express left-of-center views, but are not dogmatic in terms of columnists. The journalism itself is more likely to have a expressed viewpoint, and they tend to have stronger reportage than the daily press. Despite this, they are mostly free, completely subsidized by advertising. They tend to be the leader in their market for coverage of local entertainment and the arts.
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At nearly every college in America, independent student newspapers are published. At the bigger schools, they come out on a Monday-Friday basis during the academic year, with smaller colleges having less frequent publication days. These newspapers do train journalists for professional careers, but are not substitutes for Journalism School educations (though they can be complementary with them). They tend to into run into more free speech issues, due to the pressures of college administrations, hyper-sensitive readerships and unpolished staff. Below them are high school newspapers that include many [[School Newspaper Newshound|school newspaper newshounds]].
At the bottom rung of the enterprise is the activist press, which is blurred with activist magazines and websites, to the point where the only real difference is the lack of staples or a computer. These papers tend to push very radical politics and views, usually socialist (or further left), [[Right-Wing Militia Fanatic|far-right]] or [[Conspiracy Theorist]]-oriented. Most of these have permanently fled to the internet, sensing the "death of printed journalism" narrative that has only
The classic ''[[Yes Prime Minister]]'' exchange on the subject of [[British Newspapers]] can be replicated thus with respect to the American media (unfortunately, the US doesn't have enough national papers to fit the template):
{{quote|'''President Bob''': Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads and watches what. [[Cable News Network|CNN]] is watched by people who think they run the country, ''The New York Times'' is read by people who think they ''ought'' to run the country, ''The Washington Post'' is read by the people who actually ''do'' run the country, ''USA Today'' is read by the wives of the people who run the country,<ref>Not surprising, since they're always in some hotel in a warm location.</ref>
'''Smarmy Civil Servant Alice''': Mr. President, what about people who read ''The National Enquirer''?
'''President's Body Man [[The West Wing|Charlie]]''': ''National Enquirer'' readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits. }}
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