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Considering that the government (authoritarian side) has certain methods of ascertaining the truth in events (testifying under oath before congressional hearings), and the public (anarchic side) has it's methods of ascertaining the truth in events (freedom of press), a problem lies in the fact that the freedom of the press is abused in conjunction with freedom of speech, in that the press can often be full of shit. Biased in the direction of their private entities interests.
While the National Enquirer exercises it's freedom of speech, and pretends to be a member of the free press, it is by no means taken seriously. This is not a problem. The problem lies in news agencies that are, when they should not be. As a suggestion, it may be agreeable to all present that news agencies purporting to be credible be given the option (and, thereafter, seen to be the duty) to swear all reported facts as true, under oath and penalty of perjury, with punishments that could be doled out (fines, loss of press license, etc).
Editorial and opinion pages are nice, but it seems more and more of the opinions end up on the front page. This, under certain lenses, would be seen as an unfortunate feature of the anarchic side of the authoritarian-anarchic continuum.
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