At last, a bailout I can get behind:
Seven legislators from the area served by The Bristol Press and The Herald in New Britain today wrote to the state Department of Economic and Community Development to ask for its help in preventing the closure of the newspapers.
[. . .]
It's also encouraging today to see that Jim Romenesko's daily email roundup of media news for the Poynter Institute, which the whole industry reads, featured at the top of its list the story about Gov. Jodi Rell and Attorney General Richard Blumenthal's willingness to lend a hand to the effort to save the papers.
Of course, it might be a little difficult for the press to continue to be the "watchdog of the government" if the government holds the key to its survival. Bailouts tend to come with strings, I've noticed. But most journalists today are clamoring for a national shield law -- which would let the government determine who is and is not a journalist -- so worrying overly about keeping the press "free and independent" is probably a waste of time.
