Do you think that the 24 hour national news channels indirectly undermine the United States tradition of federalism? Since they are national news they have to appeal to the lowest common denominator of its viewers so logically they focus on stories about the federal government to the exclusion of local issues. Does this give an impression to viewers that the federal government should be of a larger importance to them then their local municipalities?
24 hour news
To quote Thomas Jefferson "The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter."
Of course Thomas Jefferson was speaking only of newspapers but they at the time were the only semblance of daily news. I don't think he feel much differently of daily news being given through other mediums.
MikeyA
I think our federalism was undermined long before the 24-hour cable news networks went on the air....