Transparenting (to make transparent)

Perhaps one of the most important roles that the fourth estate has is transparenting government.  Government, at least this one, was founded on the principle of "of the people, by the people, and for the people," this sort of motto can only apply if the people have the information.  If the close door of governmental meetings has a transparent plane of glass through which we can peek inside.  

All the President's Men is more than just a mediation on the opaquity of government, it is a dramatization of the vitality that transparence must have in government.

Much of what we've done over the past few weeks has been research about sound journalistic methodologies and ethical journalistic practices.  We've outlined the models of journalism, we've debated their merits.  But, what is the best that journalism can do?

All of what we've done takes us back to Alexis de Tocqueville's conception of the fourth estate.  

A more serious question, though, arrises from Tocqueville's argument.  Today's discourse is fragmented, whether newspapers are doing a good job or not is immaterial to their loss of stature.  With multiple media outlets competing for multiple audiences, Tocqueville's sense that newspaper creates and mobilizes community seems to fade.  

Does it?