At the local level, there is (almost) no modern journalism. Large media companies have swooped in and gobbled up pretty much every major newspaper, local tv news, local radio news. They've then fired the journalists and switched everything to sites that push mainly national stories mixed in with 100 clickbait marketing garbage ads.

And for national journalism, it's 90% about access journalism. Every interview is softballs, no follow up, etc. Journalists almost never press for an answer. And it's just so absurdly lazy. Rather than actually reporting or investigating anything journalists just republish press briefings.