Robert McChesney was one of the founders of The Rocket, Seattle’s erstwhile rock n’ roll tabloid bible.

Then he went off to Wisconsin to be a radical scholar and professor of media studies, writing several books about the evils of corporate-controlled news and broadcasting.

Now, he and John Nichols have cowritten a manifesto book suggesting federal government subsidies for news organizations, presumably including the Seattle Times—which co-presented the authors’ Town Hall appearance Tuesday night.

How would an already fiscally flailing government find the funds for this? Not specified.