It is all too easy for The Australian to kick Fairfax while it is down, with the often repeated but never substantiated claims that it is “ignorant of mainstream Australia”, a “conclave of left-leaning professionals”, etc. (Editorial, 20/6). The Australian, on the other hand, can freely continue to lose money promoting its profoundly unpopular free-market ideology, knowing that its owner will continue to subsidise it with profits from his other tentacles in order to retain his grip on public opinion.

David Young (The Australian, Letters, 20/6) is only half right when he asserts that Fairfax’s woes are caused by “the most democratic of institutions, the free market”. The most democratic of institutions is in fact universal suffrage, something the market will never produce. It may well have forced media restructuring, but as long as people do not have equal economic power, there is nothing democratic about it.

Nor does the market guarantee balance or quality, which is why we have government-resourced media, whose “aura of legitimacy” is not “spurious” but earned by recognised journalistic rigour and merit which is the envy of commercial media. Nonetheless, if Mr Young objects so strenuously to their existence, he may prefer to get his information from market-driven sources, like say, “Today Tonight”, or perhaps “The Bolt Report”.

Douglas Taylor (The Australian, Last Post, 20/6) among others, finds amusing the idea that the owner of a newspaper would not dictate editorial policy. It seems we have lived so long in Rupert’s empire that what the rest of the world sees as political interference, we view as normal business practice.

Meredyth Cilento’s suggestion (The Australian, Last Post, June 13) that the ABC screened only pro-Gillard tweets on Q&A carries more than a little irony, as hers is one of many letters selected by The Australian for their anti-Labor slant.