This week, President Trump signed an executive order that seeks to restrict public funds to NPR and PBS. Since appropriations are made two years in advance, the immediate impact of the order is debatable. However, it is a moment the media should use for long-overdue self-reflection.

I have been critical of some of the administration's attacks on the media, from barring the Associated Press from some White House events to lifting protections of the media from subpoenas regarding their sources. However, if these objections are going to have any legitimacy, the media must take a serious look at what it has become.

This coming week, I have the honor of giving the keynote address for the Center for Integrity in News Reporting at the Library of Congress. For many of us who have been part of the media for decades, these are precarious times for the American press. The damage done to the press in the last decade would have been unimaginable when I started. The most chilling fact is that it is almost entirely self-inflicted.

The state of American media was captured recently when the president of the White House Correspondents' Association (and MSNBC correspondent) Eugene Daniels declared, "We are not the opposition." Given the controversy that had occurred over the association originally booking a vehemently anti-Trump comedian for the dinner, it seemed more like a punchline than a plausible claim.

As if to bring that comedic point home the next day, the New York Times published its collection of essays titled, "A Road Map of Trump’s Lawless Presidency." A recent study showed that media coverage of the Trump Administration has been 92 percent negative.

The undoing of American journalism began in "J-schools," where young reporters were taught that the touchstones of neutrality and objectivity were no longer viable. At schools like the University of Texas,

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