It seems clear that our news media, both legacy and new, are in disarray.

The most common villain cited is technology, which has wiped out the advertising base. But that’s not the full story.

Still, many media outlets are finding a new way — the most common may be replacing the advertising base with a circulation or paywall base — and if they succeed, they may find ways to save our democracy as well.

On the wall, I see handwriting that says our traditional standard of “straight reporting,” and the neutrality that comes with it, no longer win the public’s esteem.

As a reporter, editor and journalism teacher, I must have iterated a million times such phrases as these. “Every story has two sides.” “Tell both sides.” “What does the other side say?” Today, especially among progressives, this discredited idea is called “both-siderism.”

Then, we began saying, “Tell all the sides of the story,” noting that more than two sides often exist. Example. While our political parties have hardened into tribes disdainful of the other’s motivation, we can look deeper and find fractures in each party.

Democrats contend with a progressive wing sometimes called “The Squad,” notably represented by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. Republicans contend with a Christian-nationalist wing that has hold on the party’s majority in the House of Representatives.

So, right off the bat, news media are looking at four sides. Ultra-progressive, moderate left, moderate right and ultra-conservative. So, it is now, “Get all four sides of the story.” Whew!

And that comes just as the bean counters have overrun newsrooms and put a price on every story. Always a low price. I have heard of a reporter who wasn’t allowed to leave the newsroom yet was expected to write about events she hadn’t witnessed. She was fired for low production.

Teaching journalism, I told students, “I never found a story on the telephone.” But I did stumble upon fatal wrecks, new businesses, exotic animals in the dooryard and so on by being out and about. Even picked up side stories driving to dreaded city council and school board meetings.

The stories one finds “on the street” are about regular people, “just trying to make a living doing what they know how to do,” as an old friend described the Amish who have settled down the road from me. And what regular people believe and feel about the major topics in the news.

Jimmy Breslin began as a copy boy in the 1940s on Long Island. Mike Royko began in the City News Bureau, chasing cops and fire trucks on behalf of all Chicago’s newspapers. Both spent their lives “on the street.” Breslin and Royko both won Pulitzer Prizes, journalism’s top award.

In 1979, I was offered a job running the newsroom at the Union-Bulletin in Walla Walla, Washington. A city reporter was among those who interviewed me. Jo Moreland told me that if she can’t show readers at the start how a story will affect them, she needs to get more info. I knew I wanted to work with reporters like her, but I turned down the job for other reasons.

In a terrific essay last month in The Guardian, Margaret Sullivan wrote that the news media must “grab American voters by the lapels.” Her topic was Donald Trump’s plans, both stated and unstated, to change our government and country should he be elected president in 2024.

She cited work by The Washington Post and The New York Times digging into those plans.

Sullivan was the “public editor” for The Times and media columnist for The Post and ran the newsroom of the Buffalo News in New York.

Sullivan has three recommendations for how the media can help save democracy. Remember, she’s writing about the 2024 election, but her ideas go beyond that, should democracy survive.

“Report more (much more) about what Trump would do post-election. Ask voters directly whether they are comfortable with those plans, and report on that. Display these stories prominently, and then do it again soon.” Reporters do that best on the street, not in an office.

Second, “Use direct language not couched in scaredy-cat false equivalence about the dangers of a second Trump presidency.” The first three words are key to all news writing. Use. Direct. Language. Don’t call the grade F “deferred success” or call genocide “ethnic cleansing.” When I got an F in physics, it wasn’t success delayed. It was failure. When one people tries to wipe out another, it isn’t cleansing. It’s mass murder.

Third, “Pin down Republicans about whether they support Trump’s lies and autocratic plans.” She wrote that George Stephanopoulos of ABC News cut off an interview with Steve Scalise, a Republican leader from Louisiana, when Scalise repeatedly sidestepped a question about the legitimacy of the 2020 election. Make him take a stand. He agreed to the interview, after all.

Above all, Sullivan wrote, the media need to make clear how news stories affect our lives.

“When Americans do understand how politics affects their lives, they vote accordingly.” That played out “with respect to abortion rights in Ohio, Virginia, Wisconsin and beyond. Voters clearly get that well-established rights have been ripped away, and they have reacted with force.”

Bob Neal believes that in 2015 Donald Trump was a symptom of our political dysfunction. As time went on and Trump’s support grew, he became a cause, as well, and a threat to democracy. Neal can be reached at bobneal@myfairpoint.net.

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