Journalist Alex S. Jones, who won a Pulitzer for a book he co-wrote on the Binghams, recently authored another, on the future of newspapering.

In a nutshell, he exhorts them to do what they’ve always done best and been valued for most: tell the readers what they should (and don’t already) know — without fear or favor.

Admittedly, that’s harder to do nowadays, amid shrinking profits, layoffs and lesser resources for labor-intensive investigations — but that would seem to be the best survival strategy. And the Herald-Leader seems to be stepping up to the plate.

As a matter of survival, newspapers need to be more selective in their coverage. I’m sick to death of H1N1. The overwhelming coverage might be justifiable if it were much more lethal than seasonal flu — or remotely as insidious and pervasive as obesity (which should be garnering more coverage than the pig flu).

As the Digital Age progresses, newspapers and blogs alike will become a more hostile home for the ill equipped, and the big boys and girls will be left to do the heavy lifting.

Ideally, more, stellar stories will twinkle in cyberspace — and if newspapers can survive in a new, improved, more interesting and consequential form (as they should), hungry minds will be better fed.

There was time I couldn’t envision the Internet machine formidably competing with the daily paper. But that time has passed.

Blogs, like papers, that are taken seriously are accessible and accountable to critics. And as more print journalists transition to the ‘net, the marketplace of news and information will grow more competitive, credible, robust and healthy.

Editorial writers will have to think thrice before protecting their pets amid a broadening base of believable opinion leaders.

And so maybe there’s hope for a better Fourth Estate.

Happy Thanksgiving, y’all.