Babiš and civil liberties

In the latest Democracy Index by The Economist Intelligence Unit, the CR ranks fairly high in terms of civil liberties. Higher, in fact, than the United States, and on the same level as Belgium, France and Italy. This survey category is based in part on the degree to which the media are free to express themselves, and the CR presumably scores quite high here, given the lack of government restraints. One of the specific criterion nevertheless caught our attention: "Is media coverage robust? Is there open and free discussion of public issues, with a reasonable diversity of opinions?" No individual rating is given for this question, but from our viewpoint, it's becoming one of the CR's main weaknesses. Czech media are getting into a rut of promoting only one side of the story, to the exclusion of a "reasonable diversity of opinion." There were always such tendencies, but there is little doubt that the entry of Andrej Babiš into politics and media has significantly exacerbated the problem.