I grew up reading the Stars and Stripes (before the www existed). A few decades back it was a decent summary of news, at least. It ran a page of headlines from across the US with state-local news. It carried a range of opinion writers. And did its own reporting in addition to syndicating AP and other news streams. Had the requisite comics and satirists. It was like a smaller version of the old USA Today papers. Kinda like the current The Week publication, but daily.

"Independent" is not a binary achievement. It's a continuous, multi-dimensional scale.

This article is about a move in one direction (away from independence) on that scale.