Os, a strong media is absolutely necessary to hold those in power to account. It's always been the case. Trump and Musk seem strangely scared of being held to account, hence why they've spent countless years trying to undermine traditional, effective journalist (and much of it is personal, childish gripes - Musk and Reuters, for instance).
You may not like the NYT, for example, (I don't think they're great these days, for what it's worth), but if they're reporting verifiable facts to hold people accountable, that's a very good thing.
You seem to be confusing fact based reporting with opinion pieces, and to be honest, you don't read the legacy media, so I'd suggest that your impression of what they are and aren't saying is somewhat warped by where you are getting your information from.