Those Special Journalists

Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit, is right---harrumph!:

My own sense (I had a column to this effect in USA Today Wednesday) is that journalists should get the same privileges the rest of us get: No more, no less. If there's to be such a privilege at all, it should be for anyone who is doing journalism, regardless of whether they get a paycheck from MSNBC or the New York Times. "Freedom of the press" in the First Amendment refers to, in James Madison's words, "freedom in the use of the press" -- that is, freedom to publish -- not freedom for some institution called "the press." (Indeed that usage of "the press" to refer to newspapermen didn't become common until well after the Constitution was ratified.) Let the press be free for all of us and let us all enjoy freedom of the press. Otherwise it's just a special privilege for a privileged guild.

What on earth makes these people feel this enormous sense of entitlement? Was "All the President's Men" really that influential?