Well, I think you are unnecessarily advocating for a form of Authoritarianism. The powerful get a microphone. But the public will not get a voice. I personally think it enhances democracy to allow public comments on articles.
Anyone can run a blog or so for free. I lose very little sleep over awful people promoting their awful views on blogs, but I get quite annoyed when I read a news article and want to hear opinions on it (even ones I may disagree strongly with), but the legitimate opinions are downed out by abusive assholes spamming hate speech or endlessly trolling. A lot of those people are just bullies trying to drive others away so they can 'own' the comment section.
Imagine you are an artist and you have your own space, maybe a small table at the fairgrounds where you are selling your pictures from.
Would you allow random people to attach notes to your pictures -- the notes that everyone who wants to look your pictures would see? Or will you say, "this is my table and I decide what goes here"? If the later, does this make you undemocratic authoritarian?
It is not just "the powerful" who "get a microphone". Anyone can speak out. There are tons of places where we one comment on articles -- we are on one of those. And getting your own site is pretty easy, too.
