The mainstream press are failing America
From “The Guardian” – By Rebecca Solnit
(Excerpts)
The media is still pursuing the appearance of fairness by treating true and false, normal and outrageous, as equally valid.
“The real reason corporate media won't cover Trump's attacks on democracy”
On August 26, 2024, the New York Times published an article on its editorial pages with the following headline: “Trump Can Win on Character.” Journalist D. Earl Stephens wrote his comment on the Times commentary:
“We need to talk about the abominable headline, and how we have come to the fatal point where The New York Times and our broken mainstream media” seem to show undue favoritism toward Trump.
Stephens says the article is an example of the Times “inability to spot the biggest news story of our lifetimes, and treat it with the heft it deserves.” The Times, he continues, is engaging in “journalistic malpractice, and is a very real danger to our country.”
“The Times isn’t alone in its mishandling and disregard of the continuing attack on our country and its institutions that back it up. In fact, I can’t point to ONE so-called reputable news source in our ‘mainstream’ media that has appropriately sounded the alarms, and given this perpetually breaking news story the treatment it demands.”
“What news could possibly override monitoring the dangerous maneuvers of a sociopath, who is still free and on the loose after unleashing his rabid attack dogs to besiege our Capitol, stomp on law enforcement officials, seek out political leaders for harm and hanging, and prevent the certification of our vote, while doing nothing for three hours except root for the attack’s success?”
“Just what in the hell is being discussed in all these newsrooms while Trump bangs the drums of hate, follows the roadmap created for him in Project 2025, and backstopped by a radical, bought-off Supreme Court, bolstered by known election-deniers, promises retribution to anybody who dares get in his way?”
Stephens cites another headline that he finds repugnant: “Harris has the momentum. But Trump has the edge on what matters most.”
“If you feel comfortable with that headline,” says Stephens, “then the mainstream media have you right where they want you: accepting that running this kind of propagandist bilge is acceptable.”
“My only plausible guess for the mainstream media’s failure to cover the attack on our country, besides sheer and incomprehensible incompetence, is that they are hedging their bets…our media’s catastrophic failure to protect and inform us.”
(D. Earl Stephens is author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” who finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes.)
In an appearance before the New York Economics Club on September 6, Trump was asked what specifically he would do to lower the cost of childcare. He launched into a completely meandering, nonsensical reply that barely even mentioned the subject at hand. He rambled about slapping foreign countries with tariffs and seemed to suggest that he could use the money collected from said tariffs to fund universal childcare.
After seeing this response, Ruhle on Morning Joe slammed members of the New York Economics Club for applauding to such a demonstrably incoherent answer. In a follow-up post, Ruhle challenged the media to accurately report that Trump's remarks made absolutely no sense whatsoever.
According to Rawstory, Ruhle stated “Calling Trump's remarks at the NY Economics Club incoherent gibberish is not a biased attack. It is a completely rational observation. He did not speak in coherent or complete sentences. And when he did, proposals like (tariffs - childcare) do not make sense."
The question Trump should be asked every single day
By Colbert I. King
If I didn’t know better, I might conclude that the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, in which rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol to prevent the certification of the 2020 presidential election, was merely the act of exuberant “patriots” voicing their displeasure with Joe Biden’s victory — and that Donald Trump had nothing to do with it.
What else to think, based on the media’s treatment of the twice-impeached former president and felon and his campaign to return to the White House?
Trump is being covered by the press as if Jan. 6 were old news.
Here we are, back to horse-race journalism and breathless pursuit of polls and other campaign nuggets designed to keep audiences glued to our websites, networks and newspapers — with little attention paid to the character, records of service and moral fitness of candidates who seek the highest offices in the land.
And here, in 2024, we have Trump campaigning in full misogyny, with lewd references to Harris, without being pressed for answers about behavior that unleashed the worst assault on the seat of the federal government since the War of 1812.
Meanwhile, (Trump shows his contempt for the rule of law) by having his New Jersey golf club host a fundraiser for families of the defendants charged in the attack on the Capitol. Felons — dubbed “patriots” by Trump — whose sentences he has promised to commute if he’s returned to the White House.
The nation needs to know in advance whether, this time around, Donald Trump is committed to accepting the 2024 results. He should be asked that whenever he shows his face in public.
Every. Single. Time.
This isn’t La La Land. We, the media and the public, need answers.
I am truly concerned about the power of Trump. The man is insane and a dictator. We will be Nazi Germany in 4 years if he is elected. The old, the infirm, anyone not functioning within his rules will be persona no grata.