Why does it always feel like our news media remain clueless about the biggest story they’ll ever cover – Donald Trump and the GOP assaulting our democracy? To be fair, they do know how to do freeway chases and beauty contests and horse races. The chase ends. Someone wins the beauty contest or the horse race while everyone else loses. Simple. But, this story? Soooooo complicated! Lots of moving parts. To be fair again to the news media, there’s no book on how to cover a story like this – where white nationalists, fascists and authoritarian thugs take over the Republican Party and literally announce their intention to end American democracy by hook or (especially) by crook. These developments always seem to shock our news media. That isn’t the case with a big slice of the news audience. Developments aren’t what’s shocking us. It’s the news media and the fact that sooooooo much of the news is news to them!
Smoking Guns
Donald Trump is “all but openly campaigning on a platform of tearing democracy down“. That’s per Vox. I wonder… if Trump actually said “Hey, let’s all go tear democracy down!” would that finally be enough of a smoking gun? Could the news media then finally do away with the “all but”?
It’s mind blowing, frankly, the amount of benefit of the doubt our news media continues to give Trump up to this moment. They still openly ask about his state of mind. “But, did he really know what he was doing or that what he was doing was wrong? What if he’s completely innocent just like he says?
This kind of “thinking” is beyond obtuse! It’s willful ignorance. A stone cold refusal to aggregate information into an evolving and emerging narrative whole. How many lies did it take before most of our news media finally used the word “lie” to describe Donald Trump’s lying?
Easy Distractions
Had the news media put its foot down at “Mexicans are rapists”, they could have ended Trump at the jump. But, the news media succumbed to distraction. Pussy grabbing and then her emails.
Our news media pursued “her emails” instead of Trump’s connections to Russia. Guess where the real story ultimately – and always – resided: Russia. That’s why our news media to this very day still asks “what is this hold Trump has over the GOP?” Yeah, his base plays a large part. But, so does Russia.
“Putin Pays Rohrbacher And Trump”
The GOP leadership knew even before the party formally nominated Trump that a Trump presidency would pose a grave threat to America’s national security. On June 25, 2016 – a month before the Republicans’ nominating convention – former Speaker Of The House Kevin McCarthy exited a meeting where our intelligence community briefed members of Congress on Putin’s ongoing efforts to undermine Ukraine’s fragile, new democracy.
From there, McCarthy walked directly into another meeting – this one of GOP leaders. Someone there recorded the meeting – and then played it almost a year later for reporter Adam Entous, writing then for the Washington Post. Upon entering the second meeting McCarthy said out loud “There’s two people I think Putin pays – Rohrbacher and Trump – swear to God!“
Now, everyone there would have agreed: Putin pays California Representative Dana Rohrbacher. He really is Putin’s favorite Congressman. But “Putin pays Trump”? That should have been news to everyone in the room.
Except it wasn’t!
They all knew the truth that, yeah, Putin does pay Trump. Same as Putin pays Rohrbacher. No one present challenged the statement. And no one contradicted it either. Instead – before things could heat up – then Speaker Of The House Paul Ryan asserted himself. They weren’t going to talk about it anymore, Ryan told them. They were going to keep this terrible secret a secret. “That’s how we know we’re a family“; that’s the bow atop it all.
Both Sides Do NOT Do It
Trump has told us – via the news media – who he is all along. Some of us have believed him – all along. When we said “Trump’s a fascist” back then, the “adults in the room” told us to be quiet. It’s unAmerican to call Americans fascists – even if that’s what they are. But, Trump didn’t just become this thing.
What hurts most is our news media’s total inability to see itself honestly so as to take stock. They fail to appreciate that their “neutrality” actually is cynicism. That’s why they insist that “both sides do it”.
Both sides don’t do “it” of course (whatever the hell “it” is). In fact, both sides are almost completely different – now more than ever. Why doesn’t our news media see it? Why does this remain news to them?