Donald Trump conducted a press conference recently as if he were a loud circus ringmaster whipping the media circus animals into shape. The establishment thought the performance was a window into an unhinged mind; half the country thought it was a long overdue media comeuppance.
The media suffer the lowest approval numbers in nearly a half-century. In a recent Emerson College poll, 49 percent of American voters termed the Trump administration “truthful”; yet only 39 percent believed the same about the news media.
Every president needs media audit. The role of journalists in a free society is to act as disinterested censors of government power—neither going on witch-hunts against political opponents nor deifying ideological fellow-travelers.
Sadly, the contemporary mainstream media—the major networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN), the traditional blue-chip newspapers (Washington Post, New York Times), and the public affiliates (NPR, PBS)—have lost credibility. They are no more reliable critics of President Trump’s excesses than they were believable cheerleaders for Barack Obama’s policies.
Trump may have a habit of exaggeration and gratuitous feuding that could cause problems with his presidency. But we would never quite know that from the media. In just his first month in office, reporters have already peddled dozens of fake news stories designed to discredit the President—to such a degree that little they now write or say can be taken at face value.
No, Trump did not have any plans to invade Mexico, as Buzzfeed and the Associated Press alleged.
No, Trump’s father did not run for Mayor of New York by peddling racist television ads, as reported by Sidney Blumenthal.
No, there were not mass resignations at the State Department in protest of its new leaders, as was reported by the Washington Post.
No, Trump’s attorney did not cut a deal with the Russians in Prague. Nor did Trump indulge in sexual escapades in Moscow. Buzzfeed again peddled those fake news stories.
No, a supposedly racist Trump did not remove the bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the White House, as a Time Magazine reporter claimed.
No, election results in three states were not altered by hackers or computer criminals to give Trump the election, as implied by New York Magazine.
No, Michael Flynn did not tweet that he was a scapegoat. That was a media fantasy endorsed by Nancy Pelosi.
In fact, Daniel Payne of the Federalist has compiled a lengthy list of sensational stories about Trump’s supposed buffooneries, mistakes, and crudities that all proved either outright lies or were gross exaggerations and distortions.
We would like to believe writers for the New York Times or Washington Post when they warn us about the new president’s overreach. But how can we do so when they have lost all credibility—either by colluding with the Obama presidency and the Hillary Clinton campaign, or by creating false narratives to ensure that Trump fails?
Ezra Klein at Vox just wrote a warning about the autocratic tendencies of Donald Trump. Should we believe him? Perhaps not. Klein was the originator of Journolist, a “left-leaning” private online chat room of journalists that was designed to coordinate media narratives that would enhance Democratic politicians and in particular Barack Obama. Such past collusion begs the question of whether Klein is really disinterested now in the fashion that he certainly was not during the Obama administration.
Recently, New York Times White House correspondent Glenn Thrush coauthored a report
about initial chaos among the Trump White House staff, replete with unidentified sources. Should we believe Thrush’s largely negative story?
Perhaps. But then again, Thrush not so long ago turned up in the Wikileaks troves as sending a story to Hillary Clinton aide John Podesta for prepublication audit. Thrush was his own honest critic, admitting to Podesta: “Because I have become a hack I will send u the whole section that pertains to u. Please don’t share or tell anyone I did this Tell me if I f**ked up anything.”
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post has become a fierce critic of President Trump. Are his writs accurate? Milbank also appeared in Wikileaks, asking the Democratic National Committee to provide him with free opposition research for a negative column he was writing about candidate Trump. Are Milbank’s latest attacks his own—or once again coordinated with Democratic researchers?
The Washington Post censor Glenn Kessler posted the yarn about Trump’s father’s racist campaign for New York mayor—until he finally fact-checked his own fake news and deleted his tweet.
Sometimes the line between journalism and politicians is no line at all. Recently, former Obama deputy National Security advisor Ben Rhodes (brother of CBS news president David Rhodes) took to Twitter to blast the Trump administration’s opposition to the Iran Deal, brokered in large part by Rhodes himself. “Everything Trump says here,” Rhodes stormed, “is false.”
Should we believe Rhodes’s charges that Trump is now lying about the details of the Iran Deal?
Who knows, given that Rhodes himself not long ago bragged to the New York Times of his role in massaging reporters to reverberate an administration narrative: “We created an echo chamber They were saying things that validated what we had given them to say.” Rhodes also had no respect for the very journalists that he had manipulated: “The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old, and their only reporting experience consists of being around political campaigns. That’s a sea change. They literally know nothing.”
Is Rhodes now being disinterested or once again creating an “echo chamber”?
His boss, former UN Ambassador and National Security Advisor in the Obama administration, Susan Rice (married to Ian Cameron, a former producer at ABC news), likewise went on Twitter to blast the Trump administration’s decision to include presidential advisor Steven Bannon in meetings of the National Security Council: “This is stone cold crazy,” Rice asserted, “After a week of crazy.”
Is Rice (who has no military experience) correct that the former naval officer Bannon has no business participating in such high strategy meetings?
In September 2012, Rice went on television on five separate occasions to insist falsely to the nation that the attacks on the Benghazi consulate were the work of spontaneous rioters and not a preplanned hit by an al Qaeda franchise. Her own quite crazy stories proved a convenient administration reelection narrative of Al Qaeda on the run, but there were already sufficient sources available to Rice to contradict her false news talking points.
There are various explanations for the loss of media credibility.
First, the world of New York and Washington DC journalism is incestuous. Reporters share a number of social connections, marriages, and kin relationships with liberal politicians, making independence nearly culturally impossible.
More importantly, the election in 2008 of Barack Obama marked a watershed, when a traditionally liberal media abandoned prior pretenses of objectivity and actively promoted the candidacy and presidency of their preferred candidate. The media practically pronounced him god, the smartest man ever to enter the presidency, and capable of creating electric sensations down the legs of reporters. The supposedly hard-hitting press corps asked Obama questions such as, “During these first 100 days, what has …enchanted you the most from serving in this office? Humbled you the most…?”
Obama, as the first African-American president—along with his progressive politics that were to the left of traditional Democratic policies—enraptured reporters who felt disinterested coverage might endanger what otherwise was a rare and perhaps not-to-be-repeated moment.
We are now in a media arena where there are no rules. The New York Times is no longer any more credible than talk radio; CNN—whose reporters have compared Trump to Hitler and gleefully joked about his plane crashing—should be no more believed than a blogger’s website. Buzzfeed has become like the National Inquirer.
Trump now communicates, often raucously and unfiltered, directly with the American people, to ensure his message is not distorted and massaged by reporters who have a history of doing just that. Unfortunately, it is up to the American people now to audit their own president’s assertions. The problem is not just that the media is often not reliable, but that it is predictably unreliable. It has ceased to exist as an auditor of government. Ironically the media that sacrificed its reputation to glorify Obama and demonize Trump has empowered the new President in a way never quite seen before. At least for now, Trump can say or do almost anything he wishes without media scrutiny—given that reporters have far less credibility than does Trump.
Trump is the media’s Nemesis—payback for its own hubris.
Discussion (23)
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to the David Rhodes of CBS. CBS anchor Otis Livingston that i met told me he had secret sexual relation with David Rhodes's wife, livingston also told he will kill Rhodes's wife if she will open her mouth. becareful of Otis Livingston he is crook and crime.
Dealt Mr. Hanson, I want to thank you for your well thought out and unique ability to give current events a historical perspective. Quite frankly I have lost interest in Krauthgammer, George Will, Bill Kristol et, al as a.bunch of intellectual "clap trap". But you sir are always a learning experience. Keep up the good work. Thank you so much. You are always a joy to read. --Gale Miller
This is, as usual, a brilliant commentary, Dr. Hanson. I really appreciated it. You lucidly called out the idiocy of how low the media has sunk in order to delegitimize the President. In their hysterics, they've crawled down into the cellar of desperation. Frankly, though I'm a conservative, for years I've been frustrated with the dishonesty by many right-wing folks online. You see false quotations made up in memes and in articles by conservatives attributing statements to Lincoln, Mao, Hitler, Jefferson, Washington, etc. regarding gun control or socialism or taxation. Snopes would call them out, and Fox News would get caught using phony footage or false information they got from a cheesy website. The Left claimed the moral high ground of journalistic integrity and honest reporting. Now we see the antithesis of that---pure, unadulterated, unfiltered hysterics and mania. They'll do anything to bring him down...and the data points to it being to their detriment and Trump's advantage. He can turn a scandal or a rumor or an accusation into a win. The man has a gift. He is the ultimate culmination of everything the Left has ever feared. And I must confess to enjoying his conquest. This piece, Dr. Hanson, was outstanding.
Outstanding analysis.
I entirely agree with this post. My local newspaper, "The San Diego Union Tribune", is inundated with anti-Trump articles. That paper seems to have an obsession with promoting negativity about Trump. Frequently, it will quote allegations that Trump is racist and sexist. There is no pretense at real and objective journalism. I've been a subscriber to the daily paper since the 1990's, but I've downgraded to Sundays only. That's the only day there is any balance with some attention to other feature stories besides anti-Trump rhetoric.
Take me off your mailing list.
Thank you for this great article.
Precisely
Dear sir, Because of your high level of wisdom, your opinion matters to me, will you clarify this statement? You said "The New York Times is no longer any more credible than talk radio" Rush is talk radio, do you think Rush has a credibility problem?
Once someone lies to me, I can't trust them. I am forced to read Townhall, Breitbart and VDH. Our media is corrupt. It is like Pravda on the Potomac.
Excellent article Victor. I'm with the "half [of] the country [that] thought it was a long overdue media comeuppance."
Sent by a Romanian friend: President Trump invited the Pope for lunch on his mega yacht, the Pope accepted and during lunch, a puff of wind blew the Pontiff's hat off, right into the water. It floated off about 50 feet, then the wind died down and it just floated in place. The crew and the secret service were scrambling to launch a boat to go get it, when Trump waved them off, saying "Never mind, boys, I'll get it." The Donald climbed over the side of the yacht, walked on the water to the hat, picked it up, walked back on the water, climbed into the yacht, and handed the Pope his hat. The crew was speechless. The security team and the Pope's entourage were speechless. No one knew what to say, not even the Pope. But that afternoon, NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC, CNN reported: "TRUMP CAN'T SWIM!"
Dr Hansen: To 'beg the question' is an innocent enough informal phrase as used in your 2 March piece, "Donald Trump conducted a press conference...", but more to the point -- as you must know -- it is a logical fallacy. This is to politely remind you that to 'beg the question' is to assume as true that which remains to be proved. You wrote, "Such past collusion begs the question of whether Klein is really disinterested now in the fashion that he certainly was not during the Obama administration." Such past collusion might animate inquiries about Klein's attitude, but it does not 'beg the question' in the proper sense of the term. My hair-splitting quibble takes nothing away from your instructive piece. This is intended to be constructive criticism, so that your already keen intellectual edge might be sharpened even more.
Thank you so much, Dr. Hanson, for this and all your writings. I read you every day, and sometimes I refresh the page in the hopes that you have put more pieces out in the same day. Cura ut valeas.
Dear Mr.Hanson, I don't disagree "the role of a journalist in a free society is to act as disinterested censor of government power". However, I believe journalists serve a more elemental role which is rarely stated and which I believes helps to explain much of the controversy we hear these days regarding the media. First and foremost a journalist is the represented of some community of people, in other words, the journalist represents some more or less common set of values and interests. It is the journalist's job to select, "objectively", that information which is vital to the interests of that community - this would necessarily include all kinds of information which the community might find unpleasant to hear. Our so-called mainstream journalists today simply don't know who they are and who they represent. They hide under the skirts of their methodologies affirming disinterested objectivity. Apparently they simply presume the values of the narrow community they do represent is somehow the values of the rest of the country. These journalist, it could be argued, are indeed doing their job for their community, but for those of us not of their community what they report is of little or no value. One person's fact may be another's trivia - there are indeed "alternative facts". Chris Augusta.
Hopefully the media will investigate more important issues, like Rafael Cruz's involvement in the murder of JFK and the unexplained disappearance of John Miller and John Barron. Not to mention virtually everything written by Alex Jones.
I agree on most points; however, there is the need for gentlemen to be civil to even their rudest critics. Decorum is important even when one's opponent is not decorus. I am reminded, as a former prosecutor, of the Supreme Court's admonition that we were entitled to strike "herd blows but not foul blows" against our opponents.
Please don't knock the National Enquirer by comparing it to Buzzfeed! Aside from the photo-shopped space alien covers, they are often right on the money, particularly concerning politicians!
Great Assessment Professor! Yes, the 4th Estate has Become the Fifth Column!
You wrote, "Unfortunately, it is up to the American people now to audit their own president’s assertions." I don't think it is unfortunate, given the dishonesty of the media and of many of the politicians in congress.
I am still enraged over The Missile Gap and the story that Herbert Hoover caused the Crash of 1929. And, that the Great Depression started in 1920 but it was masked by two new industries distracting the masses: Movies and motels. In First Grade I was taught that Uncle Joe Stalin was our New Best Friend. That did not compute with afternoon radio news stories of German POWs on trains in Italy guarded by British troops leaping to their deaths as the trains went over bridges. They feared returning to the USSR. On Benghazi, Media did not understand the Spirit of September 11th, 1683, and the fact that Jihad against foreigners takes planning and usually leaks, as it did. State and Defense were also ignorant of this. Anyone who watched the all-news DC TV station, containing interviews with experts like on C-Span, knew that withholding ammunition from the Cambodian Army would lead to a Khmer Rouge victory and genocide, as they and other like-minded cadres did in South China and North Vietnam. Newly-minted Senator Joe Biden was the ubiquitous spokesman for disarming the Cambodian Army. The two big newspapers, before it happened, said something like Communism for Cambodia will mean a better life for all. I was shocked that President Ford did not resign when all TV media refused air time to take the issue of sending ammunition to Cambodia to the people. It would be odious to be President of a US that facilitates Communist victory and genocide.
Interesting article. I hope that the 4th Estate learns how to separate objectivity and opinion. A problem from the sixties I think.
Well said, Dr. Hanson. You provide meat to put on the bones of a statement I made to an acquaintance the other day who worships at the altar of the New York Times. She said Times is the "gold standard" of information sources. I replied that the NYT, WaPo, L.A. Times and other traditionally reputable sources have put themselves in the position of a teen-aged child who lies, perhaps not frequently, but enough that you can never be certain that he is telling the truth - and that you, the parent, doubt that probity is in his character.