Dammit. The following sentence is one I never wanted to type and never thought I would, either:
Kudos to CNN, The New York Times and the rest of the corporate mainstream media for fighting the good fight and speaking truth to power in the US.
Ugh. I know. But credit where credit is due.
Since Donald Trump was elected President of the United States and especially since he took offfice, they have been calling him and his administration out on absolute falsehoods, some so glaring it’s astounding they were put forward in the first place. They have also been critical of the more extreme points of his policies.
In short, they are doing their jobs, finally. And the Trump administration has been fighting back, calling them fake news and of course, who could forget:
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 17, 2017
Then yesterday, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer cancelled his regular press briefing in favour of an off-camera “press gaggle” with select media outlets. ABC, NBC, CBS and FOX were there and so was Breitbart, the far-right online bastion of bigoted news presentation that used to employ Chief White House Strategist Steve Bannon. Not invited: CNN, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, the New York Daily News, the Hill, Politico and Buzzfeed.
That’s right, the White House invited Breitbart over CNN and the New York Times. To put this in perspective, imagine if the White House invited Breitbart over CNN and The New York Times. No real need for allegory with this administration.
There is leaked audio from inside the gaggle of Spicer trying to defend his decision:
To their credit, the Associated Press and Time were invited to this exclusive event but declined in solidarity with their colleagues. That’s right, I just used the word solidarity to describe the actions of a division of a multinational corporation. That’s just how things are now.
Clinton News Network
It wasn’t always that way. In fact, during the Primaries a few short months ago, the mainstream press, the very same outlets that I am now defending, were pulling out all the stops to defend the status quo.
Calling CNN the Clinton News Network wasn’t a Trump supporter thing, it was a Bernie supporter go-to. I remember being livid with the network for breaking away from Bernie Sanders speaking live to a shot of Trump’s empty podium before he took the stage.
Obviously, it wasn’t a move designed to help Trump, it was clearly a way to silence Sanders and make everyone think the Trump-Clinton matchup was a done deal. You see, the Democratic Party establishment thought Trump was the ideal foil, someone who couldn’t possibly win, and as such, they wanted to elevate him…and CNN helped do just that.
The New York Times also ran countless articles discrediting Sanders and his campaign. It’s clear they saw him as more of a threat than the orange buffoon reality star B-list celeb who was running for the GOP.
But it goes further back than that. For years, the mainstream press had a very cozy relationship with the powers that be, regardless of who the President was. Barack Obama, George W. Bush and even Bill Clinton enjoyed a far less critical glare than they should have.
Yes, the corporate media did question and call the leaders out on some things, especially scandals, but they were far too trusting of the official narrative most of the time. Otherwise, the whole story about Iraq having weapons of mass destruction may have not led to a war, or at least not a media-championed war.
What it took for the mainstream media to do their jobs
It’s quite possible that the Trump Administration thought that they would have an easy ride coming in. What they failed to realize is that the reason the establishment press was so cozy with previous establishments is that those administrations knew how to play the game.
Did that game involve deception? Of course it did. But clever deception. Wording things in a way that could technically be defended as factual. Rarely an outright lie and then never one that is blatant and easy to de-bunk.
The unwritten rule? Don’t insult the press or the public’s intelligence with your BS. A rule that the Trump Administration clearly never heard or considered following for a moment.
So that’s what it took for corporate press to finally start doing their jobs. A narcissistic carnival barker with the temperament of a spoiled child trying to shove outright lies down their throats and punishing them when they don’t present his ridiculous claims as absolute truth.
Well, at least there was a bridge too far for them. Now we know what it is.
Not a good day for independent media, either
As someone who has always championed independent or alternative media sources (including this one) as well as media with a declared, or at least obvious, bias (like this one), what happened yesterday in Washington was in no way a victory for the non-corporate press. In fact, it signaled a rather unwelcome transformation of the very concept of independent media.
With biased sources like One America and the Washington Times as well as biased and independent sources like Breitbart included in the press gaggle, independent media has become a mouthpiece of and propaganda tool for the government. It would be different if the White House had also granted press credentials and given special treatment to, say, The Young Turks and Democracy Now, but that’s not the case.
No, it’s the mainstream sources who haven’t investigated the President that hard and indie outlets that are so far right that in this White House they are considered mainstream which make the cut. It’s not about independent versus mainstream, it’s about kissing Presidential ass or not.
It is important for independent media to stand with their corporate colleagues on this one issue. Then we can all go back to criticizing them for lack of coverage on extremely important issues like Standing Rock.
For the corporate press, here’s hoping you don’t go back to the old ways and have finally learned that:
“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.”
– George Orwell
