Two different worlds: If you look at the MSM, you’d think Trump was doing very very poorly
And that has been true for his entire presidency.
So take a look at a sampler for today at memeorandum. Nothing unusual about today; it’s very typical. Trump doing badly vis a vis North Korea. Trump “venting anger” at this and that (often, it’s Trump “raging” and/or “out of control”). “Concerned by Trump, some Republicans Quietly Align With Democrats” (although funny thing, what I’ve seen most of the time is a few concerned Democrats quietly aligning with Republicans). Sad tales of separated “immigrant families” (i.e. illegal immigrants). Focus on a weirdo 9-11-truther GOP candidate for Congress in a district in Illinois in which the Republican primary was uncontested and the Democrat is virtually certain to win anyway. Hit piece du jour on Jordan Peterson. Seahawk wide receiver saying “Trump is an idiot, plain and simple.” Featured op-ed in the WaPo entitled, “Are Republicans abetting a demagogue—or something worse?” And perhaps my personal favorite: “The Chilling Effect of Trump’s War on the FBI.”
Countering that? A few neutral articles—neutral in the sense that they’re not directly about Trump nor are they attacks on Republicans, nor even about politics—as well as one from Kimberly Strassel that appeared in the WSJ and presents the other side: “The Real Constitutional Crisis: The FBI and Justice Department continue evading congressional oversight.”
So that’s the picture with the featured articles (“Top Items”). Different worlds, and the world of the right is far less visible to the casual observer. And this represents the usual ratio of left-to-right coverage in the MSM generally. It requires no effort at all to see the views on the left, which are presented as mainstream, standard, the default positions. The right’s point of view is something you have to seek out. And how many do?
I certainly never did, before the internet. It was the internet that made such things easily accessible. Nor was I purposely seeking out the point of view on the right. It actually came to me by accident, through links from other articles I happened to be reading, and I was naive and ignorant enough that I didn’t even realize which periodicals I clicked on were from the left and which from the right.
But that’s how I ended up reading so much on the right without being fully aware of what I was doing, and ultimately discovering that the right side made more sense to me than the left. I had just never been exposed to it before.
The media valued it’s capacity to injure people and provoke displays of abasement through generating sh*tstorms. Trump refuses to engage in these charades and survives anyway. They want it the way it was, and if enough people go to school with Trump and prosper while telling reporters to get stuffed, they’ve lost something of great value to them in addition to all the ad revenue and prestige which has evaporated. Trump is the enemy in a way that the Bushes were not, because he is happy to be outre.
N.B. the p’s and q’s the media try to enforce are orthodoxies on campus, in law firms, and, increasingly, in the corporate apparat. Trump’s a threat to the Dean of Diversity and the HR twits too.
I liked Engelbert Humperdinck’s version better.
Shhh…. don’t TELL them!
In the aggregate, it’s not possible for the MSM to have failed to realize that they are lying to the public. Willful blindness can only stretch so far.
It’s also self-evident that they justify the lies by falling back on the tired bromide that, “the end justifies the means”. But when you have to repeatedly lie to get your way, the least amount of self-honesty forces one to realize that one is in the wrong.
So these are not honest people, they are self-aggrandizing people. The purpose of their virtue signaling is to garner outward confirmation of their worthiness.
And in their eager willingness to pile hate upon those who refuse to go along with the lies, they have embraced evil.
Trump is right, the media are one of America’s enemies.
When will we be forced to start treating them as the enemy their actions demonstrate them to be? And if we continue to refuse to do so, how have we not turned the Constitution into a suicide pact?
Scott Adams “Dilbert” posted a lot of articles about his theory that leftists and conservatives are “watching two different movies” — now we don’t even seem to be in the same theater.
The media long ago turned themselves into Pravda for the democrats. They aren’t reporters, they are democrat party apparatchiks. They are not honest, ethical honorable people, they are corrupt, dishonest. The term Moral turpitude comes to mind.
SICK of these libtards trying to destroy the country…they want a coup. You let that happen and just watch the spics roll in, that’s what they want…undermine AMERICAN LAW and give handouts to ghetto trash. I wish President Trump could deport these traitors. He ought to just go ahead and hit NK, we could beat them in a day.
The MSM coverage is 90+% negative, yet Trump has 50% approval ratings, with 2/3 of the people in a poll crediting him for the improved economy.
I’m thinking a lot of people have found a way around the MSM’s narrative, whether it’s the internet, Trump’s twitter feed, or their paycheck, or seeing friends and family getting work. I like it!
So long as Trum doesn’t get killed before he gets outside DC, he is doing ok.
When will we be forced to start treating them as the enemy their actions demonstrate them to be? And if we continue to refuse to do so, how have we not turned the Constitution into a suicide pact?
That’s part of the DS strategy. The Deep State is looking forwards to the Red killing the Blue.That way the powers keep themselves full of resources, while their enemies and useful idiots expend resources fighting each other. By the time the civil war is over, the Deep State will have full control over the US, as their competitors will have offed themselves and become extremely fatigued with war casualties.
Muh:
You’re new here, so perhaps you haven’t yet noticed that I try to keep the comments on a higher level than at most blogs. I am warning you for language in your comment here, and I deleted another comment of yours in another thread.
neo-neocon, 6:09 pm — “Muh: You’re new here, so perhaps you haven’t yet noticed that I try to keep the comments on a higher level than at most blogs.”
And I thank you deeply for that, esteemed landlord neo.
Muh, I never got to see the deleted comment, and that doesn’t matter. I think I speak for most of us here, when I say we’re interested in your perspective, expressed soberly and intelligently. Go for it!
Neo – thanks for your comment concerning language. I always wonder if there are people who troll websites and use extreme language to make the site look bad. I’ve learned to ignore them.
I remember a “quote” but I can’t find it right now – basically, a person believes what they read in the newspaper until they read something that they know a lot about and the information is wrong. Then, they learn to take everything with a more skeptical view.
There are very few sites that I accept everything they discuss. It is frustrating when the “reporters” cut and paste from other news sites and make assumptions from that reporting. But, when you go to the the source documents, it’s something different. Sometimes, it is hard to get the source document, but when it is something like a law, an executive order, or a recording, then I expect accuracy and neutral terms.
On an item that was very close to me (like about 1/4 mile), there was a shooting at a restaurant last night. It’s been interesting to watch & read the evaluations of the incident, especially since there were men who ran towards the shooter, got their guns from their cars and took action. Note – I haven’t read/heard if the attacker was a legal CCH, but the men who reacted were obeying the rules about “gun free zones”.
But, what was originally reported has changed with time, as the police learn things. Unfortunately, some people will only read part of the first report and make assumptions. And then it continues on, compounding the errors.
And, local knowledge is important. For example, the reports sound like this was the only restaurant in the area. Nope. This happened at a local lake that has a very popular walking/biking trail system and there are four very popular restaurants in the area. Unless you go into the water, there are limited exit areas. That the shooter was in the parking area shooting towards the restaurant does not mean that he was finished with his attack. I fully understand the reaction of the men – there were too many people in the close area that could be hurt if the shooter was able to continue. I appreciate that they were trained and willing to take the risk.
Liz, 7:49 pm – “I remember a ‘quote’ but I can’t find it right now — basically, a person believes what they read in the newspaper until they read something that they know a lot about and the information is wrong. Then, they learn to take everything with a more skeptical view.”
That quote is one by Michael Crichton:
“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward–reversing cause and effect. I call these the ‘wet streets cause rain’ stories. Paper’s full of them.
“In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.”
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/65213-briefly-stated-the-gell-mann-amnesia-effect-is-as-follows-you
Well, I was close… I guess I’m the type of person who becomes skeptical about the press after reading poorly written stories.
In the years I have been reading this blog, I do not recall anyone commenting in the manner of Muh. Yes, this is a wingnut blog, but the pro-wingnut comments here are reflective of educated, reasonable people. As are the lefty comments.
My take is that Muh is a lefty troll writing what “he” considers to be a typical wingnut style. You know, those wingnuts are racist, ignorant, bigoted, XXXX-phobic troglodytes. So I will write a comment to reflect my very correct opinion of wingnuts.
Delete, please. Ban, even.
I am reminded of the commenter bunkerbuster, who exasperated me by misrepresenting what I wrote. I was far from the only exasperated commenter. Neo banned him.
Gringo:
See this and this.
“Muh” the supposed conservative with the potty mouth had returned as “Johanson” from the left, talking about how racist the GOP is.
M J R, 6:24 pm — “I think I speak for most of us here, when I say we’re interested in your perspective, expressed soberly and intelligently. Go for it!”
I had not perused the comments on the “The DOJ’s defiance of Congress” blog post until now. As a consequence of that perusal, I repudiate my welcome quoted above. I’m a senior dude at this point, but I’m sometimes naive; shame on me.
“One movie; two screens.” Scott Adams.
Ironically it was that I knew for a fact that the media had Palestine ass-backwards intentionally and with malice aforethought that was responsible for my beginning to stop trusting them on everything else, which is what begat this two-time Bill Clinton-voter’s change story.