No, Donald Trump Freezing Out a Reporter is Not the Biggest Threat to Freedom of the Press
The president-elect's hostility to critical media is dangerous, not least of which is due to the precedent set by the Obama administration.
President-elect Donald Trump's typically frenetic press conference yesterday struck terror in the hearts of some liberal commentators for what they believed was a mortal threat to freedom of the press.
Trump has long demonstrated a dangerous hostility to press freedom through his calls for Congress to "open up" and expand upon existing libel laws, his history of suing journalists and media organizations critical of him and his work, his blacklisting of a number of news organizations from being credentialed for his campaign events, and his general lack of understanding of the broad protections provided by the First Amendment.
But in contrast, Trump's petulant refusal to answer a question posed to him by CNN's Jim Acosta—a day after the network aired a report about a classified dossier containing embarrassing information about Trump of questionable veracity—is relatively small potatoes.
Here's how the scene played out, via Mediaite:
With Trump looking to call on other reporters, Jim Acosta yelled out, "Since you are attacking us, can you give us a question?"
"Not you," Trump said. "Your organization is terrible!"
Acosta pressed on, "You are attacking our news organization, can you give us a chance to ask a question, sir?" Trump countered by telling him "don't be rude."
"I'm not going to give you a question," Trump responded. "I'm not going to give you a question. You are fake news!"
As those on stage by Trump clapped, Acosta retorted, "Now, Mr. President-elect, that's not appropriate!"
To be sure, openly freezing out a specific media organization at a presidential press conference is a disquieting precedent. That said, some of the reactions from the commentariat took the constitutional outrage volume to 11:
Playing favoritism and blacklisting ones he doesn't like is called THREATENING THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS https://t.co/jL94057Sx4
— Sally Kohn (@sallykohn) January 11, 2017
RIP Freedom of the Press 1776-2017
— Connor Finnegan (@ConnorFinnegan) January 11, 2017
Trump refusing to take a question because the outlet wrote a negative story is the beginning of the end of freedom of press.
— Elizabeth Plank (@feministabulous) January 11, 2017
Some conservatives have pointed to the Obama administration's early posture toward Fox News, when in 2009, White House communications director Anita Dunn told The New York Times, "We're going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent," adding, "As they are undertaking a war against Barack Obama and the White House, we don't need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organizations behave."
It's important to note that when the Obama administration attempted to freeze Fox News out of a round of interviews with an administration official, a number of reporters from Fox's competitors—including then-ABC correspondent (now with CNN) Jake Tapper—came to the defense of what Tapper called "one of our sister organizations" and refused to go along with the administration's decision to exclude Fox from access.
However, of far greater concern than whether or not a president-elect calls on a specific reporter in a press conference is whether or not as president he would authorize spying on reporters as part of a crackdown on leaks, which Obama did and which the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) called an "unacceptable abuse of power."
New York Times reporter James Risen—who the Obama administration's Justice Department threatened with prison time if he did not reveal a source—recently wrote:
Under Obama, the Justice Department and the F.B.I. have spied on reporters by monitoring their phone records, labeled one journalist an unindicted co-conspirator in a criminal case for simply doing reporting and issued subpoenas to other reporters to try to force them to reveal their sources and testify in criminal cases.
Risen has also said about Obama's first attorney general, "Eric Holder has sent a message to dictators around the world that it is okay to crack down on the press and jail journalists," adding, "This is Eric Holder's true legacy on press freedom: 'There is no First Amendment 'reporter's privilege.'"
No less an authority on the First Amendment and press freedom than James C. Goodale—who represented the Times in the Pentagon Papers case—wrote in 2013 that the Obama administration effectively dismissed the First Amendment when it came to reporters covering national security issues. Goodale wrote, "President Obama will surely pass President Richard Nixon as the worst president ever on issues of national security and press freedom."
By using the executive branch to punish members of the media who inconvenienced them, the Obama administration has set a precedent that could very likely be emulated by an overtly-press hostile Trump administration.
For his part, Trump has already followed-up his press conference performance with tweets likening intelligence leaks to "Nazi Germany" and describing the publication of potentially embarrassing information about him as "illegal." Considering the awesome powers Trump is days away from inheriting, being rude to a reporter at a press conference is relatively inconsequential.
As Obama's presidency ends, the U.S. ranks 41st on Reporters Without Borders' Press Freedom Index—just behind South Africa and Melania Trump's native country Slovenia, and just ahead of Burkina Faso and Botswana.
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I wonder what effect all of this is having on CNN’s bottom line?
Because they made an ass of themselves?
Because they have worn their already thin veneer of objectivity off during this election cycle. It makes me wonder how it is affecting their ratings and ad revenue.
It will certainly show them a thing or two about their abusive “free speech” baloney. No one should be “criticizing” and mocking our national leader the way these people have been doing. Hopefully our excellent incoming Attorney General will be able to tighten up some of our nation’s cutting-edge whistle-blower and libel laws (definitely criminalize libel, on a federal level) so we can stop some of these abuses. Surely no one here would dare to defend the unpresidented “First Amendment dissent” of a single, isolated judge in America’s leading criminal “satire” case? See the documentation at:
http://raphaelgolbtrial.wordpress.com/
Start working at home with Google! It’s by-far the best job I’ve had. Last Wednesday I got a brand new BMW since getting a check for $6474 this – 4 weeks past. I began this 8-months ago and immediately was bringing home at least $77 per hour. I work through this link,
go? to tech tab for work detail,,,,,,, http://www.foxnews20.com
In the end, yes. But, who am I to take a seat in this argument? I’ll just stand quietly in the rear for the rest of this thread.
You two are disappointing.
“bottom”
“ass”
“???” — crickets.
Never mind, EDG, I just made my own asstoundingly stupid statement.
I shall retire for the day. My day has ended.
See below, sarcasm detector is in for repairs.
Don’t bring it to me, I didn’t recognize it either. Scarecrows only!
Judging by their website and the commentators on it, they’re still the good guys.
You’d find the same thing on the other two American cable news networks, I don’t think that is a particularlly good indicator of anything other than people like to read stuff that confirms their baises.
That’s just in response to whether or not it’s doing anything to their bottom line.
What you did there, I saw it.
*takes sarcasm detector in for repairs*
Last night CNN aired an interview of Kellyanne Conway with Anderson Cooper (wow, he’s aging fast — this election seems to have stressed him significantly) in which they said they were airing the ‘entire interview unedited’, I guess because they felt it made CNN look good.
I didn’t see the whole thing, but Conway kept making Cooper and CNN sound ridiculous and stupid. She called them out on their over-reporting of the Pisswhore story, and Cooper kept saying “nnn-uhh, we didn’t do that, we never did anything” when of course everyone saw what they had done the previous day.
This made CNN look good? Cooper was like a little boy with chocolate all over his hands and mouth who swears he didn’t steal a candy bar.
Best part was when she said that CNN had clearly gone all-in on Clinton, and now CNN was very butthurt and just looking for any way to malign Trump.
CNN should either do what Fox and MSNBC has done, and at least admit they have a bias — or blow everyone’s minds by canning most of their whiny, biased talking heads, and become a true straightforward news station that everyone can rely on as the best source of information. (Hahahahahaha that either of those is going to happen any time soon!)
“..or blow everyone’s minds by canning most of their whiny, biased talking heads, and become a true straightforward news station that everyone can rely on as the best source of information.”
All week, he’ll be here.
That’s not chocolate.
ALL news organizations should just admit to bias, report what they want, and let the market decide. Pretence of unbiased-ness where none exists is much, much worse than apriori advertising bias.
Totally agree. My main defense of Fox News — that still gets shit on by all my proggie friends — is that if I want to know the Right’s view on a topic I can garner that information from Fox; same thing for the Left if I go to HuffPo or Salon or some shit.
They want to live or die by this notion of ‘unbiased reporting’ (which I am not even sure is possible).
Writing persuasive arguments comprised about 90% of the papers I wrote in college. I don’t see what’s so wrong with writing from an established view point. Obviously that is what Reason Magazine does.
Its not the established point-of-view articles that bother people.
Its the facade that these douches insist is journalists integrity and it is not.
As you said, if I want Republican stuff, I look at FOX or similar. If I was lefty stuff, I look at WaPo or similar. If I want Libertarian stuff, I look at Reason or similar.
I remember watching CNN on Election night. It was like a funeral. Their panel was all reacting like they got news a family member had just died any time indications that Trump might win were announced.
And it was all delivered from an obvious Clinton-supporter view. “Here’s what she needs. Here’s what’s left for Hillary. This is bad (for Hillary,) but it doesn’t mean she’s lost Pennsylvania yet.” Fox News, on the other hand, had their traditional panel of repubs and right wingers, but brought in 4 lefties to have an amiable discussion with, and nobody talked over anyone.
It was a huge sign of the times that Fox had become less bombastic than the alternatives.
Yup, was watching CNN too. They got quieter the longer the night went on. When it was clear Trump was going to win, Van Jones went apocalyptic, saying, “What am I going to tell my kids?”
“Cooper was like a little boy with chocolate all over his hands and mouth”
*instant visual attacks my brain*
Did CNN pump up the Buzzfeed document, or the story about intel agencies briefing Obama and Trump about the threat of blackmail? I’ve heard conflicting accounts, and I’m not gonna start watching CNN to find out what’s what.
They’re doing both. They know the salacious and unverified report is out there, public, and people know about it, but they caveat their comments enough to not be caught outright referring to it. Instead they conflate the “known and reliable” with “tawdry unreliable” and count on people thinking they’re talking about the “piss whores” story.
Poor Trump. =(
Speaking of piss whores…well I mean shit whores.
Shit like this doesn’t affect people who are already fully committed to their side. They just dig in harder. CNN’s base viewership isn’t going to jump ship now.
Trump has definitely grabbed the Media by the pussy. And I believe most of America liked it.
I think Trump will be grabbing the Intelligence community by the pussy very shortly. And again, most of America will like it.
The intelligence community might just kick back in shadowy ways.
The 4th branch of government is more powerful than the other 3.
Just like all shadow lurkers, light kills them. They can’t do their job right, let alone try to get in a fight with a public figure that appears to know how to play the public game like PT Barnum. The lurkers won’t know what hit them.
I’m a pessimist who — using the wisdom of history — believes that Trump isn’t going to know what hits him when that sniper’s bullet connects.
It won’t be the CIA directly, just a leveraged asset.
O.o
Sniper bullets have a nasty habit of fomenting revolutions, people in power hardest hit.
Get your guillotines ready!
This is the thing. Trump shouldn’t have compared the report to what happened in Nazi Germany; he should have compared it to the way J. Edgar Hoover kept dossiers on his opponents.
The National Socialist Germany comparison is apt for both sides. Hitler’s Enabling Act speech–larded down with evangelical christian cant–is online in English. Sample: “The National Government perceives in the two Christian confessions the most important factors for the preservation of our Volkstum.” Americans no longer line up for mystical superstition or communist doublethink the way they used to. But those dogmas are the backbones of “both” the GO-Pee and Democratic People’s Party. Until they die and are replaced by libertarians we’ll be stuck in a 1933 Groundhog Day rerun of Christian National Socialists and Soviet Democratic Socialists at our throats.
Nah, he grabbed the pussies by their media.
That’s an unflattering picture of Trump.
+2 Jazz hands.
It looks like someone else.
Looks just a couple pounds short of Fat Bastard.
Caption/ alt-text suggestion:
“I ate a baby! Aye, baby, the other other white meat! Baby, it’s what’s for dinner! It was this big!”
Remember when Mike Myers was kinda funny?
Pepperidge Farms remembers!
there is definitely some Mitch McConnell in there.
They morphed his photo with one of Obama, since they’ve both engaged in this tactic against an unfavored news source.
Is their really a such thing as a flattering photo of that mug?
I like his smug look. After eight years of Obama mugging smugly for the cameras it’s a little heartening to see the left getting it back in spades.
“Very small hands, smells like cabbage.”
Trump’s been busy and hasn’t had time to haul his carcass to the paint shop for a touch-up on the orange top coat. Everybody noticed how “rough” he looked – that’s just the paint peeling.
I just don’t see what the big deal is. Look at Obama’s press conferences:
Did every reporter in the country who wanted to be there get admitted? No. Is that censorship? No. If you wanted to let everybody in you’d have to use a frickin’ stadium.
Did every reporter in the room get to ask a question? No. Is that censorship? No. If everybody got a question the press conference would take all damn day.
Did Obama answer every question ever put to him by a reporter? No. Is that censorship? No.
Do Democratic politicians accept every invite from Fox News? No. Is that censorship? No.
In all cases, the reporter can still report.
This is another example of people not really understanding what the 1st amendment actually protects. There’s nothing in the 1st that guarantees access to public officials. The government isn’t allowed to suppress speech or press activity outside of some narrowly defined circumstances, but neither is it required (by the 1st at least) to offer up any information.
I want to eat some cake after reading this.
Oh go fuck your special privileges.
Just because you’re at a press conference doesn’t mean anyone is obligated to call on you.
Well, let’s say it’s some special protocol that certain ‘news’ organizations get access to the president of the USA. Trump isn’t even president yet, so how would that apply? And if ‘certain’ news organizations get access, who decides who gets access? CNN?
This was my knee-jerk too.
If you’re the member of an elite news organization and you’ve come up with *the* question that will topple the government and not only are your peers unable to come up with the question on their own, but you’re also entirely unable to make some sort of deal whereby they ask the question or even viably communicate even a whiff of the underlying issue to them… it says a lot more about the press corps than it does about the Administration.
It can’t be stated enough how great the next four years are going to be. I can’t remember a time where so many agencies that the president has authority over have such an open disdain for their chief executive. The Intelligence community is literally having a knife fight with Trump through the media on a level I could have never imagined. I mean you could tell the military brass had a low opinion of Obama but it never even in the same fucking sport as this is and we aren’t even at the inauguration yet.
We might actually see the Gov. cease to function on any level at all. I’m literally getting a boner right now just thinking about it.
We’re getting close to it. The problem is, is that the government is completely out of control, no longer represents the citizens, are for all intent, completely illegitimate at this point. Laws only apply to the serfs, not the politically connected or powerful. The rule of law is dead.
It died way before this past November.
I don’t think the rule of law ever existed; just peasants and kings all the way down through human history.
Asset forfeiture is just a fancy word and mindbogglingly long legal documentation to protect the kings and towns guard right to walk past you in the street and say, ‘what do you got there, pal?’ — takes your coin-purse, raps you on the head with an iron sap, walks off laughing with total impunity.
So we’ve arrived at libertopia? Did Obama do that?
That is the opposite of what libertarians want – but I am sure you know that and are trying to impress yourself with a little turd-mot left in the commentary.
Might have to put those idle hands to use.
But you have to play by our rules!
Trump is playing by Alinsky’s rules, no ?
“Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.”
“The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.”
“Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
“Keep the pressure on. Never let up.”
“A good tactic is one your people enjoy.”
Perhaps if they keep getting frozen out of press conferences, they can go back to their actual jobs of investigating and undercovering previously unknown facts instead of just repeating politicians’ lies.
Don’t count on it. They have hundreds of other politicians to hound and plenty of other politicians to feed them information to present without rebuttal because Trump refuses to talk to them.
Point taken, but even this would require more investigation than the currently accepted baseline. Adam hit the nail on the head. There is a pretty solid economic argument that if the press is outright denied insider access to information that they will of necessity rediscover investigative skills or die on the vine. Presuming of course the market values empirical information and not propaganda.
I actually find Trump’s disdain and complete disregard for CNN, refreshing. I mean compared to Obama’s behavior of wanting to round them all up, have a cocktail party and turn them into the propaganda wing, AKA Pravda, wing of the government. Just remember, CNN got caught red handed giving Hillary questions before the debates. The asswipes should never be allowed to moderate a political debate again.
“A good tactic is one your people enjoy.
You said moderate
At least it will be 4-8 years of funny tweets. That Finnegan tweet is making me laugh more than Trump’s Nazi Germany tweet.
TWEET
Riding the fake news accusation tiger is fun until you try to get off it.
You can see his stripes but you know he’s clean
Oh don’t you see what I mean
+1 gotta get away
As usual, the left are just a bunch of one-side, myopic assholes.
I love how this Acosta guy claims Trump is attacking CNN when it was they who threw the first punch.
That’s how cowards roll. They punch first, miss and then freak out you had the temerity to hit back and connect.
Also. Connor. Wow.
CNN reported on a news story, nothing more. They didn’t repeat any of the allegations, they just reported that they exist and that the peotus was briefed on it.
Yeah…riiiiiight.
Like they didn’t know what they were doing.
Riiiight.
Even if they had an agenda, so the fuck what? I thought you people were against government. Trump is government now. Do you get that, or are you such an ignorant partisan fuckface that you’ll even defend that bloated ignoramus against anything and everything?
I actually stand for rationality and integrity, myself. What they did was report the existence of something that’s almost definitely false, without attempting to verify it, solely because it was furthering their agenda of embarrassing or undermining Trump.
It’s irrational and dishonest. Furthermore, this undermines the people who have rational and reasonable objections to Trump, like his anti-free trade stances and his anti-free speech rhetoric. I can say I have many reasons to hate him without believing he’s a Nazi or a Russian plant, but those objections water down my own.
You’re only allowed to hate Trump the same way Tony does. Off to the reeducation camp with you!
Tony needs a last name…like dipshit or fuckface, I can’t take someone with only a Christian name seriously and I want to take him seriously.
Correct me if I’m wrong but all they did was report that the FBI had an document and was investigating. It also appears that the document was given to the FBI by a fell Republican.
Was anything they reported not true?
They weren’t stupid, they were inept!
Yes, they knew their BS would be more effective if they left it to implication, rather than show their evidence. Buzzfeed showed everyone their hand, which turned out to be full of fuck-all. I would suggest Trump himself had it leaked, if it didn’t sound so paranoid.
What I still find amazing is that, effectively, buzzfeed scooped CNN and made CNN the story in the process.
Buzzfeed.
“Mr. President! Mr. President! I demand that you address me and talk to my issues!”
“F*ck you. I don’t even LIKE you.”
Trump has already been more entertaining than Obumbles managed to be in eight years, and he hasn’t even been inaugurated yet.
Hillary probably wouldn’t have been any worse than Trump will when it comes to Rights and Liberty, but she was dull, grating, and painful to watch WHILE she undermined the Constitution. If we’re going to hell in a hand basket (and I think we are) we might as well enjoy the ride.
If we’re going to hell in a hand basket (and I think we are) we might as well enjoy the ride.
McAffee/Sheen 2020
Who the hell would enjoy THAT ride?
She wanted to be able to ban news agencies and has been consistently against free political speech.
Telling a CNN reporter to shut up is pretty mild in comparison.
Another example, because Reason comments only allows two links.
So, the assholes at CNN reported some of that Buzzfeed/4Chan bullshit as legitimate news (when every other responsible media organization in the country wouldn’t by the way), it completely and predictably blew up in their faces when it turned out that the idiots confused one guy named Michael Cohen for a completely different guy named Michael Cohen, the aforementioned assholes petulantly and stubbornly refuse to admit that they completely fucked up by reporting a fake story as real news, but Trump is the bad guy here because he called them out on it and told that jerk to be quiet and stop being rude when he wouldn’t shut up and kept trying to yell the same question at Trump over and over again. Uh huh. Riiiiight.
Obama wasn’t exactly the most open to the press president ever. And I seem to recall talk from a few years ago from the Whitehouse about limiting access of certain news organizations.
And that CNN guy was being a dick. I don’t think it would be great for Trump to exclude major news orgs. But it’s not a threat to free press and really is up to him. He doesn’t have to have press conferences at all. And it’s not as if any real news actually comes out of the stupid things.
Obama just did it in a smug holier than thou passive aggressive sort of way. Trump is just right in your face.
I’m definitely enjoying that aspect of Trump’s style. It is damn hilarious. And really just what they deserve.
When Obama pissed on FoxNews the left was ecstatic, celebratory.
Exactly Zeb. It is totally up to him. He only owes answers to the voters. How he gets those answers out is up to him. In four years the voters can decide if they liked the answers he gave and how he gave them.
And, unlike Buzzfeed justifying their actions by declaring that Americans can make up their own minds, for Trump the proof will be in the pudding.
CNN and the rest of the dinosaur media don’t want the president communicating directly with the public. They want to control the narrative and put their spin on it. With the leftist bias and downright dishonesty of CNN, how can that be good for either Trump or the public? I’m fine with him just using the intertoobz, fuck the mainstream media. They’ve played a major role in most of the things that have gone wrong in this country. We don’t need them, let them die.
That is why they are having such a stroke over his Twitter account. It is not that they care about decorum or anything. They are just incensed he has the nerve to ignore them and go around them to get his message out. Welcome to the 21st Century bitches.
It would probably help the major news networks if they occasionally had to cut their teeth by doing some actual reporting instead of getting their talking points straight from the presidential bully pulpit.
They’ve been apostles for so long, I doubt they know how to.
As I say below, if they really wanted to make a statement about press conferences and such, they would just refuse to show up. Because what you say is all they are ever going to get from presidential pressers.
Reportage is for proles. The journslustic elites have Access!
“As those on stage by Trump clapped, Acosta retorted, “Now, Mr. President-elect, that’s not appropriate!”
Who the hell appointed CNN to decide what is appropriate?
They appointed themselves.
I’ve always understood that it’s established (if unwritten) that when the President sits down for an interview, the President’s people set ground rules for the interview and if the reporter/network violate those rules that’s it: blackball city.
How is this all that much different?
Which kind of makes presidential interviews useless as news gathering exercises.
If the press wanted to make some real statement about it, they should refuse to attend the press conferences and decline to do interviews unless they are allowed to ask whatever they want. All they are going to get is carefully controlled BS (maybe less carefully controlled with Trump, but we’ll see).
But they clearly care more about access and being part of the club than about actually doing good reporting.
Interview or submit questions to cabinet officials and their staff; report on their responses. The fact that we rely so heavily on presidential pressers speaks volumes about how seriously these reporters take their craft. How much factual content can you glean from a few sentences of vagary from the man who has little particularized knowledge on any given matter? Forget Trump for a moment, every president hires people (ideally) better suited than he to deal with the many different branches of government. THOSE PEOPLE should be answering questions. The whole press pool thing is a total sham.
Come on people… yeah I believe in a public safety net, but this guy is actively cheering on the fascist grapefruit and the death of the press. Criticize, libertarians! Go!
“the death of the press”. Sweet Baby Jesus, how can anyone, even you, believe something that childishly stupid? Worst case: the blow-dried asswipes in the press will have to actually get off their slab-sided asses and do an honest day’s work. I’ll wager we’ll learn far more about the bad things Trump does (and he will, I have no doubt of that) that way than by the “journalists” in spray tans sitting in the White House waiting for the news to be dispensed to them by the very people they’re supposed to be skeptical of.
You think libertarians are duty bound to support your propaganda corps?
of course not, Obama did that when he bailed out the auto companies.
Ooooooo, forgot that didn’t you Tony?
Trump isn’t hostile to the press. He is just not going to kiss their ass and treat them like they are some special class who old a position above anyone else in the country. And he is right to do that. Fuck the media. He owes the voters and Congress answers. He doesn’t owe CNN or any other media outlet shit.
He also seems to recognize that trying to make nice with the likes of CNN is a losing strategy. They are going to attack him not matter what he does, so kissing their ass gains him nothing. Hitting back gains him support.
Everyone hates the press. Trump can only win by kicking them around. They are so arrogant and so out of touch, they actually think anyone is going to care if Trump doesn’t answer their questions.
Trump didn’t “kick around” the press yesterday.
Instead, with two notable exceptions, he praised the press for its professionalism and said they went “up a notch” in his book.
CNN’s attitude seems to have some consistency with most prog positions that rights are things done for you by the state. So, originally, freedom of the press meant no interference from the government. Now it means the state must take actions on your behalf.
It’s totally different when The Lightbringer/ the Chocolate Jesus does it. Principals > Principles.
“President-elect Donald Trump’s typically frenetic press conference yesterday struck terror in the hearts of some liberal commentators for what they believed was a mortal threat to freedom of the press.”
Well, I NEVER!
I’m curious, does Trump has a defamation case in regards to Buzzfeed and the memo? CNN didn’t release the actual memo but good god can you imagine the legal department at BF right now?
/puts on more popcorn
I’d have to imagine that “Being the President of the United States” is a position of such obvious public figureitude that you’d have to be outlandishly slanderous and false to even get a suit sniffed by the court.
Normally I would agree with you but this is Trump we’re talking about. He’s already threatened to do so in the past.
you’d have to be outlandishly slanderous and false to even get a suit sniffed by the court
Does falsely reporting that the President likes golden showers and the Russians are going to blackmail* him over it count as “outlandishly slanderous and false?”
*Which is itself stupid. Do these fuckers not understand how blackmail works? In order for Trump’s sexual peccadillos to be good blackmail material, the fact that he likes piss (if true – a YUGE if) would have to be something that isn’t already common knowledge and that he’d want to keep quiet. Since they’ve already reported it, the damage is done. These people are fucking idiots.
I think that even if he did he should send them a thank you note instead. IMO if they wanted to hurt him, CNN’s method of ominously hinting at the “Russian blackmail dossier” without actually revealing any details was more effective than publishing the whole thing.
Now everyone knows it was a joke and Trump will take advantage of this when the next “scandal” rolls around.
The Democrat standard on any lie about Republicans was expressed in 1980 by Senate leader Mitchell and House Speaker Foley:
“We have no conclusive evidence of wrongdoing, but the seriousness of the allegations, and the weight of circumstantial information, compel an effort to establish the facts.”
In other words, every conspiracy theory involving Republicans must be politicized, repeated over and over in the media, and investigated.
Of course, any hint of impropriety involving Democrats is fake news.
“Goodale wrote, ‘President Obama will surely pass President Richard Nixon as the worst president ever on issues of national security and press freedom.’ ”
I doubt Tom Hanks or Meryl Streep will be mentioning this part of the Obama Legacy in their farewell tribute to the Great Departing Leader.
“By using the executive branch to punish … the Obama administration has set a precedent that could very likely be emulated by {the} Trump administration.”
Funny how often I have been reading words to this effect, in a wide variety of different contexts, over the past few weeks.
yet every single left media person will fall into hysteria because This Has Never Happened Before!! … At least not since Bush!
Is everyone who fails to answer a reporter’s question trampling on press freedoms, or just certain people?
If CNN had a lick of sense they’d stop trying to argue with the troll and just go ahead and say since they can’t get Trump to answer their questions, they’re just going to have a stand-in who’ll speculate on what Trump’s answers might be if CNN were to ask them.
Wait, that’s what they do already, isn’t it?
Okay, then maybe CNN could stop pretending everything they’re saying isn’t purely speculative and go into over-the-top ridiculous mode. Speculate as to what Trump might say if you asked him if he’s ever had a threeway with Bill and Hillary and speculate that he’d say “No, but there was a fourway where Chelsea was involved, too.” That’s completely legit news – CNN is reporting on what CNN is speculating.
Time Warner should sell CNN to Viacom. Viacom could then migrate their comedy news shows from Comedy Central to CNN.
It would be win-win. The quality of comedy on Comedy Central would improve and the quality of journalism on CNN would improve.
Complaining that a politician is being mean to them is a guaranteed loser for the press, given how negative the public opinion of them is. Until this goes to the level of using the apparatus of government to harass reporters, as Obama did, I couldn’t care less.
Sally’s just annoyed that her daughter finds Trump attractive.
Sally’s annoyed that her daughter isn’t gay. She’s like an inverse of a caricature of homophobic parents upset that their kid is gay,
So it’s alright for Obama to throw journalists in prison?
I would like Sally Kohn et al. to answer that.
Huh. Sally Kohn’s twatter pic makes her look like a 12 year old boy.
I haz a surprize.
She makes Rachel Maddow seem pleasantly feminine by comparison.
Some journalists came to imagine that the social justice warrior, ‘everything that doesn’t further the progressives agenda is a catastrophic meltdown’ mentality was the new normal. It never was normal, and the general public isn’t willing to pretend anymore.
Historians will someday look back at the years 2008-2016 the way we look back at the Red Scare, when we took our anxieties about the world outside and directed them at each other. It was the 1950s all over again.
Now, I go over to look at Salon, and even they seem to have realized the party is over.
“BuzzFeed’s gift to Trump”
BuzzFeed’s decision to publish a bunch of sleazy Trump-Russia innuendo only undermines legitimate journalism
http://www.salon.com/2017/01/1…..helps-him/
Salon spent the last eight years doing shit like that. It’s like they’re going after BuzzFeed for being like Salon was only a few weeks ago! But they can tell, the wind has changed direction.
Recently, an owner was forced to sell his basketball team because of the stupid shit he said to his estranged girlfriend. Nowadays, the recording of a pussy grabbing braggadocio doesn’t cost Trump the presidency. Nowadays, just because someone says, “I thought the KKK was okay–until I found out they smoked pot”, that doesn’t mean he can’t be confirmed as the Attorney General.
When you look back at the ’50s and the Red Scare, you realize that it was never as conformist and square as people imagined at the time. They had communists and hipsters, too. But the public’s willingness to accept, embrace, and perpetuate that false image of conformity, that’s what made the ’50s so stifling for so many people.
Someone clue the rest of the journalists in–our long national nightmare is over.
“I thought those guys [the Ku Klux Klan] were OK until I learned they smoked pot.”
Sessions said this was a joke, and that he never thought anyone would take it seriously”
—-Washington Post
http://tinyurl.com/zyhr5cn
Knowing how good ol’ boys talk, the point was supposed to be about how much he hates marijuana. He’s saying that as bad as you think the Klan is, he thinks marijuana is even worse.
It’s an exaggerated mode of speech that good ol’ boys use around the campfire, in a bar, or around the clubhouse, and although this is hard for people who didn’t grow up in the south to understand–that statement is both not supposed to be taken too seriously–and supposed to be funny because it’s true.
My point was that three months ago, you’re not supposed to be able to hold public office anywhere outside of Alabama after saying something like that. Nowadays, having said that is not enough to disqualify you from being the Attorney General.
It’s an exaggerated mode of speech that good ol’ boys use around the campfire, in a bar, or around the clubhouse, and although this is hard for people who didn’t grow up in the south to understand–that statement is both not supposed to be taken too seriously–and supposed to be funny because it’s true.
Much like the pussy-grabbing comment for a different set of men from a different part of the country.
Ahh yes, I’ve borne witness to this before. Company VP from the South told some racy and uncomfortable jokes in close quarters once about the first time he came to MN and saw the Mall of America at Halloween time, had a big banner up that called it ‘Spooksville’ — he had to call all his southern bros and laugh long and hard. It’s a bit funny, but I don’t do racy at work.
Kind of makes me want to find the link the story where telling a joke is now a “reportable” offense at whatever irrelevant college it was. But I am lazy.
I’m really looking forward to the state dinner with President Duterte.
BREAKING NEWS: Shootout between the Secret Service and Filipino presidential security agents at the White House tonight…
What, no poisonings at dinner?!
Goodale wrote, “President Obama will surely pass President Richard Nixon as the worst president ever on issues of national security and press freedom.”
That’s a terrible thing to say about Nixon.
I always loved how Bobby Knight and Bill Parcells treated the media, like dogshit. Enjoy your getting scraped guys. I know I will.
And Bill Bilichick.
And I wanna say Brian Burke.
Brian Burke was just an asshole, period. He just treated the press like he treated everyone else.
I’m not much of a Mark Cuban fan, but watching him dismantle Skip Bayless to his face a few years ago was awesome.
“The president-elect’s hostility to critical media”
Critical media? CNN is critical for what? Spinning, obfuscating, lying?
Everything to the right of Stalin.
Elizabeth Plank
“Trump refusing to take a question because the outlet wrote a negative story is the beginning of the end of freedom of press.”
Does this woman believe that pile of bullshit is going to fly anywhere but the CNN newsroom?
No, lady, it wasn’t a “negative story”; it was out and out horseshit.
I’ve said this for a long time, usually to much laughter, but a president hostile to the press is a lot less dangerous than a president in cahoots with the press.
It’s possible that the press might end up skeptical of POTUS claims and statements. I sorta think we could use that. It’s only 8 years late.
As those on stage by Trump clapped, Acosta retorted, “Now, Mr. President-elect, that’s not appropriate!”
Sounds like a little whiny bitch to me. See, the proper response would be to laugh and say “Sad how some little pussies can’t handle being asked tough questions. Maybe you should pull up your little pink panties and run home crying to your mama.”
I guess the “Obama really was bad, but Trump is totally going to be so much worse” party is going to be continuing for a while. So rather than expose the leftists crying about Trump as childish and irrational, Fisher has to go all: “Even though this isn’t a good example, Trump is so, like, scary.”
So the blacklist that Fisher refers to included: Buzzfeed, The Huff Post, The Des Moines Register and WaPo. So of these 4, only 1 is exactly “prestigious”. How would the American people ever get the “truth”? And they are always free to interview anyone and everyone who attended. Or free to yell to the world that they weren’t allowed in.
And referring to Reporters Without Borders ranking of the US as 41st in journalistic freedom (behind South Africa!) just puts the icing on the “I really am just a leftist progtard” cake.
The media can give me a call when Trump turns DOJ lose on reporters and starts bugging offices and hacking emails. Then, I will be concerned and angry just like I was when Obama pulled that shit. But if the best they can do is “Trump is a big meanie and won’t kiss my ass and that is scary”, they can go fuck themselves, because I really don’t care whether Trump or anyone else kisses the media’s ass.
Exactly. Trump owes them precisely nothing. If anything, he owes them a middle finger.
All of a sudden everyone loves authoritarian government figures here. How very curious!
Fascism chapter 1, paragraph, like, 4: Trash journalism and make people hate journalists.
Let me know when you finish writing it. I’ll give it a proof-reading once over.
I’d call it “Fascism for Dummies,” but I hear Trump has never read a book in his life.
How come the details in “Fascism for Dummies” contradicts actual Fascist writing?
Well, they say you should write about what you know. I don’t believe you know much about Fascism (based on your usual incorrect statements) but you should carry on because you certainly are a Dummy.
Have a nice day Tony! 🙂
Do you know what the word “authoritarian” means? Not giving access is not censorship.
Do you know what “embarrassing corrupt incompetent manchild” means? That’s who you’re jerking off to. The leader of the government libertarians are supposed to hate for its incompetence and corruption.
Tony|1.12.17 @ 1:35PM|#
“Do you know what “embarrassing corrupt incompetent manchild” means?”
Yes, we do. He leaves office here shortly.
Has anyone in your entire life ever asked you for your expertise on anything that didn’t have to do with cooking roadkill?
Tony|1.12.17 @ 1:45PM|#
“Has anyone in your entire life ever asked you for your expertise on anything that didn’t have to do with cooking roadkill?”
If that was directed at me, I am compensated for my expertise quite handsomely.
What does the River View Homeowner’s Association pay for your talents as editor of Dog Walker’s Weekly?
Okay so you don’t know what the word “authoritarian” means. Otherwise you’d know what you were seeing in the mirror.
The press has been lavishing praise on an incompetent man child for the past eight years. At least the will be critical now.
Tony|1.12.17 @ 1:21PM|#
“All of a sudden everyone loves authoritarian government figures here.”
I guess the stupidity is sooooo thick, Tony requires cue-cards to read a newspaper.
What a fucking imbecile.
And referring to Reporters Without Borders ranking of the US as 41st in journalistic freedom (behind South Africa!) just puts the icing on the “I really am just a leftist progtard” cake.
Only a leftist progtard would point out that press freedom in the U.S. has withered under Obama’s administration in the eyes of anti-censorship activists. Impeccable logic!
I was wondering about that as well.
I guess “but Obama was worse” really is going to be the new “But Booosh!”
To a bunch of cynical libertarians and anarchists, they are all going to be awful. Do we really need to rank them?
And even here, Fisher’s point was precisely that Obama was far, far worse, and has laid the groundwork for Trump to do a bunch of awful stuff too.
Trump has first amendment rights too Acosta. He doesn’t have to associate with lying assholes. Too bad for you.
CNN should ask Trump to bake them a cake for a gay wedding. Then he will have to interact with them.
the so called Petulant treatment of CNN was well deserved by CNN
Having them in the building but pointedly ignored and insulted for what they did does set the nsrrative though .
Especially for those who don’t keep up with this stuff on a daily basis like most here do.
lets not forget a very important rule though keep your enemies close so Trump should not completely cut off CNN but berating them now and then doesn’t hurt either. I doubt Trump is but hurt enough to bother spying on them like Obama did to FOX
Is Obama going to be responsible for every terrible thing Trump does?
But Boooooosssssssshhhhhhhh…
Yeah, fuck off.
Yeah Obama was to blame for Bush’s deficits and Obama’s going to be to blame for Trump’s deficits too.
Obama will go down in history as the cause of one of the biggest losses the Democratic party has suffered. *puts tear bottle collector up to Tony’s face
Obama and Hillary. The dems had an unbreakable lock on the House until Bill’s wife fucked it up.
Maybe. It’s no great reflection of the American people either though. And compared to W. and Trump Obama’s gonna be a candidate for Mt. Rushmore.
BOOOOOOOOOSH
…. was the worst president in American history, no doubt destined to come in second after Trump.
Tony|1.12.17 @ 1:35PM|#
“…. was the worst president in American history,”
Not close.
Well behind that lying piece of shit who is soon to be escorted from the WH.
was the worst president in American history, no doubt destined to come in second after Trump.
The hell is with the trolls on this site and thinking America was founded in 1980? The only thing this statement proves is your historical ignorance.
Hi Paulie “deficits matter again” Krugscum!
Tell us the truth, who writes more of your material these days, you or your wife?
Do you know anything about mainstream economic theory or are you a fucking retard?
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH
I guess that means it’s your wife.
Mainstream economic theory:
– deficits are bad during GOP administrations
– deficits are essential during Democrat administrations
Y = C + I + G
G = T + D
Ergo, D is good, except when GOP is in power.
BOOOOOOOOOSH
I won’t be particularly shocked if Trump uses that dodge. Every president in my lifetime has done it.
That doesn’t mean it ain’t bullshit. But that shouldn’t bother a pragmatist like you.
Are you not particularly shocked that it’s the theme of every single article at Reason?
You guys should figure out how to tell the difference between people who support slightly higher taxing and spending than you do and people who are genuine authoritarians. Otherwise you might come off as an obviously partisan right-wing joke in political philosophy sources.
*collects more tears
Keep this up and my orphans will have to work overtime.
Genuine authoritarians? You mean like, presidents who assert the authority to murder American citizens without due process? Guys like that?
Maybe now you’ll finally understand how stupid it was everytime you tried to blame anything Obama did on Bush. Nah, that would you require to be capable of actually learning something. Fuck off, moron.
I blamed things Bush was at fault for on Bush. Rightwing idiots such as who populate this site tried to actually shift timespace itself in order to blame Obama for the great recession.
BOOOOOOOOOOSH
Actually, we blame decades of bad fiscal and monetary policy for the bubble and the resulting pop. We blame Obama for the shitass recovery.
Just like how FDR blamed his excessively slow recovery on his predecessor. Despite the empirical fact that his policies prolonged the recession into the longest one ever seen heretofore.
Awwww, poor little Tony didn’t get his way on election day and he’s still miserable.
Progressive tears are the silver lining to Trump’s victory. Except for John, there aren’t any Trumpists here. Instead, libertarians and a few intellectually honest liberals like Glenn Greenwald are just about the only people who see things as they really are.
Of course, Tony is too stupid and self-absorbed to understand what that means.
Assuming the DNI report is entirely correct, who interfered in the US electoral process and undermined America democracy the most:
1) Russia for its coverage of the election on RT, which is the only substantiation of the DNI’s conclusions that the report makes
2) The UK in its Parliamentary debate on whether to grant Trump a visa
3) The Democrat Party in refusing timely concession of defeat, conspiring with Stein in a recount, campaigning electors to be faithless, smearing Trump as a Russian stooge, smearing Trump as a pervert, etc, etc.
4) The US “intelligence community” for spying on all Americans, murdering Americans abroad without due process, impugning Assange’s and Snowden’s credibility, making up fake news about Russia hacking critical infrastructure and Trump’s sexual perversions
5) US media outlets for stating over and over again that the “election was hacked” and thereby creating the impression among 50% of Hillary voters that the Russians changed vote totals, spreading obviously fake news about faked hate crimes by Trump supporters, fake news about Russian hacking, fake news about Trump’s perversions, fake news about Trump’s finances, fake news about Trump’s subservience to Putin, fake news about Trump being an anti-Semite, fake news about Trump being a racist, etc., etc.
Am I allowed to circle more than one answer?
To be sure, openly freezing out a specific media organization at a presidential press conference is a disquieting precedent.
For the pompous, over-privileged self-important clique of private citizens known as journalists, sure. For those of who think freedom of the press is a right of all citizens, not a privilege of courtesans, rake those bitches over the coals.
*golf clap*
RIP Freedom of the Press 1776-2017
This guy should research what happened in the early and middle 19th century in the Adams/Lincoln admins. But history is hard.
Playing favoritism and blacklisting ones he doesn’t like is called THREATENING THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
Uh, no it is not. “Freedom of the press” has nothing to do with professional journalism. “Press” is an action; reporting info. Also, where has she been for the last 8 years?
Yeah, it’s not like a President Trump would have the authority to have a reporter that he perceives as unfriendly assigned to the Cartel beat in Mexico City…..which might teach a few of them some perspective.
The “press” by turning itself from a reporter of news into a merchant of politically motivated narratives, has lost its objectivity. The First Amendment does not require anybody, President or busboy, to speak to, answer questions of, or otherwise interact with any particular “reporter” or news agency. They are free to howl at the Sun and bay at he Moon to their heart’s content. No one has to talk to them or to read/listen/watch their product. Howl away boys, no one cares anymore.
What is the problem. The fact that a government employee unlawfully discloses restricted information to a reporter does not give the employee a “free pass” on his crime. The FBI may use all lawful methods to solve the crime. The personality of the recipient in no way abbrogates the crime. And the fact that the accomplice is a reporter does not absolve him either although tradition has been for that to be ignored. The First Amendment protect outgoing speech not the burglary or other crime that got the secret files to which the speech refers.
Oh please. You act like this is a normal press. It’s not. It’s not even news.
Trump refusing to take a question from the Fake News outlet CNN makes him look strong and respectable, not “petulant.” Is Reason seeking to soil itself by promoting the reputation of a lying, deceitful corporation?
Let’s get this straight. CNN and BuzzFeed are NOT “The Press”. They are a wing of the Clinton Criminal Foundation and nothing else.
There are few things as delightfully entertaining and disarmingly honest as looters calling each other liars.
Well Russia is #148 on the list and I believe that he has praised Putin more then any other foreign leader. He has pointed out his respect dictators so you’ll never know.
Is there anything better than the progs and their ventriloquist dummies reaping the whirlwind? This makes the 8 years under Obama like the time spent with a chick’s lame friends before you banged the shit out of her that night. You might have to countenance a lot of nonsense for a while but eventually, that sweet payoff was coming.
Most feared three words in the world of the media:
“cite your source”
Having been falsely accused, over many different things, in my life, I want to await the final report before making any judgments. Talk is cheap and people who would spread gossip are akin to murderers.
Fuck the press, good for Trump. Their fake news, their liars, all of them in the mainstream media. These idiots attack libertarians and conservatives on a daily basis with smears, innuendo, false accusations etc. and Trump had the guts to put these smarmy, elitist scumbags in their place. Their not “the Press” their progtard mouth pieces, they deserve every bit of scorn and back lash that comes their way. Its about time conservatives and libertarians start fighting back, again Nick is just confused.
CNN pulled a “Ponius Pilate” by washing its hands off the dirt of actually publishing the unverified report by putting out the fact that the intelligence community had the information and then Buzzfeed published. It’s like they pointed to the dirty smear that is probably Russian disinformation and then said, “Oh, we won’t publish it because it’s too dirty for us.”
It’s also noteworthy that all of the other major MSM and blogs had this information peddled to them all summer and chose not to publicly give it exposure because it could not be verified. CNN is now going to receive the same sort of treatment that Obama gave to Fox News.
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