Posted on 07/27/2016 5:30:39 AM PDT by randita
Media Have a ‘Cry Wolf’ Problem with Trump
Decades of smearing decent Republican candidates leaves them without credibility on Trump’s demagoguery.
By Jonah Goldberg — July 27, 2016
Dear Mainstream Media and Democrats: It’s your turn. Now that Donald Trump has been formally nominated, the formal responsibility to stop him passes from the Right to the Left, from Republicans to Democrats and the journalists who amplify their values.
You’re going to find it a very tough slog. And it’s your own damn fault.
During the primaries, the task of exposing the true nature of the Trump takeover fell disproportionately to a few conservative magazines, columnists, renegade radio hosts, and behind-the-scenes activists. We all failed. There will be plenty of time for recriminations and “we happy few” speeches later. (If you detect a note of bitterness on my part, I’m not being clear enough: I contain symphonies of bitterness.)
We failed in part because the mainstream media were having too good of a time to help. Last spring, Stop Trump operatives told me they brought damning stories to mainstream outlets. The response was usually: “We’re not interested in covering that — right now.”
By May, Trump had already received roughly $3 billion worth of free media, thanks to ratings-hungry TV networks. CBS chief Les Moonves summarized it well at an investor conference in February: Trump’s rise “may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.”
Many in the media were so willing to put clicks and ratings before country because the conventional wisdom was that Trump would fade or implode eventually. Why not gawk at the spectacle? And if Trump did get the nomination, many journalists calculated, all the better. What fun it will be to watch Hillary Clinton destroy Trump and Trump destroy the GOP.
Only slowly have the media come around to the realization that Trump is an actual threat, but now it may be too late because they have a serious “cry wolf” problem. Millions of Americans firmly believe that journalists are water carriers for the Democrats and will tune out much of what they have to say about Trump now that he’s the nominee.
You can start the timeline as far back as the World War II era. In 1944, Franklin Roosevelt told the country that if Republicans were returned to power, “even though we shall have conquered our enemies on the battlefields abroad, we shall have yielded to the spirit of fascism here at home.” The press nodded along.
In 1964, CBS News’s Daniel Schorr claimed that Barry Goldwater’s planned post-convention vacation in Europe was really an effort to coordinate with “right-wing Germans” in “Hitler’s one-time stomping ground.”
In recent years, as the distinctions between news and opinion, analysis and advocacy, reporting and click-baiting has blurred, the problem has only gotten worse.
Every election cycle, the GOP nominee is smeared as a racist by the Democrats or the press — or both. Representative John Lewis of Georgia trades in a bit more of his hard-earned moral authority each time he insinuates that the GOP nominee is like George Wallace or wants to bring back Jim Crow, and political columnists relinquish a bit more of their claim to objectivity each time they let his comments pass without condemnation or criticism.
George W. Bush revived for the Left the paranoid style in American politics, and if you google “John McCain, racist, 2008” you’ll see he was lazily demonized too.
In 2012, pundits said Paul Ryan wanted to throw old ladies over cliffs because he wanted to reform Social Security. When Mitt Romney spoke to the NAACP, the response from many in the media was, per usual, “Racist!” (It’s ironic that many of the notable Republicans rebuking Trump this year are the ones pundits were only too happy to paint as racist not long ago.)
I have no doubt many journalists would defend their smears and professional failures, but that doesn’t change the fact that many Americans outside the mainstream media/Democratic bubble find it all indefensible. More important, they find it all ignorable — because the race card and the demagogue card have been played and replayed so often they’re little more than scraps of lint.
Already, editorial boards are preparing their indictments of what they believe to be Donald Trump’s incompetence, bigotry, and authoritarianism. Trump operatives will undoubtedly respond: “That’s what they always say about Republicans.” And they’ll be right.
— Jonah Goldberg is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a senior editor of National Review.
If Hillary wins the country as we’ve known it is OVER!!
She will pack the courts with radical activists.
She will gut the Second Amendment.
She will import 30+ million new Democrat voters.
She will force Section 8 into every currently safe GOP district.
What about that do these cretins NOT get????
Let her finish what Obama started and you guys will
NEVER get a SECOND CHANCE. Jeb, Ted, Jonah.....
——How did he become——
He spoke to FReepers at the pizza fest at the AIA building following the March For Justice and the Freeper cries of impeach, impeach impeach earlier in the day
The butt hurt is strong in this one.
It’s a good thing we didn’t elect Goldwater...he’d have started a war in Southeast Asia that would’ve killed tens of thousands of Americans.
I can forgive Jonah a bit, but he does need to come to terms with reality now.
I also was not a Trump fan, at least not for his candidacy for the Presidency. I always have believed that Donald Trump has the ability to be our Chief Executive [certainly more than Hillary who has never held an executive office]. My problem with Donald has always been his volatility, his lack of discipline and tendency to throw out epithets whenever he feels a personal affront.
However, he often also would make statements that were not PC but which were so much on target that I would sit in front of the TV set and cheer out loud. Example: when in August 2015 he was asked why he always appeared so angry, and he gave a great answer - because he saw our country being destroyed by poor leadership and that no one respected the USA anymore, etc.
After my first, second, and third choices dropped out of the race, I changed the tone of my prayers. I beseeched the Good Lord to give us a leader who would be competent and who would put our interests first, especially as to the Constitution. I told God that I would place my trust in Him. After all, God had raised up leaders of Israel in the old Testament who were not exactly choir boys, yet who were good leaders.
So, my faith is now in God, and I think He has had a hand in raising up Donald Trump at this time. He certainly is fearless, and with today’s problems, that is a good characteristic.
Shalom.
Jonah Goldberg is right about one thing: people hate the media and tune it out.
I haven’t missed two nights of the freak show watching it and still marveling at the Hillary implosion.
And their own polls show Trump well ahead. Screw ‘em.
“During the primaries, the task of exposing the true nature of the Trump takeover fell disproportionately to a few conservative magazines, columnists, renegade radio hosts, and behind-the-scenes activists. We all failed. There will be plenty of time for recriminations and “we happy few” speeches later. (If you detect a note of bitterness on my part, I’m not being clear enough: I contain symphonies of bitterness.)
We failed in part because the mainstream media were having too good of a time to help”
Trump is the Outmeister!
Thank you, Mr. Trump, for getting so many cockroaches to crawl out of their dark spaces!
Agreed. I’m a nervous wreck every time he uses twitter, :)
But he will be a great president and a great ally to Israel.
Egypt has shut down thousands of mosques, so that may be another ally in the area.
I dont see Sisi wanting trouble with Israel.
Dam Turkey coup failed.
False. He got free media coverage because he was bashing Republicans. His free media coverage has largely dried up, now that he's mostly bashing Hillary. (It comes back when he still bashes Republicans).
Except.....Goldwater would have WON it.
“Now that Donald Trump has been formally nominated, the formal responsibility to stop him passes from the Right to the Left, from Republicans to Democrats and the journalists who amplify their values.”
“...from Republicans to Democrats...”
amplify the values of democrats??
This man has become totally insane. I am not engaging in hyperbole. The man has lost his mind. In his mindless hatred of Trump, he embraces completely the full load of democrat demagoguery and sanctions the destruction of the United States.
I would love to corner this ass-hat wearing snob and get him to admit that Trump is running the most conservative campaign since Reagan, and admit that he has a photo album of the Bush family he keeps under his pillow.
Johah, you are NOT a conservative, just a Washington D.C. elitist scared that you may have to go out and get a real job when Trump cleans out the cesspool you wallow in.
I have often prayed that the scales be dropped from my eyes, so that I can see more clearly, and this election cycle has certainly opened my eyes to the corruption in both parties and in the media, especially “conservative” media. I wonder if Trump is the one being raised up by God, as you’ve said. We need a good strong leader.
He is lashing out at the media for not doing their job of destroying the Republican candidate? What? This is madness. I don’t think the anti Trump brigade will stop, and their attacks may become more vicious. I have never seen such a thing in my lifetime.
Are you actually saying the MSM did not attempt to demolish Trump every day, day in and day out for the entire news cycle? Are you serious?
I actually held my nose and read the first five paragraphs. If Johah hasn’t actually turned into a rabid chimp, he’s still done a total, insane, disloyal, anti-American chimp out. Now the most important thing in the world for this psychotic nut is to have the DemonCraps and liberal media team up to destroy The Donald and, by the way, the U.S., the Republican party, and Western Civilization in general by electing the most corrupt traitor in history President. Defeating Trump is the only thing that matters to him, nothing else.
It’s heartbreaking. He was one of hte best writers at NR.
Funny and witty as heck
What a shame.
‘Last spring, Stop Trump operatives told me they brought damning stories to mainstream outlets. The response was usually: “We’re not interested in covering that — RIGHT NOW.”
So Jonah, all those stories that you and your ilk passed to the Media are waiting in the wings to help Hillary!? Jonah, you have jumped the shark. You have lost your credibility. Trying to use Big Media for your own nefarious purposes will come back to bite us in the rear long about October. Go away......you have served the purpose the Left was using you for.........
That was Jonah who said that. You asked me where he claimed the media didn’t go after Trump.
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