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Donald Trump’s base is itching for a fight
The Chicago Sun Times ^ | November 23, 2018 | Gene Lyons

Posted on 11/23/2018 2:24:50 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

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To: neverevergiveup
The media have hurt many, many people in society, and both rationalize and justify their irresponsible and dangerous behaviors by invoking the first amendment - all the while trampling on the rights of others, ruining lives, and supporting suppression of the first amendment rights of those they disagree with.

They have propagated hatred against many, but now cry foul as they are criticized in society. No one is advocating for violence against journalists. Many are, however, advocating for a ‘redo’ of the media, with a focus on truth and neutrality. They have applauded the ‘reform’ of so many things and professions in society, but now balk when it has become irrefutably clear that it is way past time for reform of their vehicle for stature and relevancy.

Establishment journalists, like judges (I’m looking at Justice Roberts, but also at the SCOTUS “injunction” in Bush v. Gore against using the fact that SCOTUS found that the Supreme Court of Florida had been cooking the books for Gore as precedent for the proposition that sometimes courts are not objective), affect to believe their professional colleagues to be objective, no matter what. The First Amendment does not aim to create a journalism establishment; to the contrary it aims to keep members of the press independent. 1A explicitly, of course, makes journalists independent of government - but then, the authors of 1A had no example of the sort of non-governmental monopoly journalism which arose in the mid-Nineteenth Century.
Amendment 1:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
does not establish a ceiling over the rights of the people. Rather, as
Amendment 9:
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
makes plain, it is to be understood only as a floor under our rights.

Since the people had independent newspaper printers at the time of the ratification of 1A, and 1A intended to keep that situation, I argue that the people had (and we still have) a right to independent newspaper printers (and speakers) - and that a law against monopoly which was valid to break up Standard Oil is valid to break up a journalism monopoly. And that the First Amendment is not a defense against a suit under the Sherman AntiTrust Act against monopoly journalism.

What is the monopoly which transformed journalism in the second half of the Nineteenth Century? The Associated Press. Why? Because the AP “wire” is a virtual meeting of all major journalism in America. And because  

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. - Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations (1776)
It is naive in the extreme to assume that, in over a century and a half, journalists have never found any incentive to practice on the credulity of the public. They have - and they do so precisely by posturing as objective when in fact they are knowingly negative. Anyone who thinks “negativity is objectivity” is a cynic.

61 posted on 11/23/2018 6:06:32 PM PST by conservatism_IS_compassion
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“Donald Trump’s base is itching for a fight”

Are we ever!


62 posted on 11/23/2018 6:06:55 PM PST by Bonemaker (invictus maneo)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

If “itching for a fight” means bringing justice to Hillary, Brennan, Comey, Mueller, Strzok, Page, and Rosenstein, then, sure.


63 posted on 11/23/2018 6:17:11 PM PST by SERKIT ("Blazing Saddles" explains it all.......)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

These morons are just reflecting. They all want violence against conservatives but that would be bad, so therefore the conservatives must be trying to cause violence against them. It follows then that that they must protect themselves by attacking before the conservative attack them.


64 posted on 11/23/2018 7:57:05 PM PST by Agatsu77
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Nah.


65 posted on 11/23/2018 8:07:13 PM PST by enumerated
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"With the president designating the news media as “enemies of the people,'..."

The President only repeated the designation that the rest of us properly assigned to the bribed, seditious big media companies long ago.


66 posted on 11/23/2018 9:17:30 PM PST by familyop ("Welcome to Costco. I love you." - -Costco greeter in the movie, "Idiocracy")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"...how long before the first well-known journalist gets murdered?"

The big media mouthpieces and their sponsors started the process towards violence a long time ago with its pushing for policies against traditional family structure and fatherhood.


67 posted on 11/23/2018 9:20:16 PM PST by familyop ("Welcome to Costco. I love you." - -Costco greeter in the movie, "Idiocracy")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Tunnel vision and memory loss affected the author’s take on things - can’t see Antifa or recall how it’s the Left , being abetted by the Media, that causes the most mayhem and has been doing so for as long as both existed with a big uptick from the ‘60s on....


68 posted on 11/24/2018 3:32:23 AM PST by trebb (Those who don't donate anything tend to be empty gasbags...no-value-added types)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The Donalds base is more than fed up with the congress and senate doing everything they can for a one world ideology.
How about America first?
And as for these a-hole judges, many need dragging behind an American made pick em up truck down a rocky road.


69 posted on 11/24/2018 4:25:44 AM PST by Joe Boucher (Criminals at F.B.I., Justice Dept, I.R.S and No one taken out in cuffs? Federal gub mint is crappola)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
The real question for Gene Lyons of The Chicago Sun Times is:

"How many Americans have to be murdered by illegals before effing 'journalists' give a damn?"

When extremist Jamal Khashogg was murdered we need to remember that - on average - fewer journalists working in the Untied States are murdered than journalists in other parts of the world.

70 posted on 11/24/2018 7:07:33 AM PST by GOPJ (Watch this for our survival: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjzfGChGlE)
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To: piytar

Wow. So much for the peaceful left.


71 posted on 11/24/2018 7:49:54 AM PST by dhs12345
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