TO COMMENT CLICK HERE
Worthless Media
WELCOME TO WORTHLESS MEDIA WHERE THE FAILURE OF REAL JOURNALISM IS
EXPOSED
oct 17, 2019
“The media serve, and propagandize on behalf of, the powerful societal interests that control and finance them. The representatives of these interests have important agendas and principles that they want to advance, and they are well positioned to shape and constrain media policy.”
–Chomsky
Media lo-lites
(source: politicus usa, raw story, alternet, newshounds)
*Sinclair Broadcasting continues to produce must-run infomercials for NRA and Trump — disguised as news
Facebook’s rationale for allowing lies in political ads makes no sense
Facebook says one's ads cannot spread falsehoods, unless you're among a specific subset of politicians. Wait, what?
NICOLE KARLIS - salon
OCTOBER 16, 2019 10:59PM (UTC)
The hashtag #DeleteFacebook is trending again, and for more than merely one scandal. Besides being in the news for a small legal fine that the social media megalith was slapped with after its falsified video data undermined numerous news media outlets, the company's recently-clarified advertising policy reveal a strange double-standard that gives prominent politicians carte blanche to spread falsehoods on the platform.
As presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) illustrated by example last week, the social media company won’t remove political ads on its platform that blatantly spread misinformation — despite touting a fact-checking system it put in place after the 2016 presidential election. Warren’s campaign published an ad last week in which she joked that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg endorsed Trump.
The ad read:
"Breaking news: Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook just endorsed Donald Trump for re-election.
"You're probably shocked, and you might be thinking, 'how could this possibly be true?' Well, it's not. (Sorry.) But what Zuckerberg *has* done is given Donald Trump free rein to lie on his platform--and then to pay Facebook gobs of money to push out their lies to American voters."
The ad was an effective way to raise awareness about Facebook's refusal to verify political ads on its platform. Warren’s ad was allowed because of a Facebook policy that allows politicians to lie in political advertising. The policy came to light in a post by Nick Clegg, Facebook’s Vice President of Global Affairs and Communications, who explained in a speech last month that the decision is “grounded in Facebook’s fundamental belief in free expression and respect for the democratic process.”
“We rely on third-party fact-checkers to help reduce the spread of false news and other types of viral misinformation, like memes or manipulated photos and videos,” Clegg said. “We don’t believe, however, that it’s an appropriate role for us to referee political debates and prevent a politician’s speech from reaching its audience and being subject to public debate and scrutiny.”
Clegg continued:
We have had this policy on the books for over a year now, posted publicly on our site under our eligibility guidelines. This means that we will not send organic content or ads from politicians to our third-party fact-checking partners for review. However, when a politician shares previously debunked content including links, videos and photos, we plan to demote that content, display related information from fact-checkers, and reject its inclusion in advertisements. You can find more about the third-party fact-checking program and content eligibility here.
Yet this policy that is meant to determine which political ads stay and which ones are deleted appears to be on precarious philosophical footing. As BuzzFeed News reported yesterday, the company is haphazardly enforcing other advertising policies, which have resulted in paid content from at least five U.S. presidential candidates to be removed. A Facebook spokesperson told BuzzFeed News none of the rejected ads were rejected because they were deemed false by their fact-checkers; rather, they were removed for violating one or more of Facebook's other advertising policies, like using fake buttons in ads or profanity.
While prevaricating isn’t exactly a new thing for political campaigns, social media allows false claims to go viral, unimpeded, in a matter of seconds. It also provides the capability for those ads to reach millions of people around the world instantaneously. This puts Facebook in a precarious position, and seems to contradict its previous vows to stop misinformation from spreading on its platform.
Indeed, Facebook haphazardly enforces its own misinformation policies because it has taken a haphazard stance on misinformation. For example, regarding the anti-vaccination "movement", which poses a vast risk to public health, Facebook says it won’t tolerate such misinformation. "If a group or Page admin posts this vaccine misinformation, we will exclude the entire group or Page from recommendations, reduce these groups and Pages' distribution in News Feed and Search, and reject ads with this misinformation," Monika Bickert, vice president of global policy management, said in a statement.
But what if a politician was spreading misinformation about vaccinations? Facebook says it is not their responsibility to intervene when politicians speak, which in essence excuses them from responsibility if a Trump-like politician actively spreads misinformation. In turn, the public thus holds all the responsibility to discern fact from fiction. Facebook's hypocritical stance is unsurprising — and in turn, so is the public choice to opt to delete the platform altogether, as much of the public has.
Meanwhile, Zuckerberg is preparing to address the company's latest criticisms in a speech tomorrow. Per his own Facebook post, he has been preparing a speech about his “views on voice and free expression.”
“It's the most comprehensive take I've written about my views, why I believe voice is important, how giving people voice and bringing people together go hand in hand, how we might address the challenges that more voice and the internet introduce, and the major threats to free expression around the world,” he said. “I spent a lot of time working on this, and it's an unfiltered take on how I think about these questions.”
As presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) illustrated by example last week, the social media company won’t remove political ads on its platform that blatantly spread misinformation — despite touting a fact-checking system it put in place after the 2016 presidential election. Warren’s campaign published an ad last week in which she joked that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg endorsed Trump.
The ad read:
"Breaking news: Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook just endorsed Donald Trump for re-election.
"You're probably shocked, and you might be thinking, 'how could this possibly be true?' Well, it's not. (Sorry.) But what Zuckerberg *has* done is given Donald Trump free rein to lie on his platform--and then to pay Facebook gobs of money to push out their lies to American voters."
The ad was an effective way to raise awareness about Facebook's refusal to verify political ads on its platform. Warren’s ad was allowed because of a Facebook policy that allows politicians to lie in political advertising. The policy came to light in a post by Nick Clegg, Facebook’s Vice President of Global Affairs and Communications, who explained in a speech last month that the decision is “grounded in Facebook’s fundamental belief in free expression and respect for the democratic process.”
“We rely on third-party fact-checkers to help reduce the spread of false news and other types of viral misinformation, like memes or manipulated photos and videos,” Clegg said. “We don’t believe, however, that it’s an appropriate role for us to referee political debates and prevent a politician’s speech from reaching its audience and being subject to public debate and scrutiny.”
Clegg continued:
We have had this policy on the books for over a year now, posted publicly on our site under our eligibility guidelines. This means that we will not send organic content or ads from politicians to our third-party fact-checking partners for review. However, when a politician shares previously debunked content including links, videos and photos, we plan to demote that content, display related information from fact-checkers, and reject its inclusion in advertisements. You can find more about the third-party fact-checking program and content eligibility here.
Yet this policy that is meant to determine which political ads stay and which ones are deleted appears to be on precarious philosophical footing. As BuzzFeed News reported yesterday, the company is haphazardly enforcing other advertising policies, which have resulted in paid content from at least five U.S. presidential candidates to be removed. A Facebook spokesperson told BuzzFeed News none of the rejected ads were rejected because they were deemed false by their fact-checkers; rather, they were removed for violating one or more of Facebook's other advertising policies, like using fake buttons in ads or profanity.
While prevaricating isn’t exactly a new thing for political campaigns, social media allows false claims to go viral, unimpeded, in a matter of seconds. It also provides the capability for those ads to reach millions of people around the world instantaneously. This puts Facebook in a precarious position, and seems to contradict its previous vows to stop misinformation from spreading on its platform.
Indeed, Facebook haphazardly enforces its own misinformation policies because it has taken a haphazard stance on misinformation. For example, regarding the anti-vaccination "movement", which poses a vast risk to public health, Facebook says it won’t tolerate such misinformation. "If a group or Page admin posts this vaccine misinformation, we will exclude the entire group or Page from recommendations, reduce these groups and Pages' distribution in News Feed and Search, and reject ads with this misinformation," Monika Bickert, vice president of global policy management, said in a statement.
But what if a politician was spreading misinformation about vaccinations? Facebook says it is not their responsibility to intervene when politicians speak, which in essence excuses them from responsibility if a Trump-like politician actively spreads misinformation. In turn, the public thus holds all the responsibility to discern fact from fiction. Facebook's hypocritical stance is unsurprising — and in turn, so is the public choice to opt to delete the platform altogether, as much of the public has.
Meanwhile, Zuckerberg is preparing to address the company's latest criticisms in a speech tomorrow. Per his own Facebook post, he has been preparing a speech about his “views on voice and free expression.”
“It's the most comprehensive take I've written about my views, why I believe voice is important, how giving people voice and bringing people together go hand in hand, how we might address the challenges that more voice and the internet introduce, and the major threats to free expression around the world,” he said. “I spent a lot of time working on this, and it's an unfiltered take on how I think about these questions.”
another fool uncovered!!!
OANN anchor goes down in flames for reporting Christopher Columbus saved natives with Christianity
October 15, 2019
By David Edwards - raw story
One America News Network anchor Liz Wheeler took on history this week when she suggested that Christopher Columbus actually ended atrocities against Native Americans by bringing Christianity to America.
In a series of eye-popping tweets on Monday, Wheeler decided to celebrate Columbus Day by whitewashing the explorer’s legacy.
“Christopher Columbus didn’t commit genocide,” she wrote. “Within 200 years of Columbus’s arrival, 95% of the 20M Native Americans died… from disease. Smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, cholera.”
“Tragic, definitely. But mass murder by Columbus? Not even close,” Wheeler added.
She followed up with a second tweet: “In fact, mass murder, genocide, slavery, war, conquest, child sacrifice WAS happening in America… before Columbus. At the hands of Native tribes. It could be argued because of the Christian influence Columbus brought to America that those atrocities ended. Happy Columbus Day.”
Liz Wheeler✔
@Liz_Wheeler
Christopher Columbus didn't commit genocide.
Within 200 years of Columbus's arrival, 95% of the 20M Native Americans died... from disease. Smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, cholera.
Tragic, definitely. But mass murder by Columbus? Not even close.
4:12 PM - Oct 14, 2019
Andrew Kimmel, BuzzFeed’s former head of live video quickly knocked down Wheeler’s assertions.
“His own journals prove otherwise,” Kimmel fired back on Twitter. “Why must you lie about everything?”
Wheeler then dared Kimmel to show her the evidence.
“Do some journalism,” Kimmel replied with a few hints for Wheeler.
In 2015, Vox came up with 9 reasons “Christopher Columbus was a murderer, tyrant, and scoundrel.”
In a series of eye-popping tweets on Monday, Wheeler decided to celebrate Columbus Day by whitewashing the explorer’s legacy.
“Christopher Columbus didn’t commit genocide,” she wrote. “Within 200 years of Columbus’s arrival, 95% of the 20M Native Americans died… from disease. Smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, cholera.”
“Tragic, definitely. But mass murder by Columbus? Not even close,” Wheeler added.
She followed up with a second tweet: “In fact, mass murder, genocide, slavery, war, conquest, child sacrifice WAS happening in America… before Columbus. At the hands of Native tribes. It could be argued because of the Christian influence Columbus brought to America that those atrocities ended. Happy Columbus Day.”
Liz Wheeler✔
@Liz_Wheeler
Christopher Columbus didn't commit genocide.
Within 200 years of Columbus's arrival, 95% of the 20M Native Americans died... from disease. Smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, cholera.
Tragic, definitely. But mass murder by Columbus? Not even close.
4:12 PM - Oct 14, 2019
Andrew Kimmel, BuzzFeed’s former head of live video quickly knocked down Wheeler’s assertions.
“His own journals prove otherwise,” Kimmel fired back on Twitter. “Why must you lie about everything?”
Wheeler then dared Kimmel to show her the evidence.
“Do some journalism,” Kimmel replied with a few hints for Wheeler.
In 2015, Vox came up with 9 reasons “Christopher Columbus was a murderer, tyrant, and scoundrel.”
Shep Smith was escorted out of Fox News by security: report
October 11, 2019
By Sarah K. Burris - raw story
While it was announced that Shep Smith was resigning, effective immediately, the resignation looked a lot more hostile, according to some sources.
According to NBC News correspondent Jo Ling Kent, sources said the majority of the Fox News staff were shocked by the move and had no idea. It certainly showed on the faces of host Neil Cavuto and correspondent John Roberts, who described the news as being hit by a subway train. Cavuto gushed about what a great person Smith is.
Smith has worked at Fox News since it’s inception in 1996 and has served as a debunker of conspiracy theories opinion hosts at his own network peddled on their shows.
“It is my hope that the facts will win the day, that the truth will always matter,” Smith said as he signed off his final show.
According to NBC News correspondent Jo Ling Kent, sources said the majority of the Fox News staff were shocked by the move and had no idea. It certainly showed on the faces of host Neil Cavuto and correspondent John Roberts, who described the news as being hit by a subway train. Cavuto gushed about what a great person Smith is.
Smith has worked at Fox News since it’s inception in 1996 and has served as a debunker of conspiracy theories opinion hosts at his own network peddled on their shows.
“It is my hope that the facts will win the day, that the truth will always matter,” Smith said as he signed off his final show.
OPINION
Corporate Media Will Defend Trump to the Bitter End
Jim Naureckas / FAIR - truthdig
9/30/19
Doonesbury cartoon by Garry Trudeau from 1974
Things never change, do they—or do they? In 1974, of course, there was an expectation that if Richard Nixon were impeached and put on trial in the Senate, there was a chance that at least some Republicans would vote to remove him from office—which is why Nixon resigned when it looked like impeachment and a Senate trial were a certainty.
In 2019, of course, few see any likelihood at all that a Republican-dominated Senate would ever vote Trump out of office, regardless of what charges the House might impeach him with—even if he knocked over a bank, say, or shot the proverbial “somebody on Fifth Avenue.”
What’s changed between 1974 and 2019? The biggest transformation was the realization of the longstanding Republican dream—perhaps first articulated in a memo drafted by Roger Ailes for the Nixon White House (Gawker, 6/30/11)—of a right-wing media network that would do an end-run around what was seen as a media establishment hostile to the GOP: “It avoids the censorship, the priorities and the prejudices of network news selectors and disseminators,” Ailes’ GOP TV proposal promised.
The idea that the media establishment was inherently hostile to Republicans was largely a delusion; newspapers endorsed Nixon over Democratic challenger George McGovern 753 to 56, after all. But merely not having the selling of conservative policies as their primary motivation made corporate media an obstacle and therefore an enemy—and Ailes worked tirelessly to create a parallel media system that would deliver the news as the right wing wants it to be seen—”The Way Things Ought to Be,” as the title of a book by Ailes protege Rush Limbaugh put it.
The main value of Fox News, the cable behemoth launched by Ailes on behalf of right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch, is that it teaches conservative viewers that no facts or logic can force them to believe anything they don’t want to believe. Much as the tobacco and fossil fuel industries created their own realms of pseudo-scholarship where smoking doesn’t cause lung cancer and greenhouse gasses don’t warm the planet, Fox creates a parallel universe where conservatives are always victims, never villains, and any evidence to the contrary is simply—as the shopworn saying goes—”fake news.”
The corporate media establishment is devoted to the peculiar notion of “objectivity” (FAIR.org, 7/20/12)—which, somewhat counterintuitively, rejects the idea that there is an objective reality that journalists can meaningfully describe, and instead limits reporters’ role to repeating claims made about reality by various sources. On matters of national importance, these sources mostly consist of powerful government officials, including representatives of the major opposition party. This system allows reality as described in the most prestigious media outlets to be defined by the leadership of the two-party establishment—which turned out to be a good recipe for a stable, self-sustaining political class (one whose policy proposals could be counted on not to threaten the profits of media owners or sponsors).
Stable, that is, until one party figures out that the system allows them to say whatever they want. The rise of the right-wing media machine allowed Republicans to create their own self-serving fantasy world—and the rules of the centrist establishment meant that that bizarro version had to be incorporated into the consensus media reality. When the president is accused of a crime, he need not disprove the allegations, but merely needs to put forward a version of events in which he is the one fighting crime, and his accuser a traitor working on behalf of a shadowy cabal. This becomes the unquestioned reality of the right-wing parallel universe—and an on-the-other-hand option offered by the centrist press.
In 2019, of course, few see any likelihood at all that a Republican-dominated Senate would ever vote Trump out of office, regardless of what charges the House might impeach him with—even if he knocked over a bank, say, or shot the proverbial “somebody on Fifth Avenue.”
What’s changed between 1974 and 2019? The biggest transformation was the realization of the longstanding Republican dream—perhaps first articulated in a memo drafted by Roger Ailes for the Nixon White House (Gawker, 6/30/11)—of a right-wing media network that would do an end-run around what was seen as a media establishment hostile to the GOP: “It avoids the censorship, the priorities and the prejudices of network news selectors and disseminators,” Ailes’ GOP TV proposal promised.
The idea that the media establishment was inherently hostile to Republicans was largely a delusion; newspapers endorsed Nixon over Democratic challenger George McGovern 753 to 56, after all. But merely not having the selling of conservative policies as their primary motivation made corporate media an obstacle and therefore an enemy—and Ailes worked tirelessly to create a parallel media system that would deliver the news as the right wing wants it to be seen—”The Way Things Ought to Be,” as the title of a book by Ailes protege Rush Limbaugh put it.
The main value of Fox News, the cable behemoth launched by Ailes on behalf of right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch, is that it teaches conservative viewers that no facts or logic can force them to believe anything they don’t want to believe. Much as the tobacco and fossil fuel industries created their own realms of pseudo-scholarship where smoking doesn’t cause lung cancer and greenhouse gasses don’t warm the planet, Fox creates a parallel universe where conservatives are always victims, never villains, and any evidence to the contrary is simply—as the shopworn saying goes—”fake news.”
The corporate media establishment is devoted to the peculiar notion of “objectivity” (FAIR.org, 7/20/12)—which, somewhat counterintuitively, rejects the idea that there is an objective reality that journalists can meaningfully describe, and instead limits reporters’ role to repeating claims made about reality by various sources. On matters of national importance, these sources mostly consist of powerful government officials, including representatives of the major opposition party. This system allows reality as described in the most prestigious media outlets to be defined by the leadership of the two-party establishment—which turned out to be a good recipe for a stable, self-sustaining political class (one whose policy proposals could be counted on not to threaten the profits of media owners or sponsors).
Stable, that is, until one party figures out that the system allows them to say whatever they want. The rise of the right-wing media machine allowed Republicans to create their own self-serving fantasy world—and the rules of the centrist establishment meant that that bizarro version had to be incorporated into the consensus media reality. When the president is accused of a crime, he need not disprove the allegations, but merely needs to put forward a version of events in which he is the one fighting crime, and his accuser a traitor working on behalf of a shadowy cabal. This becomes the unquestioned reality of the right-wing parallel universe—and an on-the-other-hand option offered by the centrist press.
"Bully commentary born of anger": Fox News host Laura Ingraham mocks 16-year-old girl with autism
Fox calls a commentator who bullied Greta Thunberg "disgraceful," but refuses to offer a comment about its big star
MATTHEW ROZSA - salon
SEPTEMBER 24, 2019 3:30PM (UTC)
For a second year in a row, Fox News host Laura Ingraham has found herself embroiled in controversy after attacking a teenager on live TV — this time a 16-year-old climate activist with autism.
On behalf of youth across the globe, Greta Thunberg put world leaders on notice Monday when she addressed delegates at the United Nations climate summit, saying: "If you choose to fail us, I say we will never forgive you."
After showing highlights of Thunberg's speech, Ingraham asked her viewers a rhetorical question: "Anyone else find that chilling?"
The Fox News host then proceeded to roll tape on the 1984 horror movie "Children of the Corn." The Fritz Kiersch film was based on a Stephen King short story about a Nebraska community, in which a malevolent supernatural creature manipulates the town's children into murdering the adults and forming a sinister cult.
Justin Baragona✔
@justinbaragona
A couple hours after Fox News guest Michael Knowles called Greta Thunberg a "mentally ill Swedish child," Fox host Laura Ingraham directly compares Thunberg to Stephen King's "Children of the Corn"
7:31 PM - Sep 23, 2019
"A time of tribulation has come," declared the character Isaac in the clip shown by Ingraham. "A test is at hand — the final test."
"I can't wait for Stephen King's sequel, 'Children of the Climate,'" Ingraham said to audible laughter from individuals in her studio. "Now, the left — if they ever get in power — will simply use the excuse of climate change to reward their friends."
The Fox News host's criticisms of Thunberg were swiftly rebuked as "bully commentary" by her own brother, Curtis Ingraham.
"Clearly my sister’s paycheck is more important than the world her three adopted kids will inherit. I can no longer apologize for a sibling who I no longer recognize," he wrote Monday night on Twitter following the segment. "I can and will continue to call out the monstrous behavior and the bully commentary born out of anger."
Curtis Ingraham
@CurtisIngraham1
Clearly my sister’s paycheck is more important than the world her three adopted kids will inherit. I can no longer apologize for a sibling who I no longer recognize. I can and will continue to call out the monstrous behavior and the bully commentary born out of anger. https://twitter.com/mmfa/status/1176329152812736512 …
Media Matters✔
@mmfa
Laura Ingraham compares Greta Thunberg and youth climate activists to Stephen King's "Children of the Corn" https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingraham-compares-greta-thunberg-and-youth-climate-activists-stephen-kings …
8:39 PM - Sep 23, 2019
And Ingraham was not the only commentator on Fox News to take aim at the Swedish activist on the autism spectrum. (Thunberg uses the familiar term “Asperger’s syndrome,” which is no longer used for diagnostic purposes in the U.S.) The Daily Wire's Michael Knowles attempted to discredit the climate movement by attacking her mental health.
"If it were about science, it would be led by scientists rather than by politicians and a mentally-ill Swedish child who is being exploited by her parents and by the international left," Knowles said of the movement. (The consensus of the scientific community overwhelmingly holds that climate change is real, dangerous and caused by human beings.)
"How dare you!" interjected the political commentator and Democratic activist Chris Hahn.
"What you're seeing here is a political movement and a religious movement," Knowles continued. "And it's fulfilling religious and political goals of the left, but it isn't doing very much for science."
When guest host Harris Faulkner asked Hahn to finish with his thoughts, the pundit told Knowles he should be ashamed.
"Yeah, I mean, you're a grown man, and you're attacking a child," Hahn said. "Shame on you. She's trying to do what she thinks is right . . ."
"I'm not," Knowles responded with a grin. "I'm attacking the left for exploiting a mentally-ill child."
On behalf of youth across the globe, Greta Thunberg put world leaders on notice Monday when she addressed delegates at the United Nations climate summit, saying: "If you choose to fail us, I say we will never forgive you."
After showing highlights of Thunberg's speech, Ingraham asked her viewers a rhetorical question: "Anyone else find that chilling?"
The Fox News host then proceeded to roll tape on the 1984 horror movie "Children of the Corn." The Fritz Kiersch film was based on a Stephen King short story about a Nebraska community, in which a malevolent supernatural creature manipulates the town's children into murdering the adults and forming a sinister cult.
Justin Baragona✔
@justinbaragona
A couple hours after Fox News guest Michael Knowles called Greta Thunberg a "mentally ill Swedish child," Fox host Laura Ingraham directly compares Thunberg to Stephen King's "Children of the Corn"
7:31 PM - Sep 23, 2019
"A time of tribulation has come," declared the character Isaac in the clip shown by Ingraham. "A test is at hand — the final test."
"I can't wait for Stephen King's sequel, 'Children of the Climate,'" Ingraham said to audible laughter from individuals in her studio. "Now, the left — if they ever get in power — will simply use the excuse of climate change to reward their friends."
The Fox News host's criticisms of Thunberg were swiftly rebuked as "bully commentary" by her own brother, Curtis Ingraham.
"Clearly my sister’s paycheck is more important than the world her three adopted kids will inherit. I can no longer apologize for a sibling who I no longer recognize," he wrote Monday night on Twitter following the segment. "I can and will continue to call out the monstrous behavior and the bully commentary born out of anger."
Curtis Ingraham
@CurtisIngraham1
Clearly my sister’s paycheck is more important than the world her three adopted kids will inherit. I can no longer apologize for a sibling who I no longer recognize. I can and will continue to call out the monstrous behavior and the bully commentary born out of anger. https://twitter.com/mmfa/status/1176329152812736512 …
Media Matters✔
@mmfa
Laura Ingraham compares Greta Thunberg and youth climate activists to Stephen King's "Children of the Corn" https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingraham-compares-greta-thunberg-and-youth-climate-activists-stephen-kings …
8:39 PM - Sep 23, 2019
And Ingraham was not the only commentator on Fox News to take aim at the Swedish activist on the autism spectrum. (Thunberg uses the familiar term “Asperger’s syndrome,” which is no longer used for diagnostic purposes in the U.S.) The Daily Wire's Michael Knowles attempted to discredit the climate movement by attacking her mental health.
"If it were about science, it would be led by scientists rather than by politicians and a mentally-ill Swedish child who is being exploited by her parents and by the international left," Knowles said of the movement. (The consensus of the scientific community overwhelmingly holds that climate change is real, dangerous and caused by human beings.)
"How dare you!" interjected the political commentator and Democratic activist Chris Hahn.
"What you're seeing here is a political movement and a religious movement," Knowles continued. "And it's fulfilling religious and political goals of the left, but it isn't doing very much for science."
When guest host Harris Faulkner asked Hahn to finish with his thoughts, the pundit told Knowles he should be ashamed.
"Yeah, I mean, you're a grown man, and you're attacking a child," Hahn said. "Shame on you. She's trying to do what she thinks is right . . ."
"I'm not," Knowles responded with a grin. "I'm attacking the left for exploiting a mentally-ill child."
Here’s how the New York Times is helping Trump get away with his corrupt Ukraine stunt
September 23, 2019
By Matthew Chapman - raw story
For all President Donald Trump’s hatred of the “failing New York Times” and all the invaluable work its journalists have done breaking stories of corruption and abuse in the administration, the paper has made serious editorial errors in its rush to get scoops on presidential candidates — often to Republicans’ benefit. Most notably, in 2016, the Times partnered with Trump ally and former Breitbart chief Steve Bannon to promote a false allegation of self-dealing at the Clinton Foundation — which set the tone for how the Clintons’ charity work was covered for the whole campaign cycle.
In 2019, the Times hasn’t struck deals with right-wing partisans. But, wrote Jonathan Chait for New York Magazine, their coverage of Trump’s smear of Biden’s Ukraine diplomacy was still badly conceived — and does more to help Trump promote the conspiracy theory than to debunk it or explore the abuses of power he used to put the story out.
“On May 1, The New York Times published a story that contained the most important facets of the Ukraine story,” wrote Chait. The Times reported that President Trump, through his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was pressing Ukraine’s government to investigate Joe Biden. And yet, having uncovered a massive scandal, the Times buried its own scoop. The revelation, which many people now see an an impeachable offense, was buried in the middle of a story that was primarily devoted to carrying Trump’s water.”
“Headlined ‘Biden Faces Conflict of Interest Questions That Are Being Promoted by Trump and Allies,’ the story spun out a version of the narrative Giuliani has been trying to implant in the media,” continued Chait. “It suggested that, during his tenure as vice-president, Joe Biden took untoward action to help his son Hunter’s business in Ukraine by demanding the firing of a prosecutor who was investigating him. The news about Trump’s role arrived only after nine paragraphs of insinuations against Biden. And then, after a brief detour that casually reveals that the Biden story is the product of an extraordinary abuse of power by the president, it returns to a long unspooling of the Biden-Ukraine narrative.”
“The Times article had important ramifications,” Chait wrote. “It immediately cast Trump’s Biden campaign as an oh-by-the-way detail, allowing the scandal to fester unremarked in the background for months until happenstance thrust it back into the headlines. The strange saga of the Times scoop also suggests something more disturbing: that Trump has hacked into the mainstream media’s ethics and turned them to his advantage. What’s more, even now that his conduct has been exposed, Trump’s gambit that he could abuse his power to discredit an opponent may yet succeed.”
The problem is that even though Trump’s attacks on Biden have already been debunked, and even though the Times does say this, readers who just see the headline or skim the first few paragraphs won’t get that impression. Thus, the articles may actually help Trump spread the false narrative — and Trump’s associates, having seen how issues like the Clinton Foundation or the email server were covered, understand that there’s no downside to the way the Times reports on them.
“Giuliani’s barely controlled performance on CNN with Chris Cuomo might have appeared like a failure of spin, but he succeeded in his primary goal of juxtaposing ‘Biden’ with words like ‘corrupt’ and ‘scandal’ dozens of times over half an hour of airtime,” wrote Chait. “Giuliani explained on Fox News how the method can work. ‘It’s the only way you can get this out. The only way they would cover this story is by punching the president in the face, and then the president deflects the punch, which he’s done, the story came down, and then he hits with a right hand that’s more powerful.’ Anything that results in the media’s raising questions about Democrats helps Trump, however minor or unfounded the questions may be.”
“The inexhaustible fire hose of Trumpian misconduct has only made this formula more effective,” Chait concluded ominously. “Trump’s supporters hold him to the lowest imaginable standard of conduct, while Democratic voters hold their leaders to fairly high standards. Trump’s base is almost immune to news of misconduct by him, while the Democratic base is highly sensitive to it. It’s therefore plausible for Trump to assume that a story that combines unsubstantiated allegations against people in his opponent’s orbit with massive, undisguised abuse of power by Trump himself is a net win.”
RELATED: Ex-Republican delivers scathing rebuke of Dem inaction on impeachment — and explains how the GOP would handle it
“First, Democrats thought Robert Mueller would save them, so they waited & waited for his report, did nothing in the meantime,” he writes. “Then they thought getting control of the House would fix everything. Nothing has happened. Now we must wait for the White House. Wait is all we ever do.”
In 2019, the Times hasn’t struck deals with right-wing partisans. But, wrote Jonathan Chait for New York Magazine, their coverage of Trump’s smear of Biden’s Ukraine diplomacy was still badly conceived — and does more to help Trump promote the conspiracy theory than to debunk it or explore the abuses of power he used to put the story out.
“On May 1, The New York Times published a story that contained the most important facets of the Ukraine story,” wrote Chait. The Times reported that President Trump, through his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was pressing Ukraine’s government to investigate Joe Biden. And yet, having uncovered a massive scandal, the Times buried its own scoop. The revelation, which many people now see an an impeachable offense, was buried in the middle of a story that was primarily devoted to carrying Trump’s water.”
“Headlined ‘Biden Faces Conflict of Interest Questions That Are Being Promoted by Trump and Allies,’ the story spun out a version of the narrative Giuliani has been trying to implant in the media,” continued Chait. “It suggested that, during his tenure as vice-president, Joe Biden took untoward action to help his son Hunter’s business in Ukraine by demanding the firing of a prosecutor who was investigating him. The news about Trump’s role arrived only after nine paragraphs of insinuations against Biden. And then, after a brief detour that casually reveals that the Biden story is the product of an extraordinary abuse of power by the president, it returns to a long unspooling of the Biden-Ukraine narrative.”
“The Times article had important ramifications,” Chait wrote. “It immediately cast Trump’s Biden campaign as an oh-by-the-way detail, allowing the scandal to fester unremarked in the background for months until happenstance thrust it back into the headlines. The strange saga of the Times scoop also suggests something more disturbing: that Trump has hacked into the mainstream media’s ethics and turned them to his advantage. What’s more, even now that his conduct has been exposed, Trump’s gambit that he could abuse his power to discredit an opponent may yet succeed.”
The problem is that even though Trump’s attacks on Biden have already been debunked, and even though the Times does say this, readers who just see the headline or skim the first few paragraphs won’t get that impression. Thus, the articles may actually help Trump spread the false narrative — and Trump’s associates, having seen how issues like the Clinton Foundation or the email server were covered, understand that there’s no downside to the way the Times reports on them.
“Giuliani’s barely controlled performance on CNN with Chris Cuomo might have appeared like a failure of spin, but he succeeded in his primary goal of juxtaposing ‘Biden’ with words like ‘corrupt’ and ‘scandal’ dozens of times over half an hour of airtime,” wrote Chait. “Giuliani explained on Fox News how the method can work. ‘It’s the only way you can get this out. The only way they would cover this story is by punching the president in the face, and then the president deflects the punch, which he’s done, the story came down, and then he hits with a right hand that’s more powerful.’ Anything that results in the media’s raising questions about Democrats helps Trump, however minor or unfounded the questions may be.”
“The inexhaustible fire hose of Trumpian misconduct has only made this formula more effective,” Chait concluded ominously. “Trump’s supporters hold him to the lowest imaginable standard of conduct, while Democratic voters hold their leaders to fairly high standards. Trump’s base is almost immune to news of misconduct by him, while the Democratic base is highly sensitive to it. It’s therefore plausible for Trump to assume that a story that combines unsubstantiated allegations against people in his opponent’s orbit with massive, undisguised abuse of power by Trump himself is a net win.”
RELATED: Ex-Republican delivers scathing rebuke of Dem inaction on impeachment — and explains how the GOP would handle it
“First, Democrats thought Robert Mueller would save them, so they waited & waited for his report, did nothing in the meantime,” he writes. “Then they thought getting control of the House would fix everything. Nothing has happened. Now we must wait for the White House. Wait is all we ever do.”
Good grief, New York Times—Trump is not a 'populist' like Warren
Eric Boehlert for Daily Kos
Community
Sunday September 22, 2019 · 7:45 AM PDT
Signaling that it's going to work hard to elevate Donald Trump during the upcoming presidential campaign, The New York Times recently suggested that Trump and Elizabeth Warren are politically similar because both offer up a version of "populism." They just do it from different perspectives, the article posited. Specifically, the Times dissected speeches that each gave on the same day last week. "The two back-to-back addresses laid out the competing versions of populism that could come to define the presidential campaign," the newspaper noted.
This is wildly misguided. It's also a continuation of the media’s Both Sides Olympics, and represents a depressing preview of 2020 coverage, where journalists scramble to make sure Trump and whoever the Democratic nominee is appear to be somewhat similar, or at least of similar stature. (The Times is not alone on this: "Trump v Warren rallies preview possible 2020 populist duel," read a BBC headline last week.)
The truth is, “populist” serves as a crutch. And when it’s used today, the identifier represents a lazy shorthand used to describe Trump’s grab bag of often-contradictory political positions. Words matter, which is why journalists should be reaching for "nativist," "white nationalist," and "authoritarian"—not "populist"—when identifying Trump.
Yet "populist" persists. And in the unfolding campaign scenario, that means elevating Trump, a congenital liar, a racist, and someone with questionable mental stability, to the same status as Elizabeth Warren, a U.S. senator and a Harvard Law School professor. It's a concerted effort to pretend that Trump is a serious person like Warren, and has given lots of thought to his political philosophy in terms of a populist agenda. In other words, it's a complete fantasy. But it's one the press is very comfortable promoting. In fact, it's one the press must promote during the upcoming 2020 campaign in order to continue its long-running pattern of trying to normalize Trump's behavior. (The seemingly impossible alternative is to aggressively call out Trump's radical and unsettling behavior.)
Reminder: Populism represents a political struggle on behalf of regular people against elite economic forces. It's an ideology that pits ordinary people against a self-serving elite, appealing to a sense that the political establishment has grown corrupt and unresponsive to the needs of everyday people. Today, Trump’s brand of pro-corporate, anti-worker politics represents the exact opposite.
Indeed, "populist" and "economic anxiety" were two of the media's biggest Trump cons of the 2016 campaign.
Trump’s alleged “populism” enticed the press and provided journalists with an acceptable, nonthreatening way to address his primary and general election successes. It was a way to downplay white nationalism, race-baiting, and sexism as the driving forces of his campaign.
Once in office, Trump's only signature piece of signed legislation was a gift basket of tax cuts for corporate America and the very wealthy. Meanwhile, Trump spent most of 2017 trying to kill Obamacare, which would have meant the elimination of healthcare coverage for millions of working-class Americans. He also tried to block overtime pay for workers making less than $47,000 a year, and abolish the government block grant program that helps fund Meals on Wheels for the elderly. His administration has been a sea of open corruption. Trump's trade war has decimated markets for Midwestern farmers, while his Cabinet members and top advisers have been a rotating door of lobbyists, businessmen, and billionaires. Basically, since taking office, Trump has relentlessly favored the wealthy over members of the working class.
Contrast that with Warren's aggressively populist plans to curb the power of the big banks, big pharma, big oil, and the increasingly monopolistic tech companies. Indeed, she's running on one of the most aggressively populist agendas in recent American presidential history. Looking at Trump and Warren side-by-side, it's comical to even pretend that Trump falls under the "populist" umbrella the way Warren does. But I guarantee you, Trump's "populism" will be a driving force of the media's campaign narrative over the next 14 months.
Note that during the past two years, many commentators have pontificated about how Trump is clearly not a populist. And that includes lots of writers appearing in The New York Times. "Message to those in the news media who keep calling Donald Trump a “populist”: I do not think that word means what you think it means," warned Times columnist Paul Krugman last year. "When you describe Trump using that word, you are in effect complicit in his lie — especially when you do it in the context of supposedly objective reporting."
So yes, there seemed to be something of a widespread agreement within the press that Trump has not governed as a populist (obviously). But now with the campaign season looming, there seems to be a pull to bring back that misleading describer, especially if Trump faces off against an actual populist Democrat next year. That, despite the fact that the man-of-the-people adjective so obviously does not apply to a president who has gone golfing more than 200 times since being sworn into office. (It's an indulgence that has cost taxpayers more than $100 million to date.)
The Times piece last week essentially conceded that Trump has not governed as a populist, but stressed, "Mr. Trump has still positioned himself for re-election as an anti-establishment brawler." Oh, so Trump has positioned himself as a populist. How, in part, does he do that? He does that by having news outlets such as The New York Times publish long articles about how he's supposedly a populist, of course.
This is wildly misguided. It's also a continuation of the media’s Both Sides Olympics, and represents a depressing preview of 2020 coverage, where journalists scramble to make sure Trump and whoever the Democratic nominee is appear to be somewhat similar, or at least of similar stature. (The Times is not alone on this: "Trump v Warren rallies preview possible 2020 populist duel," read a BBC headline last week.)
The truth is, “populist” serves as a crutch. And when it’s used today, the identifier represents a lazy shorthand used to describe Trump’s grab bag of often-contradictory political positions. Words matter, which is why journalists should be reaching for "nativist," "white nationalist," and "authoritarian"—not "populist"—when identifying Trump.
Yet "populist" persists. And in the unfolding campaign scenario, that means elevating Trump, a congenital liar, a racist, and someone with questionable mental stability, to the same status as Elizabeth Warren, a U.S. senator and a Harvard Law School professor. It's a concerted effort to pretend that Trump is a serious person like Warren, and has given lots of thought to his political philosophy in terms of a populist agenda. In other words, it's a complete fantasy. But it's one the press is very comfortable promoting. In fact, it's one the press must promote during the upcoming 2020 campaign in order to continue its long-running pattern of trying to normalize Trump's behavior. (The seemingly impossible alternative is to aggressively call out Trump's radical and unsettling behavior.)
Reminder: Populism represents a political struggle on behalf of regular people against elite economic forces. It's an ideology that pits ordinary people against a self-serving elite, appealing to a sense that the political establishment has grown corrupt and unresponsive to the needs of everyday people. Today, Trump’s brand of pro-corporate, anti-worker politics represents the exact opposite.
Indeed, "populist" and "economic anxiety" were two of the media's biggest Trump cons of the 2016 campaign.
Trump’s alleged “populism” enticed the press and provided journalists with an acceptable, nonthreatening way to address his primary and general election successes. It was a way to downplay white nationalism, race-baiting, and sexism as the driving forces of his campaign.
Once in office, Trump's only signature piece of signed legislation was a gift basket of tax cuts for corporate America and the very wealthy. Meanwhile, Trump spent most of 2017 trying to kill Obamacare, which would have meant the elimination of healthcare coverage for millions of working-class Americans. He also tried to block overtime pay for workers making less than $47,000 a year, and abolish the government block grant program that helps fund Meals on Wheels for the elderly. His administration has been a sea of open corruption. Trump's trade war has decimated markets for Midwestern farmers, while his Cabinet members and top advisers have been a rotating door of lobbyists, businessmen, and billionaires. Basically, since taking office, Trump has relentlessly favored the wealthy over members of the working class.
Contrast that with Warren's aggressively populist plans to curb the power of the big banks, big pharma, big oil, and the increasingly monopolistic tech companies. Indeed, she's running on one of the most aggressively populist agendas in recent American presidential history. Looking at Trump and Warren side-by-side, it's comical to even pretend that Trump falls under the "populist" umbrella the way Warren does. But I guarantee you, Trump's "populism" will be a driving force of the media's campaign narrative over the next 14 months.
Note that during the past two years, many commentators have pontificated about how Trump is clearly not a populist. And that includes lots of writers appearing in The New York Times. "Message to those in the news media who keep calling Donald Trump a “populist”: I do not think that word means what you think it means," warned Times columnist Paul Krugman last year. "When you describe Trump using that word, you are in effect complicit in his lie — especially when you do it in the context of supposedly objective reporting."
So yes, there seemed to be something of a widespread agreement within the press that Trump has not governed as a populist (obviously). But now with the campaign season looming, there seems to be a pull to bring back that misleading describer, especially if Trump faces off against an actual populist Democrat next year. That, despite the fact that the man-of-the-people adjective so obviously does not apply to a president who has gone golfing more than 200 times since being sworn into office. (It's an indulgence that has cost taxpayers more than $100 million to date.)
The Times piece last week essentially conceded that Trump has not governed as a populist, but stressed, "Mr. Trump has still positioned himself for re-election as an anti-establishment brawler." Oh, so Trump has positioned himself as a populist. How, in part, does he do that? He does that by having news outlets such as The New York Times publish long articles about how he's supposedly a populist, of course.
KOCH DATA MINING COMPANY HELPED INUNDATE VOTERS WITH ANTI-IMMIGRANT MESSAGES
Lee Fang - the intercept
September 9 2019, 12:40 p.m.
IN RECENT YEARS, Charles Koch, the billionaire industrialist megadonor to Republicans and libertarian causes, has carefully recalibrated his public image, releasing a variety of statements to assert that he supports immigration and opposes President Donald Trump’s blatant scapegoating of undocumented immigrants and foreigners.
At the same time, however, Koch’s sprawling political network’s in-house technology company has mined consumer data to motivate Republican voters with dehumanizing messages that depict immigrants as an invading army of criminals and potential terrorists.
Last year, when many GOP candidates across the country turned to vicious anti-immigrant advertisements to turn out voters in the midterm elections, some turned to i360, Koch’s state-of-the-art data analytics company. The company is one of the several appendages of the Koch political machine — one that includes a suite of voter outreach organization, lobbying, and campaign messaging tools.
Dozens of GOP candidates for state and federal office contracted with the Koch data company to identify voter segments and push out targeted ads on television and social media in 2018. And the company looks to be expanding its role in GOP campaigns going into 2020; more than a dozen federal candidates list the firm as a contractor.
The path to one Republican’s successful 2018 Senate run is detailed on i360’s website. Then-Tennessee Rep. Marsha Blackburn aired at least four different television advertisements and a wave of social media advertisements focused on immigration, often with false or inflammatory language. She ended up beating out Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, who had been leading in the polls for months.
“A CARAVAN OF 14,000 illegal immigrants is marching on America … gang members, known criminals, people from the Middle East, possibly even terrorists,” intoned an ad for Blackburn, flashing images of Hispanic men and warning of a flood of immigrants welcomed by her Democratic opponent, Bredesen.
“Phil Bredesen gave driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. Phil Bredesen opposes the Trump immigration ban,” declared another Blackburn ad. At one point, the ad displays an image of the Middle East and Africa.
The messages about the caravan were far-fetched given the fact that there is no evidence that the migrant caravan from Honduras contained any terrorists or members from the Middle East, as fact-checkers noted during the campaign. The driver’s license claim was also misleading: Tennessee briefly offered driver’s licenses to those without a Social Security number through a 2001 law signed by former Republican Gov. Don Sundquist. The law was later amended and repealed under Bredesen’s tenure as governor.
“It was Phil Bredesen who lured illegal immigrants to Tennessee,” other Blackburn advertisements on television and social media claimed.
“The invading force approaching our southern border is seeking to enter the country is wrong,” read a grammatically challenged paid advertisement on Facebook posted by the Blackburn campaign. Another promoted post from the Blackburn campaign decried the “illegal alien mob marching on our border.”
The ads, crude as they might have appeared, were distributed using an empirical approach to motivating Republican voters. The Blackburn campaign had turned to Koch’s i360 company to develop “a series of custom predictive models” to peel Republican voters away from Bredesen, according to a testimonial for potential clients.
Blackburn, a firebrand of the religious right who positioned herself as a steadfast ally to Trump and opponent of allowing Muslim refugees into the country, was clearly aligned with Koch priorities. Blackburn also supports judicial appointments favored by the business-friendly Federalist Society, corporate tax cuts, and scaling back most forms of environmental regulations, the criteria on which the Koch network has made its political endorsements historically.
Americans for Prosperity, the primary political advocacy arm of the Koch network, founded by Charles’s brother David, who passed away in August, and financed by Charles’s close-knit group of likeminded business owners, spent $5.6 million to support Blackburn’s Senate run through its nonprofit and Super PAC arm. That much is well reported and public. But the role of i360 in guiding the campaign’s anti-immigrant messages did not become clear until after the election.
THE COMPANY SEGMENTED Republican supporters for Bredesen, a Democrat, using its vast database of voter profiles. The data suggested immigration could be used as a wedge. “From there,” the testimonial notes, “i360 further segmented the universe using the Sanctuary Cities model which identified voters likely to oppose Sanctuary City policies like allowing illegal immigrants to get drivers’ licenses — a policy Bredesen favored while Governor.”
The i360 database was integrated into the Blackburn campaign’s media strategy. The company’s television advertising service, i360 Rabbit Ears, allows campaigns to target television programs and schedules favored by various behavioral profiles. I360 sorts television programs by over 40 voter profiles, including anti-immigrant sentiment. The company refers to this voting bloc as: “Individuals who have a high likelihood of believing that undocumented immigrants should be required to leave the United States.”
Blackburn’s media consultants, through a company called Smart Media Group, not only relied on i360 data to inform its advertisement buying strategy, but its data findings were merged into Blackburn’s canvassing effort as well. Field staff used the i360 voter profiles to determine which messages to use when knocking on doors of potential voters and could “educate voters about Marsha’s positions by showing them videos right from their iPads.”
The i360 team also developed “140 unique segments,” an advertising term that refers to unique demographic profiles, “against which the campaign delivered millions of impressions across several different platforms including Google and Facebook.” The individual segments allowed the Blackburn campaign to send customized messages to each voter profile over a variety of platforms, a dynamic that allowed the campaign to “tailor their messaging to ensure they were talking about the issues that mattered to each voter.”
In the end, i360 boasts that the Blackburn campaign used its technology to shape 3 million voter contact calls, 1.5 million doors knocked, $8.4 million spent on television ads, and 314,000 campaign text messages — advocacy that led to Blackburn’s commanding victory over Bredesen, who had been favored in the polls for the months leading up to the election.
Federal Election Commission records show that Blackburn’s campaign paid $188,366 to i360 for a variety of services — a small price for the significant campaign services the company provided.
FOUNDED IN THE aftermath of the 2012 election, in which Republican candidates favored by Koch fared poorly, i360 was envisioned as a way to revolutionize right-wing pressure campaigns and election efforts by incorporating the latest in data science. The company, based in the same Arlington, Virginia, office complex that houses other Koch groups, harvests troves of data to build profiles of every voter and potential voter in the country. Over the course of four years, the Koch network poured $50 million into i360 to develop its capabilities.
Journalist Sue Halperin noted that i360 acts as somewhat of a data broker, combining “commercial sources, such as shopping habits, credit status, homeownership, and religious affiliation, with voting histories, social media content, and any connections a voter might have had with advocacy groups or other campaigns” to build its voter database.
The i360 profiles offer a dizzying array of ways to segment voter preferences. The company allows GOP campaigns to target voters based on equity held in their home, likelihood that an individual has been personally affected by the heroin crisis, views on gay marriage, interest in dogs, levels of religious devotion, and even psychological profiles that measure an individual’s ego, based on previous purchases of monogrammed clothing.
Notably, according to CNET, i360 partners with D2 Media Sales, a joint venture with DirectTV and Dish, “‘to push TV ads to specific households that meet a candidate’s criteria ‘no matter which stations or programs they’re watching.'”
And the firm appears to still be a central cog in the Koch advocacy machine. Demeter Analytics Services, the holding company that owns i360, is listed as a subsidiary of the Seminar Network Chamber of Commerce, the nonprofit that serves as the central clearing house for the Koch political spending, in its most recent tax filing.
Media attention has swirled over the role of technology firms that have harnessed sophisticated targeting methods to influence campaigns. Billionaire hedge fund investor Robert Mercer, once a participant in the Koch network, split off and formed his own array of groups, including an effort to fund Cambridge Analytica’s 2016 targeting methods. Less scrutiny has been paid to i360’s role in shaping the political climate. Both firms vacuum up incredible amounts of data to develop personalized voter outreach methods, allowing campaigns to peer deeply into the hearts of voters and trigger emotional responses — a revolution in campaign strategy that gives well-heeled donors with access to the technology a tremendous advantage.
Over the last year, Charles Koch has stated his support for lofty, high-minded goals such as ending over-incarceration, scaling back America’s military empire, defending free speech, and providing legal status for undocumented youth. These laudable positions, however, have not translated to changing the behavior of his political advocacy apparatus.
The Intercept has previously reported on Koch’s financing of tough-on-crime advocacy and support for Congress’ most militaristic, surveillance-friendly lawmakers. That the Koch political operation also deliberately fine-tunes anti-immigrant messages further undermines Koch’s purported beliefs. Neither Blackburn nor Mark Holden, the Koch Industries executive who simultaneously helps manage the company’s political and philanthropic investments, responded to a request for comment.
At the same time, however, Koch’s sprawling political network’s in-house technology company has mined consumer data to motivate Republican voters with dehumanizing messages that depict immigrants as an invading army of criminals and potential terrorists.
Last year, when many GOP candidates across the country turned to vicious anti-immigrant advertisements to turn out voters in the midterm elections, some turned to i360, Koch’s state-of-the-art data analytics company. The company is one of the several appendages of the Koch political machine — one that includes a suite of voter outreach organization, lobbying, and campaign messaging tools.
Dozens of GOP candidates for state and federal office contracted with the Koch data company to identify voter segments and push out targeted ads on television and social media in 2018. And the company looks to be expanding its role in GOP campaigns going into 2020; more than a dozen federal candidates list the firm as a contractor.
The path to one Republican’s successful 2018 Senate run is detailed on i360’s website. Then-Tennessee Rep. Marsha Blackburn aired at least four different television advertisements and a wave of social media advertisements focused on immigration, often with false or inflammatory language. She ended up beating out Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, who had been leading in the polls for months.
“A CARAVAN OF 14,000 illegal immigrants is marching on America … gang members, known criminals, people from the Middle East, possibly even terrorists,” intoned an ad for Blackburn, flashing images of Hispanic men and warning of a flood of immigrants welcomed by her Democratic opponent, Bredesen.
“Phil Bredesen gave driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. Phil Bredesen opposes the Trump immigration ban,” declared another Blackburn ad. At one point, the ad displays an image of the Middle East and Africa.
The messages about the caravan were far-fetched given the fact that there is no evidence that the migrant caravan from Honduras contained any terrorists or members from the Middle East, as fact-checkers noted during the campaign. The driver’s license claim was also misleading: Tennessee briefly offered driver’s licenses to those without a Social Security number through a 2001 law signed by former Republican Gov. Don Sundquist. The law was later amended and repealed under Bredesen’s tenure as governor.
“It was Phil Bredesen who lured illegal immigrants to Tennessee,” other Blackburn advertisements on television and social media claimed.
“The invading force approaching our southern border is seeking to enter the country is wrong,” read a grammatically challenged paid advertisement on Facebook posted by the Blackburn campaign. Another promoted post from the Blackburn campaign decried the “illegal alien mob marching on our border.”
The ads, crude as they might have appeared, were distributed using an empirical approach to motivating Republican voters. The Blackburn campaign had turned to Koch’s i360 company to develop “a series of custom predictive models” to peel Republican voters away from Bredesen, according to a testimonial for potential clients.
Blackburn, a firebrand of the religious right who positioned herself as a steadfast ally to Trump and opponent of allowing Muslim refugees into the country, was clearly aligned with Koch priorities. Blackburn also supports judicial appointments favored by the business-friendly Federalist Society, corporate tax cuts, and scaling back most forms of environmental regulations, the criteria on which the Koch network has made its political endorsements historically.
Americans for Prosperity, the primary political advocacy arm of the Koch network, founded by Charles’s brother David, who passed away in August, and financed by Charles’s close-knit group of likeminded business owners, spent $5.6 million to support Blackburn’s Senate run through its nonprofit and Super PAC arm. That much is well reported and public. But the role of i360 in guiding the campaign’s anti-immigrant messages did not become clear until after the election.
THE COMPANY SEGMENTED Republican supporters for Bredesen, a Democrat, using its vast database of voter profiles. The data suggested immigration could be used as a wedge. “From there,” the testimonial notes, “i360 further segmented the universe using the Sanctuary Cities model which identified voters likely to oppose Sanctuary City policies like allowing illegal immigrants to get drivers’ licenses — a policy Bredesen favored while Governor.”
The i360 database was integrated into the Blackburn campaign’s media strategy. The company’s television advertising service, i360 Rabbit Ears, allows campaigns to target television programs and schedules favored by various behavioral profiles. I360 sorts television programs by over 40 voter profiles, including anti-immigrant sentiment. The company refers to this voting bloc as: “Individuals who have a high likelihood of believing that undocumented immigrants should be required to leave the United States.”
Blackburn’s media consultants, through a company called Smart Media Group, not only relied on i360 data to inform its advertisement buying strategy, but its data findings were merged into Blackburn’s canvassing effort as well. Field staff used the i360 voter profiles to determine which messages to use when knocking on doors of potential voters and could “educate voters about Marsha’s positions by showing them videos right from their iPads.”
The i360 team also developed “140 unique segments,” an advertising term that refers to unique demographic profiles, “against which the campaign delivered millions of impressions across several different platforms including Google and Facebook.” The individual segments allowed the Blackburn campaign to send customized messages to each voter profile over a variety of platforms, a dynamic that allowed the campaign to “tailor their messaging to ensure they were talking about the issues that mattered to each voter.”
In the end, i360 boasts that the Blackburn campaign used its technology to shape 3 million voter contact calls, 1.5 million doors knocked, $8.4 million spent on television ads, and 314,000 campaign text messages — advocacy that led to Blackburn’s commanding victory over Bredesen, who had been favored in the polls for the months leading up to the election.
Federal Election Commission records show that Blackburn’s campaign paid $188,366 to i360 for a variety of services — a small price for the significant campaign services the company provided.
FOUNDED IN THE aftermath of the 2012 election, in which Republican candidates favored by Koch fared poorly, i360 was envisioned as a way to revolutionize right-wing pressure campaigns and election efforts by incorporating the latest in data science. The company, based in the same Arlington, Virginia, office complex that houses other Koch groups, harvests troves of data to build profiles of every voter and potential voter in the country. Over the course of four years, the Koch network poured $50 million into i360 to develop its capabilities.
Journalist Sue Halperin noted that i360 acts as somewhat of a data broker, combining “commercial sources, such as shopping habits, credit status, homeownership, and religious affiliation, with voting histories, social media content, and any connections a voter might have had with advocacy groups or other campaigns” to build its voter database.
The i360 profiles offer a dizzying array of ways to segment voter preferences. The company allows GOP campaigns to target voters based on equity held in their home, likelihood that an individual has been personally affected by the heroin crisis, views on gay marriage, interest in dogs, levels of religious devotion, and even psychological profiles that measure an individual’s ego, based on previous purchases of monogrammed clothing.
Notably, according to CNET, i360 partners with D2 Media Sales, a joint venture with DirectTV and Dish, “‘to push TV ads to specific households that meet a candidate’s criteria ‘no matter which stations or programs they’re watching.'”
And the firm appears to still be a central cog in the Koch advocacy machine. Demeter Analytics Services, the holding company that owns i360, is listed as a subsidiary of the Seminar Network Chamber of Commerce, the nonprofit that serves as the central clearing house for the Koch political spending, in its most recent tax filing.
Media attention has swirled over the role of technology firms that have harnessed sophisticated targeting methods to influence campaigns. Billionaire hedge fund investor Robert Mercer, once a participant in the Koch network, split off and formed his own array of groups, including an effort to fund Cambridge Analytica’s 2016 targeting methods. Less scrutiny has been paid to i360’s role in shaping the political climate. Both firms vacuum up incredible amounts of data to develop personalized voter outreach methods, allowing campaigns to peer deeply into the hearts of voters and trigger emotional responses — a revolution in campaign strategy that gives well-heeled donors with access to the technology a tremendous advantage.
Over the last year, Charles Koch has stated his support for lofty, high-minded goals such as ending over-incarceration, scaling back America’s military empire, defending free speech, and providing legal status for undocumented youth. These laudable positions, however, have not translated to changing the behavior of his political advocacy apparatus.
The Intercept has previously reported on Koch’s financing of tough-on-crime advocacy and support for Congress’ most militaristic, surveillance-friendly lawmakers. That the Koch political operation also deliberately fine-tunes anti-immigrant messages further undermines Koch’s purported beliefs. Neither Blackburn nor Mark Holden, the Koch Industries executive who simultaneously helps manage the company’s political and philanthropic investments, responded to a request for comment.
Bonkers Fox News segment blames mass shootings on God-hating liberals who teach kids about evolution
September 1, 2019
By David Edwards - Raw Story
Tony Perkins, head of the conservative Family Research Council, on Sunday said that liberals were to blame for mass shootings because they have allegedly taken God out of the public square.
Perkins appeared on Fox & Friends where he was identified as a “former police officer.”
According to Perkins, the shooting near Odessa, Texas that left five dead was “just tragic.”
“At some point, we have to realize that we as a nation have a problem,” he continued. “And the problem is not the absence of laws, it’s an absence of morality.”
According to Perkins, the “absence of morality” had been caused by a “decades-long march through the institutions of America, driving religion and God from the public square.”
Perkins said he was “willing” to talk to liberals about ending the epidemic of mass shootings.
“I agree, praying alone is not enough,” Perkins opined. “It’s time to act. It’s not just about having a conversation about restricting those who should not have guns, criminals. But it’s also a discussion of a absence of a moral core in our culture today.”
Perkins said that teaching children about evolution is one cause of mass shootings.
“We’ve taught our kids they come about through chance through primordial slime and then we’re surprised they treat their fellow Americans like dirt!” he exclaimed. “It’s time we talk about the result of the left’s systematic march through our institutions, driving religious expression from the public square.”
Perkins complained that children are not being taught that they are “created in the image of God.”
“We’ve driving religion from our public life and we’re shocked that we no longer have morality and we no longer value human life,” he remarked.
Perkins appeared on Fox & Friends where he was identified as a “former police officer.”
According to Perkins, the shooting near Odessa, Texas that left five dead was “just tragic.”
“At some point, we have to realize that we as a nation have a problem,” he continued. “And the problem is not the absence of laws, it’s an absence of morality.”
According to Perkins, the “absence of morality” had been caused by a “decades-long march through the institutions of America, driving religion and God from the public square.”
Perkins said he was “willing” to talk to liberals about ending the epidemic of mass shootings.
“I agree, praying alone is not enough,” Perkins opined. “It’s time to act. It’s not just about having a conversation about restricting those who should not have guns, criminals. But it’s also a discussion of a absence of a moral core in our culture today.”
Perkins said that teaching children about evolution is one cause of mass shootings.
“We’ve taught our kids they come about through chance through primordial slime and then we’re surprised they treat their fellow Americans like dirt!” he exclaimed. “It’s time we talk about the result of the left’s systematic march through our institutions, driving religious expression from the public square.”
Perkins complained that children are not being taught that they are “created in the image of God.”
“We’ve driving religion from our public life and we’re shocked that we no longer have morality and we no longer value human life,” he remarked.
The Empty Piety of the American Press
Chris Hedges - truthdig
3/12/18
The press, giddy with its newfound sense of mission and purpose, is carrying out a moral crusade against Donald Trump. The airwaves and print have shed their traditional claims of “impartiality” and “objectivity.” They fulminate against Trump, charging—falsely—that he was elected because of Russian interference and calling him a liar, ignorant and incompetent. They give airtime to his bitterest critics and bizarre associates, such as Omarosa Manigault-Newman, a onetime star of “The Apprentice” and now a fired White House aide, and Stormy Daniels, the porn actress who says she had a sexual relationship with Trump. It is great entertainment. It is great for ratings. It is great for profits. But it is not moral, and it is not journalism.
The empty piety is a mask for self-interest. It is accompanied by the veneration of the establishment politicians, generals, intelligence chiefs, corporate heads and hired apologists who carried out the corporate coup d’état that created our system of “inverted totalitarianism.” The corporate structures that have a stranglehold on the country and have overseen deindustrialization and the evisceration of democratic institutions, plunging over half the country into chronic poverty and misery, are unassailable. They are portrayed as forces of progress. The criminals on Wall Street, including the heads of financial firms such as Goldman Sachs, are treated with reverence. Free trade is equated with freedom. Democratic politicians such as Barack Obama—who assaulted civil liberties, transferred trillions of dollars upward to reigning oligarchs, expanded the drone wars to include targeted assassinations of American citizens, and used the Espionage Act to silence investigative journalism—are hailed as champions of democracy. Deference is paid to democratic processes, liberties, electoral politics and rights enshrined in our Constitution, from due process to privacy, that no longer exist. It is a vast game of deception under the cover of a vacuous morality.
Those cast aside by corporate capitalism—Noam Chomsky calls them “unpeople”—are rendered invisible and reviled at the same time. The “experts” whose opinions are amplified on every issue, from economics to empire and politics, are drawn from corporate-funded think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, or are former military and intelligence officials or politicians who are responsible for the failure of our democracy and usually in the employ of corporations. Cable news also has the incestuous habit of interviewing its own news celebrities. Former CIA Director John Brennan, one of many former officials now on the airwaves, has morphed into a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC. Brennan was the architect of the disastrous attempt to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to arm “moderate” rebels in Syria, oversaw the huge expansion of our drone wars and instigated the canard that Russia stole the last U.S. presidential election. The most astute critics of empire, including Andrew Bacevich, are banished, as are critics of corporate power, including Ralph Nader and Chomsky. Those who decry the waste within the military, such as MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol, who has exposed the useless $13 billion anti-ballistic missile program, are unheard. Advocates of universal health care, such as Dr. Margaret Flowers, are locked out of national health care debates. There is a long list of the censored. The acceptable range of opinion is so narrow it is almost nonexistent.
Where is the flood of stories about families being evicted or losing their homes because of foreclosures and bank repossessions? Where are the stories about the banks and lending agencies that prey on recent college graduates burdened with crippling loans and unable to find work? Where are the stories about families going into bankruptcy because they cannot pay medical bills and the soaring premiums of for-profit health care? Where are the stories about the despair that drives middle-aged white men to suicide and millions of Americans into the deadly embrace of opioid addiction? Where are the stories on the cruelty of mass incarceration, the collapse of our court system and the reign of terror by police in marginal communities? Where are the investigative pieces on the fraud and the tax boycott that have been legalized for Wall Street, the poisoning of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel and animal agriculture industries? Why is climate change a forbidden subject, even as extreme weather devastates the nation and much of the rest of the planet? Why are the atrocities we commit or abet in Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen ignored? Why are the war crimes carried out by Israel against the Palestinians erased from news coverage?
The relentless pillorying of Trump is news-as-reality-television. Trump fills in for Richard Hatch of the old “Survivor” show. Trump’s imbecility, dishonesty, narcissism and incompetence are at once revolting and riveting. The press, ostensibly seeking a more polished brand to improve the public presentation of empire and corporate capitalism, is in fact further empowering the lunatics who will dominate the political landscape.
“America is ceasing to be a nation,” reporter and author Matt Taibbi writes in his book “Insane Clown President: Dispatches From the 2016 Circus,” “and turning into a giant television show.”
The stunts pulled during the last presidential election—Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul wearing goggles as he chain-sawed the tax code in half, Trump inviting women who accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault to a presidential debate and Ben Carson having to defend himself against allegations he lied when he wrote that as a child he attempted to stab another boy—will become staples of political campaigning. Voters, stripped of all meaningful power or control over their own destiny, used only as stage props in rallies and at party conventions, are permitted to vote only for a system they hate. And the winners are those who can give the best and most entertaining expression of that hatred. “Trump found the flaw in the American Death Star,” Taibbi writes. “It doesn’t know how to turn the cameras off, even when it’s filming its own demise.”
If the press sided with citizens and exposed the corporate systems of power that hold them captive, its advertising income would dwindle and it would be treated as an enemy of the state. Since corporations own the airwaves and declining city newspapers, this will not happen. Journalism will remain burlesque. The Public Broadcasting System, along with National Public Radio dependent on corporate money, including the Koch brothers, is as loath to take on the corporate establishment as its for-profit competitors. Dissenters and critics exist only on the margins of the internet, and the abolition of net neutrality will see them silenced.
CNN’s Jake Tapper, one of the high priests in the Trump Inquisition, was quite open about the narrowness of the assault. Being interviewed on “The Axe Files” podcast, hosted by former Obama White House aide David Axelrod, Tapper addressed charges that he opposes Trump’s policies by saying, “Whenever anybody says that to me, I say, you can’t find any evidence about what I think about his tax plan or repealing Obamacare or DACA or immigration or trade or any of these issues—terrorism or ISIS or Syria. I’m agnostic on that. I want to have full and interesting and provocative debates and call balls and strikes. But I’m not putting out there an immigration proposal.”
The corporate airwaves have a depressing habit of taking political hacks like Axelrod or the former Clinton strategist George Stephanopoulos and transforming them into journalists. Even Chelsea Clinton got a shot at journalism, being paid $600,000 a year to do fluff pieces for NBC. The fusion of news and celebrity, with figures like Tapper appearing on late night talk shows, fits with the reality-television presidency the corporate press empowers.
The press, like the Democratic Party, is playing a very dangerous game. It is banking, as Hillary Clinton did, on Trump being so repugnant he and those who support him will be replaced with Democrats. It relies on polls to guide its tactics and strategy, forgetting that every national poll offered assurance that Trump would lose in 2016. This gamble may work. But it may not. Policy issues accounted for only 10 percent of the media coverage during the 2016 presidential race. News reports concentrated on the latest polls, scandals, publicity stunts, campaign tactics and strategy as well as Trump’s bombastic remarks, according to a report issued by the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University. In short, there was little substance to the coverage. This will only get worse. The gossip, trivia and invective masquerading as news are not only irrelevant to most of the electorate but reinforce the image of liberal elites being out of touch with the pain and rage rippling across the nation.
Corporations that own the press look at news as a revenue stream. The news division competes against other revenue streams. If news does not produce comparable profits, its managers are replaced and its content is altered and distorted to draw in more viewers. Journalism is irrelevant. The disease of celebrity and greed, which warps and deforms the personality of Trump, warps and deforms celebrities in the media. They share Trump’s most distasteful characteristics. The consequences are ominous. An ignored, impoverished and frustrated underclass will turn to increasingly bizarre politicians and more outlandish con artists and purveyors of hate. Trump is only the beginning. The grotesque mutations to come, ones that will make Trump look reasonable, are being spawned in newsrooms across the country.
The empty piety is a mask for self-interest. It is accompanied by the veneration of the establishment politicians, generals, intelligence chiefs, corporate heads and hired apologists who carried out the corporate coup d’état that created our system of “inverted totalitarianism.” The corporate structures that have a stranglehold on the country and have overseen deindustrialization and the evisceration of democratic institutions, plunging over half the country into chronic poverty and misery, are unassailable. They are portrayed as forces of progress. The criminals on Wall Street, including the heads of financial firms such as Goldman Sachs, are treated with reverence. Free trade is equated with freedom. Democratic politicians such as Barack Obama—who assaulted civil liberties, transferred trillions of dollars upward to reigning oligarchs, expanded the drone wars to include targeted assassinations of American citizens, and used the Espionage Act to silence investigative journalism—are hailed as champions of democracy. Deference is paid to democratic processes, liberties, electoral politics and rights enshrined in our Constitution, from due process to privacy, that no longer exist. It is a vast game of deception under the cover of a vacuous morality.
Those cast aside by corporate capitalism—Noam Chomsky calls them “unpeople”—are rendered invisible and reviled at the same time. The “experts” whose opinions are amplified on every issue, from economics to empire and politics, are drawn from corporate-funded think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, or are former military and intelligence officials or politicians who are responsible for the failure of our democracy and usually in the employ of corporations. Cable news also has the incestuous habit of interviewing its own news celebrities. Former CIA Director John Brennan, one of many former officials now on the airwaves, has morphed into a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC. Brennan was the architect of the disastrous attempt to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to arm “moderate” rebels in Syria, oversaw the huge expansion of our drone wars and instigated the canard that Russia stole the last U.S. presidential election. The most astute critics of empire, including Andrew Bacevich, are banished, as are critics of corporate power, including Ralph Nader and Chomsky. Those who decry the waste within the military, such as MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol, who has exposed the useless $13 billion anti-ballistic missile program, are unheard. Advocates of universal health care, such as Dr. Margaret Flowers, are locked out of national health care debates. There is a long list of the censored. The acceptable range of opinion is so narrow it is almost nonexistent.
Where is the flood of stories about families being evicted or losing their homes because of foreclosures and bank repossessions? Where are the stories about the banks and lending agencies that prey on recent college graduates burdened with crippling loans and unable to find work? Where are the stories about families going into bankruptcy because they cannot pay medical bills and the soaring premiums of for-profit health care? Where are the stories about the despair that drives middle-aged white men to suicide and millions of Americans into the deadly embrace of opioid addiction? Where are the stories on the cruelty of mass incarceration, the collapse of our court system and the reign of terror by police in marginal communities? Where are the investigative pieces on the fraud and the tax boycott that have been legalized for Wall Street, the poisoning of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel and animal agriculture industries? Why is climate change a forbidden subject, even as extreme weather devastates the nation and much of the rest of the planet? Why are the atrocities we commit or abet in Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen ignored? Why are the war crimes carried out by Israel against the Palestinians erased from news coverage?
The relentless pillorying of Trump is news-as-reality-television. Trump fills in for Richard Hatch of the old “Survivor” show. Trump’s imbecility, dishonesty, narcissism and incompetence are at once revolting and riveting. The press, ostensibly seeking a more polished brand to improve the public presentation of empire and corporate capitalism, is in fact further empowering the lunatics who will dominate the political landscape.
“America is ceasing to be a nation,” reporter and author Matt Taibbi writes in his book “Insane Clown President: Dispatches From the 2016 Circus,” “and turning into a giant television show.”
The stunts pulled during the last presidential election—Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul wearing goggles as he chain-sawed the tax code in half, Trump inviting women who accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault to a presidential debate and Ben Carson having to defend himself against allegations he lied when he wrote that as a child he attempted to stab another boy—will become staples of political campaigning. Voters, stripped of all meaningful power or control over their own destiny, used only as stage props in rallies and at party conventions, are permitted to vote only for a system they hate. And the winners are those who can give the best and most entertaining expression of that hatred. “Trump found the flaw in the American Death Star,” Taibbi writes. “It doesn’t know how to turn the cameras off, even when it’s filming its own demise.”
If the press sided with citizens and exposed the corporate systems of power that hold them captive, its advertising income would dwindle and it would be treated as an enemy of the state. Since corporations own the airwaves and declining city newspapers, this will not happen. Journalism will remain burlesque. The Public Broadcasting System, along with National Public Radio dependent on corporate money, including the Koch brothers, is as loath to take on the corporate establishment as its for-profit competitors. Dissenters and critics exist only on the margins of the internet, and the abolition of net neutrality will see them silenced.
CNN’s Jake Tapper, one of the high priests in the Trump Inquisition, was quite open about the narrowness of the assault. Being interviewed on “The Axe Files” podcast, hosted by former Obama White House aide David Axelrod, Tapper addressed charges that he opposes Trump’s policies by saying, “Whenever anybody says that to me, I say, you can’t find any evidence about what I think about his tax plan or repealing Obamacare or DACA or immigration or trade or any of these issues—terrorism or ISIS or Syria. I’m agnostic on that. I want to have full and interesting and provocative debates and call balls and strikes. But I’m not putting out there an immigration proposal.”
The corporate airwaves have a depressing habit of taking political hacks like Axelrod or the former Clinton strategist George Stephanopoulos and transforming them into journalists. Even Chelsea Clinton got a shot at journalism, being paid $600,000 a year to do fluff pieces for NBC. The fusion of news and celebrity, with figures like Tapper appearing on late night talk shows, fits with the reality-television presidency the corporate press empowers.
The press, like the Democratic Party, is playing a very dangerous game. It is banking, as Hillary Clinton did, on Trump being so repugnant he and those who support him will be replaced with Democrats. It relies on polls to guide its tactics and strategy, forgetting that every national poll offered assurance that Trump would lose in 2016. This gamble may work. But it may not. Policy issues accounted for only 10 percent of the media coverage during the 2016 presidential race. News reports concentrated on the latest polls, scandals, publicity stunts, campaign tactics and strategy as well as Trump’s bombastic remarks, according to a report issued by the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University. In short, there was little substance to the coverage. This will only get worse. The gossip, trivia and invective masquerading as news are not only irrelevant to most of the electorate but reinforce the image of liberal elites being out of touch with the pain and rage rippling across the nation.
Corporations that own the press look at news as a revenue stream. The news division competes against other revenue streams. If news does not produce comparable profits, its managers are replaced and its content is altered and distorted to draw in more viewers. Journalism is irrelevant. The disease of celebrity and greed, which warps and deforms the personality of Trump, warps and deforms celebrities in the media. They share Trump’s most distasteful characteristics. The consequences are ominous. An ignored, impoverished and frustrated underclass will turn to increasingly bizarre politicians and more outlandish con artists and purveyors of hate. Trump is only the beginning. The grotesque mutations to come, ones that will make Trump look reasonable, are being spawned in newsrooms across the country.
worthless media funnies
|
|
https://teespring.com/fox-news-toilet-2#pid=369&cid=6513&sid=front
|
|
