The media and Trump’s mind

they do want him to win and frankly legacy media is a farce now with this election

If my ear was hit with an AR-15 bullett it wouldn't look like that.

The media is complicit. Dump brings ratings and clicks, which is money. That’s all they care about.

[quote] If my ear was hit with an AR-15 bullett it wouldn't look like that.

Of course not. You’re not the Messiah.

Well -- either it's true or it isn't, that Trump's brain is shitting the bed for real. If it's true, there's no hiding it in a 1:1 debate against Kamala Harris of all people. She is nearly 20 years younger than Trump, and she has decades of experience as a prosecutor and state AG etc. Next Tuesday night's debate should be illuminating. The last one, all the focus was on Biden showing up all elderly and weak.. any question of Trump's cognitive capacity flew under the radar.

This time will be different... let's hope.

The argument that all journalists care about is ratings and clicks is lazy. There are a lot easier ways to make a living, and journalism is not a particularly profitable industry. Most journalists are motivated by a desire to investigate, explain and influence.. And most of them are in the reality-based community, which means they are mostly liberals.

The reluctance to cover Trump’s mental state comes in part from the elusiveness of the topic. It’s at least apparently a subjective assessment and they are afraid of facing inevitable partisan blowback for taking a stand on such shaky ground . They need some guts.

Molly Jong Fast, Lawrence O Donnell, Chris Hayes, Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post, Dana Milbank are sme of the others who have been highly, openly critical of their colleagues and Media in general for the way they have not covered Trump. Barnicle just got on the bandwagon.

Really? They sure didn't mind going after Biden's mental acuity. Trump rambles incoherently time after time with nary a peep.

R8 Lawrence O Donnell did a great piece on that. It's on You Tube.

[quote]Most journalists are motivated by a desire to investigate, explain and influence.

I was journalism major and this is utter horseshit. It's all about the ratings and sales for most outlets now. I refused to let an article go to press because I caught an error in a quote, but was told that nobody notices any more or bothers to check if they do. I struck the article any way and decided that if I write, I will do it through Substack, my own site or a reliable outlet like F.A.I.R.

*anyway

Biden’s mental acuity was a question of age-related dementia which is more common than Trump’s mix of personality disorders and age-related decline. Nonetheless, a lot of the media was reluctant to tackle the subject until the debate made the deterioration apparent to all. Then the floodgates opened

Trump’s problems are a mix of old and new. He’s always been somewhat nuts, so the effects of dementia are not as clear-cut.

[quote] I refused to let an article go to press because I caught an error in a quote

What do you mean? Someone was quoted incorrectly or someone said something that was incorrect?

[quote] I was journalism major and this is utter horseshit.

Did you want to go into journalism for the money?

In the 1990's I worked for the non-profit Society of Professional Journalists, and I must say that the climate is much different now.....those folks were all out to be Woodward & Bernstein and get the facts out to the folks and find out why things were happening.....most of them.

They could drink anyone under the table and while you were down there, they'd fuck you.

It was great!

Awesome work OP. This subject has only been covered 3,469 times on Datalounge. thank god you brought it up again. This thread is YOUR mona lisa good work! I hope you printed out a copy to send to your mom.

Thanks, r16. And thank YOU for your valuable contribution.

Right R12. The media all but ignores Trump's obvious mental deficiencies because, geee, it's so hard to explain? And they ignore Trump's flip-flopping on abortion for what reason? Not sure why you're defending this media bias, but go ahead and enjoy yourself.

yeah the media is so pro trump. are you fucking nuts?

It’s not that it’s “hard to explain.” It’s that the explanation (he’s insane) is subjective to most people. Especially considering that this insane person has already served one term as President. You can line up all the psychological experts you want to support you, and there will be plenty of others who will say you are wrong..

They haven’t ignored his flip-flops on abortion, though they certainly have not given it the attention it deserves. Probably because Trump lies and flip-flops ALL THE TIME. I think the media have a reflexive bias against “old news.” Unless it bleeds.

Kamala doesn't flip flop? Oh no precious angel evolves

sorry. she pivots.

It’s one thing to change a policy on a technical issue occasionally, either because of new information, a change of circumstances or because you now represent a different constituency. It’s another to frequently chance you position from day to day on moral questions, or in response to campaign contributions from Elon Musk or the crypto industry.

yeah sure.

[quote]Trump’s problems are a mix of old and new. He’s always been somewhat nuts, so the effects of dementia are not as clear-cut.

I think this is true and cuts close to home re why the media seem uncertain as to how to cover him. He's just always been so incoherent, temperamental, politically incorrect to the point of cruel, and dishonest, there isn't anything new to report. If they jumped up to report every lie and delusion he spouted, there'd be a hundred new articles a day about it.

When Harris missteps or misspeaks, it's a lot more glaring given her intellect and sanity, so they jump on it.

A clear cut answer form an award winning author (link to tiktok, but he’s an oldster)

^Why does he point to his head every time he says the word “bonkers?”

Another lazy “they just care about profit” argument from someone making a living competing with mainstream media. (Except apparently, The Atlantic.)

Unanswered—how does the decision not to talk about Trump’s mental state increase the media’s profit? I guess the argument is that they want Trump to win because his reign of terror will generate more interest in the news and therefore they can charge more for ads. If some reporters get indicted or threatened with violence or if Disney or Comcast get their business plans blocked by the Justice Department or the Federal Trade Commission when Trump wants to punish criticism, that’s worth it for the ratings.

If they want Trump to win so much, why are they not shilling for him like Fox News? So that they walk right up to the edge of supporting Trump without giving away the game to their liberal readers who are too stupid to notice what they are doing?

Why do they happily publish reports about chaos in Trump’s campaign, the stupid things JD Vance has said, Trump’s criminal trials, Russia Russia Russia? Why do we know so much about Project 2025. Why do they call his claims of election fraud a lie?

No. There is another reason they don’t cover his mental state when they do cover other stories. It’s not “all about profits.”

The media are afraid of the right wing attack dogs who are well-organized and heavily funded by all the right wing think tanks which have hundreds of millions of dollars flowing through them from Koch, the Mercers, et al.

This has been going on since the Iraq war at least. A criticism of Trump, even if polite and well-reasoned, is inundated with hate mail and threats of canceled subscriptions because the MAGA-lemmings on their e-mail lists are directed to target new ‘libtards’ every day. They live for this blood sport, and it has worn the media down over the years and pushed the center far to the right. Which has been the goal all along.

There is no comparable pressure from the left that is as organized or well-funded. Just human decency and fairness, which seems to go out the window for many when Republican dollars are waved before their eyes.

[quote] I guess the argument is that they want Trump to win because his reign of terror will generate more interest in the news and therefore they can charge more for ads.

Ding Ding Ding! they had a FILED day during his term, bunky

Again, it simply a fantasy to say that the media is afraid to criticize Trump at all.

There is something unique about their reluctance to take on his mental capacity.

[quote] Ding Ding Ding! they had a FILED day during his term, bunky

Your argument does not hold up to scrutiny. They sharply criticize Trump on many other grounds.

[quote]Why do they happily publish reports about chaos in Trump’s campaign, the stupid things JD Vance has said

like where? the sin is in the framing. "JD Vance has an interesting mishap" is NOT pointing out what heinous things he does on the campaign "trump claims he did nothing wrong going to arlington" implies that what he did was right somehow, all a mistake, not craven hucksterism.

[quote]There is something unique about their reluctance to take on his mental capacity.

you make it sound mysterious. it isn't. they get money from letting it bleed like it does

[quote]They sharply criticize Trump on many other grounds.

legacy media does NOT

[quote] legacy media does NOT

You’re as delusional as he is.

legacy media does not attack him and his mental deficiencies like they should. they, like in 2016, weigh merely the odds, not the stakes.

oof, so glad I just blocked that cunt

Not just blocking me in a huff, but announcing that you’re blocking me in a huff.

I am duly chastened.

[quote]Molly Jong Fast, Lawrence O Donnell, Chris Hayes, Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post, Dana Milbank are sme of the others who have been highly, openly critical of their colleagues and Media in general for the way they have not covered Trump.

Also Joy Reid. She's been calling out the media for a long time now about the double standard where it comes to Trump and Biden.

I'm a journalism professor (go ahead and mock me), and I get frustrated by today's news media, but I also get frustrated by some of the overly simplistic criticisms of the news media.

The pressure for clicks and ratings is happening because journalism is dying and profit margins are dropping. But that pressure is coming from the greedy corporate and hedge-fund owners and has very little to do with the journalists themselves. Most journalists' salaries are pathetically low.

R28 is correct that journalists have been criticized so heavily for supposedly having a "liberal bias" that some go out of their way to "tell both sides," even when one side is full of shit. Some journalists are afraid they'll be physically attacked and harassed if they're too critical of Republicans. As a result, smart young people who want to "speak truth to power" no longer have much interest in journalism. My journalism classes are still full, and I would estimate that at least 80% of the students are politically liberal. They're not Trump fans. But most of them have no interest in covering politics or doing any kind of investigating. They just want to cover sports and entertainment. I try to get them interested in politics and investigative reporting, but I often get ripped in course evaluations for doing it.

Half of this thread is troll posting.

[quote] But that pressure is coming from the greedy corporate and hedge-fund owners and has very little to do with the journalists themselves. Most journalists' salaries are pathetically low.

Absolutely, the buck stops with those Scoundrels

[quote] Some journalists are afraid they'll be physically attacked and harassed if they're too critical of Republicans

Isn’t that a crime though? That’s terrible

R6 - journalists and *the media* really are two different things today, the latter being the corporate arm. Although really I don’t see these alleged journalists asking Dump simple questions like clarifying how his ear regrew. Instead I watched them question Walz’ trustworthiness when he said IVF instead of IUI - which is objectively still a type of reproductive treatment under the IVF banner. Shit like this makes me question if such journalists have a genuine interest in journalism, or of instead feeding the clicks and ratings machines. The focus seems to be on manufactured outrage and salaciousness. It’s not lazy coming to that conclusion when that conclusion seems blatantly obvious.

My espresso machine asked to be descaled. I obliged.

I'm getting that impression. what a journalist says on Tikotk and what they publish in the NYT are sometimes very different takes

" Sanewashing." Writer skewers the New York Times.

From r47:

[quote] To combat this, we need a paradigm shift in political reporting. Instead of contorting themselves to find rationality in incoherence, journalists should simply present politicians’ words and actions plainly, complete with fact-checks. This might mean rethinking traditional notions of “objectivity” that often lead to false equivalencies and misrepresentation.

I agree that the press has been doing a bad job, but if all you want is stenographers and fact-checkers, why hire reporters at all?

The problem is that reporters are trained to make, and pride themselves on making, sense of events. They hear Trump make a speech and ask, “What is the news here? What does the reader need to learn?” Trump has always spoken in a rambling, free-associating style so that is not, to a reporter, the story. They also trade on access, and they fear if they paint a more accurate picture of Trump they will lose access to campaign insiders. Journalists just don’t have the tools to cover a candidate of this incompetence. They can either participate in the cover-up or tell the truth and become cut off from their sources.

"They can either participate in the cover-up or tell the truth and become cut off from their sources."

Cut off from their sources? Everything that comes out of Trump's mouth or any of his acolyte's pie holes, (Vance, Conway, et al) is nothing but a bunch of regurgitated bullshit and lies, R48.

If by chance you're a reporter, R48, you obviously flunked Journalism 101 if you can't tell the damn difference between valid information and being spoon fed horseshit by unreliable "sources."

Is it any wonder the NY TImes prints the rubbish it does print?

Their sources are campaign insiders. Sources are what make a reporter valuable. Anyone can record what Trump says. They view their job as finding out what is going on behind the scenes.

Yeah, a worthless source is worthless

True investigative journalism is rare these days because it costs money to send people out into the field to investigate for weeks, months, maybe even years. ProPublica still does this very well. I'm not rich but I do send a few clams their way every now and again. And we're living in short attention span theatre--people don't have the patience to sit and read some 10 page story about corporations cutting corners and dumping toxic waste. They'd rather just read a headline that confirms their own ideas. I'm not sure if we've gone full Idiocracy yet, but we're definitely on the path.

I saw the clip of him "rambling incoherently" at the Economic Club of New York. And I find it mind boggling that anyone can sit there listening to him, let alone think he's worthy of reelection as POTUS. I would walk out.

Just a reminder...this man as POTUS incited a mob to overturn the election. He violated his oath to defend and protect the constitution of the United States.

Shout that from the rooftops!

[quote] Yeah, a worthless source is worthless

Ridiculous. If a reporter is covering a campaign, campaign insiders are not “worthless.”

Example:

[quote] While the two camps’ preparations for the big night in Philadelphia could not be more different, both sides view the debate the same way, according to interviews with nearly two dozen people close to the candidates, many of whom insisted on anonymity to discuss the private preparations. The Harris and Trump teams see it as a crucial moment to define Ms. Harris for millions of swing voters who know what they think about Mr. Trump but are still curious about her.

[quote]Bringing out Mr. Trump’s most self-destructive instincts is a priority for Ms. Harris, as is coming across as coolheaded and presidential.

[quote] And I find it mind boggling that anyone can sit there listening to him

We don't care, we want our precious tax cuts.

New York Times preparing its adjectives for Trump after the debate: "clear, presidential, stately, innovative."

NYT adjectives for Harris: "unfocused, whiny, rude, unprepared."

Trump was very presidential!

Interesting choice in photos, r55.

blocked

Many “journalists” in legacy media are first and foremost careerists—and not all that smart. Their safe place is both-siding any issue and seldom asking a decent follow-up question.

Support local media!

Cry more, Defuckto.

[quote]...this man as POTUS incited a mob to overturn the election. He violated his oath to defend and protect the constitution of the United States.

Sentences Kamala would so obviously do very well to pronounce at the debate. Coolly and incisively, so the grotesque day is re-conjured for the world to consider.

Then when he blathers another offensive word-salad in deflection - she slowly coolly repeats: "Mr Trump - you violated your oath to defend and protect the constitution..."

This is a vital ace it would be remiss not to play.

I agree.

Insanity

Good thing they post this on Social Media, R66, because we'd never read about it in the NYT.

Fattie is already crying that he’s cheating because he knows he can’t win otherwise.

I trust the people preparing to defend Democracy are keeping a running doc with every last one of his social media posts with all of the details for the court cases later.

What a cunt!