Finally Friday Reads: Fight like our democracy Depends on It!

“Rump Rally in New York,” John Buss, @repeat1968

Bright Blessings on Memorial Day Weekend!

It’s a great time to acknowledge and understand what all the soldiers who died fighting for the U.S. were doing for our country and its form of government. I remember this weekend as the one we spent in Kansas and Missouri, picnicking in cemeteries in very small towns and trimming the peony bushes around the graves of my relatives who had died fighting for the Union and other wars. I also remember a recent history where a President of the United States said one of the most shameful things I’ve ever heard. “Trump: Americans Who Died in War Are ‘Losers’ and ‘Suckers.’ The president has repeatedly disparaged the intelligence of service members and asked that wounded veterans be kept out of military parades, multiple sources tell The Atlantic.  We’ve had some questionable reasons for some of the wars our soldiers have been asked to fight, but we should never question their commitment to serving our country.

When President Donald Trump canceled a visit to the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery, near Paris, in 2018, he blamed rain for the last-minute decision, saying that “the helicopter couldn’t fly” and that the Secret Service wouldn’t drive him there. Neither claim was true.

Trump rejected the idea of the visit because he feared his hair would become disheveled in the rain, and because he did not believe it important to honor American war dead, according to four people with firsthand knowledge of the discussion that day. In a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit, Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” In a separate conversation on the same trip, Trump referred to the more than 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood as “suckers” for getting killed.

Fifty years ago, I was graduating from high school.  I was worried about my cousin John, who served in-country during the Vietnam War.  He didn’t die in battle, but the drug habit he brought back with him took him early in his life. I was horrified by the entire Watergate Scandal and the resignation of Spiro Agnew, which by this time was winding down after extensive hearings and heading toward Nixon’s resignation on August 8, 1974.  You know where we stand today, I don’t stop being horrified for a minute.  The media were all over Nixon.  Where are they now?

This is from The Daily Beast about three weeks ago. “Irked Nancy Pelosi Suggests MSNBC Anchor Katy Tur Is a Trump ‘Apologist.’   “That may be your role, but it ain’t mine,” the former House Speaker said. ”  We probably missed it because none of us around here watch her.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) appeared to criticize MSNBC anchor Katy Tur during a discussion Monday about job losses during the Trump administration by suggesting she was an “apologist” for the former president for mentioning the COVID-19 pandemic—a charge which Tur promptly denied.

On Katy Tur Reports, the former House Speaker began by stating that Trump hasn’t shown that he “ever valued or did anything to support a democracy.”

“I have sympathy and respect for everybody who votes. I’m just glad people vote. I know some of them will always reject those of us who might look different to them in leadership or the rest, and that’s that,” Pelosi then said.

“But there are those who have real legitimate concerns about immigration, globalization, innovation, and what that means for their job and their family’s future, and we have to address those concerns, and Joe Biden is doing that. [He] created 9 million jobs in his term in office,” Pelosi went on.

It wasn’t immediately clear where Pelosi obtained that number, but according to FactCheck.org 14 million jobs were added from when Biden took office through last December.

Pelosi then claimed that Trump “has the worst record job loss of any president.” Moments later, Tur interjected: “There was a global pandemic.”

Pelosi, who appeared surprised by the comment, took a moment before continuing on. “He had the worst record of any president. We’ve had other concerns in our country. If you want to be an apologist for Donald Trump, that may be your role, but it ain’t mine.”

Tur rejected that depiction.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot since I read BB’s Wednesday post about the absolute ignorance of the economy and other things shown by 3/5 of likely voters in a Harris poll.  The Guardian article she cited showed these same people think the “U.S. economy is in a recession, and the majority blame the Biden Administration.” I’d like to ask them if the country is in such bad shape, why this?  “Nearly 44 million Americans to travel for Memorial Day weekend. AAA forecasts a near-record travel weekend over the Memorial Day holiday period that is above pre-pandemic numbers.”  This is from Fox Weather who appears to not get their news from Fox News. This would not happen if prices were too high, people were out of work, gas prices were outrageous, and everyone squeezed every penny just to get by. You can trust me on this; I’m an economist with a terminal degree and a bad case of teaching students to recognize what’s happening in the economy.

How can people be so stupid, and why aren’t they hearing about reality from somewhere?  Could it be someone like Katy Tur?  Could it be Fox News?  Could it be Russian Trolls on X? I doubt it’s the New York Times because these folks can’t be actually reading newspapers, even those with a bad case of both-siderisms.

This is from The Daily Beast today. Read and wonder.  “Media Matters Lays Off a Dozen Staffers Amid Elon Musk Lawsuit. The liberal media watchdog let go of a number of veteran researchers and writers on Thursday as it faces a number of legal threats from Musk and Republicans.”  Justin Baragona has the lede. Do you know what your state’s attorney general is up to?

Months after edgelord billionaire Elon Musk launched a “thermonuclear lawsuit” against Media Matters for America, the liberal media watchdog announced that it was laying off a dozen staffers on Thursday to remain “sustainable” amid a “legal assault on multiple fronts.”

Besides Musk’s defamation complaint, which was launched by the X owner in November after Media Matters reported his social media site placed ads next to pro-Nazi content, the outlet has also been hit with lawsuits and probes from Republican attorneys general.

“We’re confronting a legal assault on multiple fronts and given how rapidly the media landscape is shifting, we need to be extremely intentional about how we allocate resources in order to stay effective,” Media Matters president Angelo Carusone said in a statement.

“Nobody does what Media Matters does,” he added. “So, we’re taking this action now to ensure that we are sustainable, sturdy and successful for whatever lies ahead.”

Laid-off staffers, some of whom have been at the left-leaning nonprofit for years, took to social media on Thursday morning to announce they were let go. Some even pointed the finger directly at Musk for causing them to lose their jobs.

“Bad News: I’ve been laid off from @mmfa, along with a dozen colleagues,” Kat Abughazaleh, who was recently featured in The New Republic’s list of political influencers to watch in 2024, tweeted. “There’s a reason far-right billionaires attack Media Matters with armies of lawyers: They know how effective our work is, and it terrifies them (him).”

Other researchers and writers who were laid off on Thursday included Brendan Karet, Bobby Lewis, Alex Paterson, Ethan Collier and Carly Evans, among others. “[J]ournalism milestone achieved (got laid off,” Lewis snarked online after he was let go.

The layoffs at Media Matters come as digital and legacy media outlets across the country are facing sweeping cuts and even extinction amid dwindling advertising revenues and dropping online traffic. In just the last few months, the Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Business Insider, Vice Media, CBS News and others have slashed thousands of jobs while outlets like The Messenger have shuttered completely.

Meanwhile… at the Manhattan Criminal Court building. Birdbrain Nikki Haley makes the pilgrimage.” John Buss, @repeat1968

The Pew Research Center is reporting these new findings.  “Americans have mixed views about how the news media cover Biden’s, Trump’s ages.”

It’s no surprise, then, that the ages of the candidates have been a major topic of conversation in news coverage of the 2024 presidential election. A new Pew Research Center survey finds that Americans have mixed feelings about the way news organizations are handling the issue for each candidate, with views sharply divided by political party.

Overall, similar shares of U.S. adults believe news organizations are giving too much attention (32%) or too little attention (29%) to Biden’s age. An additional 38% think the media cover Biden’s age about the right amount.

By comparison, Americans are less likely to say the news media are overemphasizing Trump’s age (19%) and more likely to think that news organizations give it about the right amount of attention (49%).

The same survey found that a larger share of American voters express confidence that Trump has the physical and mental fitness needed to be president than say the same about Biden.

Americans’ opinions on news coverage are split along party lines. Each party’s supporters tend to say that the opposing candidate’s age is getting too little attention.

So, should their ages be getting this much focus?  What about both physical and mental fitness?  How does the media decide what to cover on these two candidates? This is a fascinating article from AlJazeera from last month.  This Opinion article is by Waleed Salem.  “Trump and the US media’s conflict of interest. “This election year, each story about Donald Trump must first pass the Lonely Planet test.”

On the last day of the Republican National Convention in July 2016, which nominated Donald Trump as the GOP’s candidate for the presidential election, CNN’s Anderson Cooper led a panel of pundits commenting on the event. Among them was cotton-haired Jeffrey Lord, who was eager to report on a call he had had with Trump.

“He has a message for you, Anderson, that he is not pleased. He feels we are not accurately representing this convention,” Lord said on air. “He [asked] me to say that your ratings, our ratings at CNN, are up here because of his presence in the convention,” he added.

“There is no doubt about Donald Trump’s impact on ratings,” Cooper responded, amiably.

Trump’s assertion was not inaccurate. The year he first ran for election was the most profitable in CNN’s history. Interest in the new, unorthodox candidate – whether it was fascination, alarm, or glee – boosted profits for media outlets left and right. Online subscriptions soared for The New York Times and The Washington Post. Fox News’s ratings reached new highs.

The boost continued throughout the Trump presidency but wore off as soon as he left office.

The real estate mogul has now returned to the centre of American politics as the presumptive nominee for the Republican Party after Nikki Hailey dropped out of the race.

The possibility of another Trump term has led to a bout of public acknowledgements among media professionals that while the former president threatens democracy with his incessant falsehoods and norm-busting practices, he is actually good for business.

“In crude material terms,” The New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg wrote in January, “Donald Trump’s presidency benefited the media, with subscriptions, ratings and clicks all soaring.”

Acknowledgement is important, but stopping at that without changing conduct seems like a shrug of resignation, a self-serving free pass for coverage and business as usual to continue. Instead of soul-searching, we are getting disclaimers.

The words that even the thoughtful voices seem reluctant to use are “conflict of interest”. It is clear that media outlets stand to benefit from their coverage of Trump. That is bad for journalism and, by extension, for democracy.

It’s interesting to read how the world’s media has been covering the Trump Trials and think about what we see and read in ours.  This is from the BBC. “What the world’s media make of Trump going on trial.” BBC is basically monitoring the coverage worldwide.  Here are a few examples.

‘SleepyDon’ trial presents US with unprecedented problems – China

By Tom Lam, BBC Monitoring China specialist

Chinese media have covered Mr Trump’s trial but it hasn’t featured as prominently on the news agenda as one might expect. Still, it offered the media another opportunity to show what’s seen as the chaos and polarisation of US politics.

English-language reporting focused on facts of the case. State news agency Xinhua’s English-language edition highlighted that Donald Trump was the first former president to stand a criminal trial. It also quoted the accused as describing the trial as “political persecution” and saying the country was “failing”. China Daily, the state-run English-language newspaper, focused on jury selection, during which more than 50 of the 96 first potential jurors were excused after saying that they could not be fair.

Domestic-facing state-affiliated outlet The Paper provided infographics and timelines of the trial, and cited US surveys as showing polarised views on it among US voters. It also zoomed in on conflicting reports about the possible impact on the general election in November.

State-owned China News Service (CNS) talked about “unprecedented problems” facing the US judicial system if Mr Trump were to win in November but also be convicted.

Nationalist daily Global Times cited high interest rates, inflation and the crisis in the Middle East as showcasing Mr Trump’s notion that the world had spun out of control under the Biden administration.

But the state-run tabloid did not spare the Republican either. It provided a colourful report on 16 April focusing on reports that he had fallen asleep in court, posting a meme ridiculing him as “#SleepyDon”.

It seems Congressional Republicans are also spouting Chinese Propaganda.  Here’s from the monitor of Latin America.

‘Mesmerised and alarmed’ – Latin America

By Pascal Fletcher, BBC Monitoring Latin America specialist, Miami

From Mexico and Cuba to Argentina, media coverage reflected the keen interest with which political events in the US are followed south of the border. Multiple stories on the Trump trial emphasised its “historical” nature.

Most of the reports made a point of publishing striking photos of a stern-looking Trump seated in what outlets highlighted was the “accused’s bench” – this was likely to be viewed as righteous justice by many of his critics in Latin America.

The mere possibility of another Trump presidency is both mesmerising and potentially alarming for many Latin American leaders, governments and societies that vividly recall his scathing anti-migrant comments and what they saw as barely-concealed scorn for struggling developing countries during his previous term in the White House.

Argentina-based Latin American news website Infobae published an extensive story on the “Colombian judge that will have the last word in the trial against Donald Trump”, noting that Judge Juan Merchan had “not flinched in decreeing a gag order against Trump”.

Some of the Latin American reports did slip into commentary, such as Mexican left-wing daily La Jornada which said that Mr Trump was “accused not of being a saviour and defender of his country as he says, but of trying to cover up payments to a porn star which sought to silence an illicit sexual encounter”.

Top Brazilian daily Folha de S. Paulo adopted a clearly anti-Trump position in a 16 April editorial entitled “Trump and the unthinkable” which posed questions about a scenario in which he was jailed and then pardoned himself as president. It urged American voters to avert that scenario at the ballot box.

You can also read the monitors’ findings from Russia and various European countries.

So, my best intentions were to write about the severe issues in the last Supreme Court-issued Decision where we found out that the 6 Republican appointees are not even serious about hiding their political agenda or abusing their positions, but you know me and my tight relationship with rabbit-holes.

I hope you all have a peaceful long weekend. But after that, fight like our democracy depends on it!  Respect and Remember those who died doing just that.

What’s on your reading and blogging list today?