Media Coverage of Politics & Elections

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Trump’s return to power raises serious questions about the media’s credibility​

New YorkCNN —
Donald Trump’s return to power is a hinge point for the American media – in ways big, small, and to be determined. His defeat of Kamala Harris is raising questions about the media’s credibility, influence, and audience. Some of the questions might not be answerable for years.

But journalists are asking each other: What does this “red wave” election say about the information environment in the United States?

In the hours after Trump won reelection Tuesday, some of his loyalists asserted that his victory is a complete repudiation of the news media. For a time on Wednesday morning, The Federalist’s lead headline was not about Trump, it was about the “corporate media industrial complex” being “2024’s biggest loser.”

Legacy media “is officially dead,” The Daily Wire podcaster Matt Walsh wrote on X overnight. “Their ability to set the narrative has been destroyed. Trump declared war on the media in 2016. Tonight he vanquished them completely. They will never be relevant again.”

That’s wishful thinking on Walsh’s part — Tuesday’s marathon election coverage was a testament to the media’s relevance — but the point is that many Trump voters share his wish. They believe the national news media is a big part of what ails America. Not only do they distrust what they read, they often don’t read it in the first place. Can anything be done to change that?

A quote in a recent New York magazine column channeled that question. The quote, from an anonymous TV executive, was recirculated on social media Wednesday morning. “If half the country has decided that Trump is qualified to be president, that means they’re not reading any of this media, and we’ve lost this audience completely,” the executive said. “A Trump victory means mainstream media is dead in its current form. And the question is what does it look like after.”

“Dead” is gross hyperbole, of course, but the comment reflected real concerns that many members of the media have. A severe trust deficit exists between the Trump base and big institutional media outlets. In a text message, a Trump campaign aide suggested that the press should show more humility.

That raises another question: Do major networks and publications have enough columnists and commentators who reflect the Trump majority’s views?

“Maybe we have a point,” the aide remarked. “Maybe ‘misinformation’ is a lazy word that was never applied to press coverage of Biden’s health or the border. Maybe ‘offensive’ things aren’t offensive to most.”
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The function of "the media" is to transmit information from people who have it to people who do not. So long as the people who do not understand that they do not, it can work. They don't have to have Socratic humility but back when newspapers were the way people learned of the world, we could at least live in a shared reality.

The media cannot work in an environment in which people demand that they be told only what they want to hear. Media cannot work when it's acceptable to "do your own research" to draw on petabytes and petabytes of bullshit misinformation that exists only to indulge the stupidest conspiracy theories about how everything is the fault of a shadowy "them."
 
superrific said:
The function of "the media" is to transmit information from people who have it to people who do not. So long as the people who do not understand that they do not, it can work. They don't have to have Socratic humility but back when newspapers were the way people learned of the world, we could at least live in a shared reality.

The media cannot work in an environment in which people demand that they be told only what they want to hear. Media cannot work when it's acceptable to "do your own research" to draw on petabytes and petabytes of bullshit misinformation that exists only to indulge the stupidest conspiracy theories about how everything is the fault of a shadowy "them."
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To me, this is the single biggest factor that impacted the election. So many people are living in an alternate reality of perceived issues/ grievances, even if what they see around them everyday doesn't support that alternate reality that is created via social media.

As long as a majority of Americans are getting their "news" from Twitter, Instagram, Tik Tok, Facebook and Joe Rogan, reasonable discussion of issues (be it being more progressive, less progressive, populist,etc) is simply not possible. People voted on their own reality, their own created "truth."
 
bassydude77 said:
To me, this is the single biggest factor that impacted the election. So many people are living in an alternate reality of perceived issues/ grievances, even if what they see around them everyday doesn't support that alternate reality that is created via social media.
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Yes, and that was the most frustrating thing to me about this election. The media constantly reported on Americans' dissatisfaction with the economy. Much less did it report much less the reality that the economy is actually awesome.

Again, data does not lie. If so many Americans were struggling financially, the economic statistics that we see would be impossible.
 
superrific said:
Yes, and that was the most frustrating thing to me about this election. The media constantly reported on Americans' dissatisfaction with the economy. Much less did it report much less the reality that the economy is actually awesome.

Again, data does not lie. If so many Americans were struggling financially, the economic statistics that we see would be impossible.
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I guess the Fed raised interest rates historically fast and stifled job growth because they were misled by the media.
 
1moretimeagain said:
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It seems clear that Bezos has decided to take the Post in a different direction - a more conservative, Trump-supporting direction. The fact that they have a managing editor who was an editor of right-wing tabloid Murdoch papers in the UK shows what direction they're heading in at the WaPo. The fact that Trumpers are celebrating in the comments section is also telling. Again, the number of liberal or even centrist major media outlets continues to steadily decline, as more and more major media outlets are bought up by right-wing, Trumper plutocrats.
 
NCK9 said:

Trump’s return to power raises serious questions about the media’s credibility​

New YorkCNN —
Donald Trump’s return to power is a hinge point for the American media – in ways big, small, and to be determined. His defeat of Kamala Harris is raising questions about the media’s credibility, influence, and audience. Some of the questions might not be answerable for years.

But journalists are asking each other: What does this “red wave” election say about the information environment in the United States?

In the hours after Trump won reelection Tuesday, some of his loyalists asserted that his victory is a complete repudiation of the news media. For a time on Wednesday morning, The Federalist’s lead headline was not about Trump, it was about the “corporate media industrial complex” being “2024’s biggest loser.”

Legacy media “is officially dead,” The Daily Wire podcaster Matt Walsh wrote on X overnight. “Their ability to set the narrative has been destroyed. Trump declared war on the media in 2016. Tonight he vanquished them completely. They will never be relevant again.”

That’s wishful thinking on Walsh’s part — Tuesday’s marathon election coverage was a testament to the media’s relevance — but the point is that many Trump voters share his wish. They believe the national news media is a big part of what ails America. Not only do they distrust what they read, they often don’t read it in the first place. Can anything be done to change that?

A quote in a recent New York magazine column channeled that question. The quote, from an anonymous TV executive, was recirculated on social media Wednesday morning. “If half the country has decided that Trump is qualified to be president, that means they’re not reading any of this media, and we’ve lost this audience completely,” the executive said. “A Trump victory means mainstream media is dead in its current form. And the question is what does it look like after.”

“Dead” is gross hyperbole, of course, but the comment reflected real concerns that many members of the media have. A severe trust deficit exists between the Trump base and big institutional media outlets. In a text message, a Trump campaign aide suggested that the press should show more humility.

That raises another question: Do major networks and publications have enough columnists and commentators who reflect the Trump majority’s views?

“Maybe we have a point,” the aide remarked. “Maybe ‘misinformation’ is a lazy word that was never applied to press coverage of Biden’s health or the border. Maybe ‘offensive’ things aren’t offensive to most.”
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This is such a bullshit argument in the sense that, far from being opposed to Trump, the so-called "mainstream legacy media" actually seemed to bend over backwards to accommodate Trumpers in this campaign. The NY Times has become such a relentlessly bosiding paper that a popular twitter handle, "NY Times Pitchbot", was created to parody its catering to Trump and Trump voters. CNN has a right-winger as its managing editor who fired several Trump critic talking heads when they took over, and the WaPo has done an almost complete about-face and refused for the first time in decades to endorse the Democratic candidate for president. The liberal LA Times is now owned by a billionaire buddy of Elon and he is also moving that paper in a rightward direction. I'm not sure what more all these legacy media outlets can do to be "nice" to Trump, other than just become Fox or Newsmax-style open right-wing networks or papers or websites, which I suspect may be the goal.

And even MSNBC, supposedly the most liberal of the major news networks, had Joe and Mika personally go see Trump after the election in a kind of surrender ceremony. And with Trump's FCC Director already threatening networks that don't play ball with Trump, I don't think the "legacy" media's problem is not catering to Trumpers and Trump himself.
 
nycfan said:
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Honestly, this was likely her destiny all along, like Luke Skywalker becoming a Jedi. Being a talking head on a right-wing network is a lucrative gig if you can get it. I wouldn't be surprised if Mark Robinson ends up on OAN or some lower-tier right-wing network either.
 

"... People close to Trump have said in recent days he should dramatically change who gets access to the president, suggesting podcasters, internet personalities and media deemed more friendly to him could replace outlets like the major television networks, The New York Times and The Washington Post in the room’s front rows.

...Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, went a step further days later, saying during a podcast episode that the incoming president is considering “opening up the press room to a lot of these independent journalists.”

“If The New York Times has lied, they’ve been averse to everything, they’re functioning as the marketing arm to the Democrat Party … why not open it up to people who have larger viewerships, stronger followings?” he said.

When Leavitt was asked directly if she would bring “different voices into the press briefing room” and change rules for press briefings, she said, “We are looking at those options. And, ultimately, it’s about serving the American people and getting President Trump’s message across to them.” ..."
 
nycfan said:

"... People close to Trump have said in recent days he should dramatically change who gets access to the president, suggesting podcasters, internet personalities and media deemed more friendly to him could replace outlets like the major television networks, The New York Times and The Washington Post in the room’s front rows.

...Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, went a step further days later, saying during a podcast episode that the incoming president is considering “opening up the press room to a lot of these independent journalists.”

“If The New York Times has lied, they’ve been averse to everything, they’re functioning as the marketing arm to the Democrat Party … why not open it up to people who have larger viewerships, stronger followings?” he said.

When Leavitt was asked directly if she would bring “different voices into the press briefing room” and change rules for press briefings, she said, “We are looking at those options. And, ultimately, it’s about serving the American people and getting President Trump’s message across to them.” ..."
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And this is very likely why legacy news outlets like the NY Times and WaPo and MSNBC are now bending over backwards to please Trump and his minions. They know their status and influence and power are slipping in society as a whole and they are likely terrified that it will finally reach DC and the Beltway and they'll be replaced from their positions of status and power, such as getting the front row of WH Press Conferences as they have traditionally done. Never mind their obligation to fairly inform the people, what matters is their social status in DC and elsewhere.
 
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