CNN’s Slavish Service to Trump I had to do a double-take when I saw this news item. First came the headline, “Pence won’t let public health officials appear on CNN unless Trump’s disinfo briefings run in full”. I thought, this is horrible: the administration is holding Fauci and Birx hostage to force CNN to cover not only them but also Trump in his daily blatherings. But no, it was exactly the other way around. Pence was keeping them from being interviewed on CNN unless the network also covered their regular briefings. What CNN has been doing instead is broadcasting the Trump portion and then cutting away when people who actually have something to say step forward. Bad enough that Trump has a high profile daily outlet for his ravings; it’s
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CNN’s Slavish Service to Trump
I had to do a double-take when I saw this news item. First came the headline, “Pence won’t let public health officials appear on CNN unless Trump’s disinfo briefings run in full”. I thought, this is horrible: the administration is holding Fauci and Birx hostage to force CNN to cover not only them but also Trump in his daily blatherings. But no, it was exactly the other way around. Pence was keeping them from being interviewed on CNN unless the network also covered their regular briefings. What CNN has been doing instead is broadcasting the Trump portion and then cutting away when people who actually have something to say step forward.
Bad enough that Trump has a high profile daily outlet for his ravings; it’s incredible the media would treat this as news and CDC updates as disposable filler. I guess they think they are doing the guy a favor by giving him free media so he doesn’t have to buy as much.
This has been a peeve of mine for some time; see here and here. We expect Fox to offer itself as a mouthpiece for Trump, but why should the self-designated “enlightened” wing of journalism be just as craven? Yes, the owners care more about ratings than the political consequences of their coverage, but why do working journalists go along without a peep? What would it take to get through to them?