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OpEdNews Op Eds    H2'ed 12/15/19

The Media Is down in the Gutter with Trump

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Russia-gate fell apart so decisively that Democratic impeachers now act like the Mueller Report -- a media obsession for three years -- never even happened.

Speaking of impeachment, mainstream media gatekeepers are so eager to see Trump removed from office that they're violating another cardinal rule of journalism: if it's news, print it. The identity of the CIA "whistleblower" (scare quotes because actual whistleblowers reveal truths that hurt their bosses) who triggered impeachment over Trump's menacing phone call to the president of Ukraine has been known in Washington, and elsewhere if you know where to look, for months.

Federal law prohibits the government from revealing his identity, and rightly so. But it has leaked. It's out. It's news. Nothing in the law or journalistic custom prevents a media organization from publishing it. News outlets felt no compulsion to similarly protect the identity of Chelsea Manning or Edward Snowden. So why aren't newspapers and broadcast networks talking about it?

"I'm not convinced his identity is important at this point, or at least important enough to put him at any risk, or to unmask someone who doesn't want to be identified," New York Times editor Dean Baquet said. So much for the people's right to know. Why should subscribers buy a newspaper that doesn't print the news?

There is a because-Trump change in media ethics that I welcome. What's suspect is the timing.

Trump is the first president to get called out for his lies right in the news section. Great! Imagine how many lives could have been saved by a headline like "Bush Repeats Debunked Falsehood That Iraq Has WMDs." A headline like "Slurring Sanders' Numerous Female Supporters as 'Bros,' Hillary Clinton Lies About Medicare-for-All" could have nominated and elected Bernie and saved many Americans from medical bankruptcy.

But all presidents lie. Why pick on Trump? His lies are (perhaps) more numerous. But they're no more bigger than his predecessors (see Iraq WMDs, above). Yet discussion of former presidents remains respectful and slavish as ever.

I say, give coverage of Obama and other ex-presidents the same tone and treatment as the current occupant of the White House gets from the news media:

"Wallowing in Corrupt Wall Street Cash, Obama Drops $11.75 Million on Gaudy Martha's Vineyard Mansion Estate"

"Ellen DeGeneres Sucks Up to Mass Murderer George W. Bush"

"Jimmy Carter, First Democratic President to Not Even Bother to Propose an Anti-Poverty Program, Dead at TK"

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Ted Rall, a political cartoonist, is the author of "The Anti-American Manifesto." He was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1963, raised in Kettering, Ohio and graduated from Fairmont West High School in 1981. His first cartoons were published (more...)
 

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