Pot: Kettle. In Friday’s Washington Post, media columnist Margaret Sullivan told those with “news fatigue” that “this is no time to tune out,” yet Sullivan soon displayed how clueless journalists are about their own leftward bias which leads so many to distrust the media and want to tune out.
Presuming President-elect Trump’s personnel choices are “upsetting,” she cited how Trump “has nominated for national security adviser a general who pushes conspiracy theories, and a climate change denier to head the EPA.”
Seemingly oblivious to her skewed descriptions which match those of liberal Trump critics, her next sentence: “And, separate from the news itself, many people don’t trust the media to be an impartial messenger.”
I can’t imagine why.
Sullivan, formerly the public editor for the New York Times, saw as a “positive sign” that the “New York Times and the Washington Post say subscriptions have soared since the election.”
As for the media’s performance in the campaign, Sullivan maintained her colleagues were not adequately liberal. Citing a Harvard study, Sullivan approvingly relayed how “it makes a powerful case that the media often traffficked in false equivalencies between the two major candidates and focused too little on substance.”
An excerpt from Sullivan’s December 9 column, “Sick of the news? This is no time to tune out,” in the Washington Post’s “Style” section:
Since the election of Donald Trump one month ago, and the rush of news that has followed, I’ve heard many people say they need to take a break from what’s happening day-to-day.
Call it news fatigue. They don’t want to hear the latest upsetting developments: For example, the president-elect has nominated for national security adviser a general who pushes conspiracy theories, and a climate change denier to head the EPA. And, separate from the news itself, many people don’t trust the media to be an impartial messenger....
There are positive signs that some Americans are tuning in. The New York Times and The Washington Post say subscriptions have soared since the election. The investigative outfit ProPublica, as well as other journalism nonprofit groups, report a flood of donations....
None of this is to suggest that the mainstream media, the “legacy press,” is faultless. It certainly isn’t, as is made abundantly clear in a new report from Harvard’s Shorenstein Center, “How the Press Failed the Voters.” Examining campaign coverage by major newspapers and television networks, it makes a powerful case that the media often traffficked in false equivalencies between the two major candidates and focused too little on substance....
In a column the day before the election, Sullivan put together a list of the thirteen “best” media moments over the campaign. Ten of the thirteen – surprise, surprise – were stories meant to undermine Donald Trump. My NewsBusters post: “Washington Post’s ‘Best’ Campaign Media Moments: Hits on Trump”
(The Hollywood Left is also agitated over Scott Pruitt at EPA. From Wednesday's Late Show:
Video: #SigourneyWeaver on @ScottPruittOK: “Let’s make America dirty again...outrageous appointment” #LSSC #TTT16 pic.twitter.com/alwHZCftgr
— Brent Baker (@BrentHBaker) December 8, 2016
