CNN anchor Jake Tapper appeared to plug his novel The Hellfire Club on ABC's The View on Wednesday. Mostly, the View crew wanted him to pronounce on the Trump tweet of the day on the "fake news" (and the MRC study showing 91 percent of the evening-news coverage of Trump was negative from January to April).
The president tweeted: "The Fake News is working overtime. Just reported that, despite the tremendous success we are having with the economy & all things else, 91% of the Network News about me is negative (Fake). Why do we work so hard in working with the media when it is corrupt? Take away credentials?"
Tapper cited the slanted Quinnipiac poll question in which 51 percent of Republicans agreed with the sentiment that the media were the "enemy of the people," but they were given the choice between (a) enemy and (b) an "important part of democracy." That's not a simple trust/distrust question. It's designed for media outrage, since they always think of themselves as Democracy Incarnate.
At least Sunny Hostin, the former CNN staffer who regularly gushes in CNN's defense on the show, asked Tapper about the charges of bias. But it amounted to a softball pitch:
SUNNY HOSTIN: To be fair, there's a concern that reporters aren't just reporting facts anymore, that reporters are editorializing. And you've taken some criticism, and people point to your facial expressions and your political cartoons –
JAKE TAPPER: This is just my face. I can't, you know -- when I hear unrepentant BS coming my way, I have a -- [applause and then whooping, as ABC shows still shots of Tapper with Kellyanne Conway, Jay Sekulow, and Rudy Giuliani] That's just my face! Tell them to stop saying those things, and my face will go back to normal!
HOSTIN: People are using it to say that CNN is biased, that you're biased, that you're editorializing. What do you say to that?
TAPPER: I am absolutely biased against lies. [ Applause ] When there are people lying, I am absolutely 100% against it. When people say things that are indecent, and not to invoke Meghan's dad again, but he is somebody that has been a big part of my life, and I have been covering him since I was a young reporter. When the president says that John McCain isn't a war hero because he was captured, and I prefer people don't be captured, that's indecent! That’s an indecent thing to say!. That's not bias. That's indecent. We revere our service members, and we revere our POWs, and that’s just how adults behave.
Someone could have followed up and asked Tapper if he felt CNN hosts and reporters do more reporting than editorializing, whether each part of CNN's hour has more news or more opinion. Someone could have asked Tapper about whether he would decry the indecency of CNN saying "s---hole" on their network 195 times in one day. Or his allowing townhall smears by Parkland survivors. But everyone, including buttered-up Meghan McCain, didn't challenge him.
