# Does Trump want to undermine the role of the press? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 19, 2018, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796 "2018-11-19T15:21:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/261 "2018-12-06T17:23:40Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > So that’s a “no” then? Was I too subtle? I’m not going to advocate for any of the current news media outlets. They can all do a better job of reporting. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/262 "2018-12-06T17:24:52Z")
What is your most trusted news organization, **doorhinge**? ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/263 "2018-12-06T18:36:57Z")
According to this [Media Bias Chart](https://www.adfontesmedia.com/), Bloomberg, Reuters, and the Associated Press have no discernible bias and they all rank near the top of ‘original fact reporting’. Are these news outlets trustworthy? Or is the ranking organization biased and a part of the lame-stream media? ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/264 "2018-12-06T20:26:37Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > … > > I’ve imposed a personal waiting period of 48 hrs on breaking news stories. … Like tornado warnings? ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/265 "2018-12-06T21:20:17Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > What is your most trusted news organization, **doorhinge**? I don’t have one. CNN used to be my go-to channel whenever there was an actual “late breaking” news event. Somewhere along the line they became more biased, and angry, and political. They are still one of news media outlets I peruse (I’m a notorious channel changer. 🙂 ), but now I start with whatever channel I am currently watching, work my way up the channel selector until it rolls over to channel 2, and then I work my way up again. Eventually, the news media outlets manage to piece together most of the story, or at least provide the parts of the story they wish to tell. It might take them 48 hrs, or more, to get the job. ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/266 "2018-12-06T21:22:55Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > Like tornado warnings? Please correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t tornado warnings more of a weather media outlet kinda thing? ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/267 "2018-12-06T22:03:54Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > I don’t have one. CNN used to be my go-to channel whenever there was an actual “late breaking” news event. Somewhere along the line they became more biased, and angry, and political. They are still one of news media outlets I peruse (I’m a notorious channel changer. 🙂 ), but now I start with whatever channel I am currently watching, work my way up the channel selector until it rolls over to channel 2, and then I work my way up again. Eventually, the news media outlets manage to piece together most of the story, or at least provide the parts of the story they wish to tell. It might take them 48 hrs, or more, to get the job. So the live coverage of the funeral of George H. W. Bush must have given you quite a shock, right? ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/268 "2018-12-09T18:18:23Z")
> [@Railer13](#): > > So the live coverage of the funeral of George H. W. Bush must have given you quite a shock, right? Do you consider the live coverage of the funeral George H. W. Bush to be an actual “late breaking” news event? ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/269 "2018-12-10T04:02:23Z")
> [@Dacien](#): > > It has always amazed me, with as flawed a president as Trump is, the media continually feel the need to stretch the truth or run with shaky stories. From bad stories like “Trump transition team in disarray” (which even David Axelrod came to Trump’s defense on that one), to “Trump considers sending 100,000 national guard to round up immigrants”, to unbelievable mistakes such as “Candidate Trump directed Flynn to talk to Russians” (As somebody pointed out, these huge retractions always seem to be about very negative stories), and on and on and on. > > It’s no secret the mainstream press hates Trump. If they’re not Fox, they hate Trump. That’s fine, they’re allowed to. But I don’t lose any sleep when Trump punches back. **None of the stories you mentioned are false.** Trump’s transition team being in disarray is factual. Multiple people from inside stated this. Only Trump and his direct aides said otherwise. All Axelrod said was that the pace of hirings was not slow, not that there was no disarray. And _to this day_ there remain hundreds of positions where Trump has not even nominated anyone. Trump considers sending 100,000 National guard troops to the border: [based on an actual memo received by the AP](https://www.apnews.com/5508111d59554a33be8001bdac4ef830), so likely factual. Just because his administration denied its existence after the fact doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. “Candidate Trump directed Flynn to talk to Russians”: This one is just a misstatement of what was reported. The actual statement was “[Flynn prepared to testify that Trump directed him to contact Russians about ISIS, confidant says](https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/michael-flynn-charged-making-false-statements-fbi-documents/story?id=50849354).” There has been no evidence to the contrary. Just because Flynn instead eventually named Kushner doesn’t change the accuracy of the report. I also note that Trump himself said “No, I didn’t direct him, but I would have directed him if he didn’t do it, okay?” That’s an odd thing to say for an illegal action. Does it not sound like he was told to not admit that he said it, or that he did the Mafia-style “Wouldn’t it be nice” bullshit? You pulled out 3 anecdotes to use as proof–already a bad strategy. But then it turns out none of them are as you presented them. You are showing your own bias towards believing the mainstream media spreads fake news. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/270 "2018-12-10T04:12:05Z")
> [@Dacien](#): > > And if anyone thinks they just started acting this way with Trump, they haven’t been paying attention. They just took it to 11 with Trump. No. This claim fails if you think critically about it. You have a handful of admittedly conservative biased news sources (usually also pro-Trump in today’s age), and the rest of the mainstream media that disagrees. Which makes more sense: these biased sources are the only ones who are telling it like it is, and everyone else is spreading false news? No, Occam’s razor is that it is the conservative biased news sources are the ones who are reporting incorrectly. That they have every interest in getting you to accept that everyone else is wrong so you will stick with them. Remind me, who came up with the whole MSM and LSM stuff? Fox News. Who started pushing the narrative that all other news was wrong? Fox News. While there do exist liberal-biased news sources, the idea that all but a handful of MSM sources are liberal biased is ridiculous. It’s simply the same logic used in cults, where the outside world is said to be lying to you. And that’s without getting into “fake news,” a term coined about 2016 pro-Trump news sources that turned out to be entirely manufactured. Yet which side is called fake news all the time? the Pro-Trump side. In addition, the fact that these same conservative sources are now clearly pro-Trump–when you know Trump is awful–should give you pause about whether they were ever accurate in the first place. Could the admittedly conservative news sources were just pushing a conservative point of view? ---
**Author:** ![Dacien](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dacien/32/5663_2.png) [@Dacien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dacien)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/271 "2018-12-10T04:31:36Z")
His transition team was not “in disarray”. Axelrod’s quote was literally something to the effect of, “There’s plenty to criticize him for, but this isn’t it.” His transition team was as far along as Obama’s was. That’s not disarray. That was the first time I realized they weren’t even going to give Trump a chance to turn it around and be a good president, they were just going to smear him at the expense of the country. And the two have been fighting ever since. About the memo though, the original headline was “Trump admin considers using 100,000 National Guard troops for immigration raids”. There was no mention of any number in the memo, to start with, let alone 100,000, and there has never been any evidence that Kelly or Trump even saw the memo, much less were “considering” it. The deceit was in the language that suggested it wasn’t just a draft memo but an actual plan Trump knew about and was considering implementing, when that was never shown to be the case. Members of the media simply don’t like Trump, they just don’t. Not saying it’s right or it’s wrong, just that they don’t like the guy _at all_, and he’s fair game for any story that will gain traction. They’re so eager to slap him around that they’ve abandoned good practice. We’ve seen it time and time again with multiple retractions, hilarious “koi pond” stories that were just flat misleading, and on and on and on. If the media had just stuck to criticizing Trump only when it was warranted, which is plenty, they’d be much better positioned. As it is, they’ve demonstrated their bias against him, which only hurts their credibility. ---
**Author:** ![Dacien](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dacien/32/5663_2.png) [@Dacien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dacien)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796/272 "2018-12-10T04:44:30Z")
It’s a symptom of the hyper-polarization. Trump is the exemplar of this, where he can say any kooky thing he wants and his supporters will eat it up and defend him. We sort of see it with Ocasio-Cortez too, if you ask me. “The other side” is too important a foe to let the nonsense that comes out of their mouths get in the way. They’ll defend the most asinine statements and remarks because opposing the other side is just too important. These media stories are in the same vein. It doesn’t matter how dubious or unfounded these stories might be, opposing Trump is too important to admit erroneousness. They can put out whatever attack article they want because the anti-Trump proponents will defend it. Just as when Trump makes an asinine comment about his opposition, his supporters will defend it, no matter how flimsy the claim or erroneous the statement. This is our hyper-polarized politics, people. [![](http://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/06/PP-2014-06-12-polarization-0-01.png) ](http://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/06/PP-2014-06-12-polarization-0-01.png) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-trump-want-to-undermine-the-role-of-the-press/824796.md?page=13)