Mourning in America - Trump Year One: November '16 to

There are effective ways to fight back, obviously. But it's still some very bad stuff.

The press (broadly speaking) capitulating and normalizing Trump/Trumpism is a distressing prospect.

On the other hand, the press overtly presenting itself as an opposition entity (or counterweight) also has its problems.

Not least that it will sound (to lots and lots of people) like a nakedly partisan stance. It also makes lots of people kneejerkily question the press's ostensible commitment to the mushy and troublesome concepts that usually get called objectivity/fairness/balance/equal time.

I've said this often enough but "we say nice things about each party exactly half the time, and mean things about each party exactly half the time" is a very stupid criterion of fairness. But a lot of people seem to think that's what it means. Changing that perception is not simple.

If roughly half the people think being "objective" means only being mean to the president half the time, then we have a long ways to go before there can be an active fourth estate that has any legitimacy in the eyes of the public and any ability to inform/educate the persuadable public.

As long as there are tens of millions of people saying things like: Snopes is an Obama mouthpiece owned by Soros; why should I trust the obviously partisan Washington Post/New York Times; of COURSE Politifact and Glenn Kessler are biased leftists... The media's just preaching to the converted and it won't change any of the minds that need to change.

I posted this yesterday: https://washingtonspectator.org/press-trump-perlstein/

As long as there are tens of millions of people saying things like: Snopes is an Obama mouthpiece owned by Soros; why should I trust the obviously partisan Washington Post/New York Times; of COURSE Politifact and Glenn Kessler are biased leftists... The media's just preaching to the converted and it won't change any of the minds that need to change.

The GWB years showed that what changes people's minds is actual experience -- once it became clear that GWB had created disaster after disaster, people became much more open to the media reports that detailed why and how. Something similar is likely with Trump. People won't start thinking the press is less biased, but some number of them will find their own biases aligning with the media's. Probably. But who knows?

less social media-oriented media during the bush years though. none, really

Good point, tipsy: the drumbeat of sleaze from the Bush years eventually took on enough weight to tip public consciousness against that crowd: Heckuva job, Brownie. Wide stance Craig. Duke Cunningham. Cheney shooting that lawyer.

But if I understand the liberal consensus correctly, "let it play out" isn't an acceptable stance in 2016. We (I hear) can't just let the Trompoids make their inevitable mistakes and let the public turn against them in the normal manner of pendulums swinging.

They showed us the playbook. Schumer, Pelosi and Ellison better follow it. Total obstruction, all day every day.

any writer of fiction who was crafting a villainous character would probably pull back the reins before they got to Trump's level of OTT unbelievability

The New Yorker Radio Hour did a sketch w/ the election as a script pitch a month-plus ago. "Nobody talks like this..."

The Fourth Estate has been declining (defunded, really) for 35 years, it's just moved into full slapstick mode.

xxpost It absolutely isn't an acceptable stance imo. Everything Trump has said and done has clearly been in bad faith, he's demonstrated no curiosity or desire to learn or grow into the job, he's nominated nothing but overt garbage to his cabinet positions. Christ knows as fucking awful as he is I WANT him to do a good or at least passable or at the very least not actively destructive job as president. I WANT to be able to find things that he does or that he supports that I can get behind. But there's literally nothing there. He wants to ruin a thing just because he can. So, yeah, we have to go in swinging and keep swinging until he's knocked the fuck down.

And Tombot OTM.

Snopes is an Obama mouthpiece owned by Soros; why should I trust the obviously partisan Washington Post/New York Times...

^^^ this whole mindset is extremely troubling to me, and I don't have any answers. I need to completely remove myself from online comment sites, because the ubiquity of this shit is really causing me to lose it:

FRINGE? You mean the entire net, the majority of peoples who seek their news online is Fringe? Hey mainstream media, you are in the minority now, and you are fringe! When you hear the mainstream saying things such as "Fringe" or "Fake" there is a very good chance it is real!!

I think some of that is a demoralization tactic, and we also don't know how many people really think that way. I wouldn't despair at it, but it's also clear that we need media sources that reach people who don't read the washington post or nytimes.

I think a good thing to keep in mind about Breitbart is that it succeeds because (1) it is entertaining to its audience to read and (2) it expressed repressed or unpopular views and feelings that a lot of its readers already have

But also don't despair, we *do* have lots of liberal media sources that get wide readership, it's just hard to penetrate to the other side, people who are diametrically opposed to your world view. And we even have our own fake news and/or shitty reporting and/or distorted/biased media.

I feel like the delegitimization of vociferousness needs to be a key point of attack. These people make waves not because there are so many of them or because their arguments hold any water but because they know that volume (or the textual equivalent thereof) gets attention.

worth mentioning that it's a lot easier to write attention-grabbing stories when you're not interested in providing a verifiable account of reality. just make up some shit!

reality is boring and no-one really wants to read about the tedious process of government. but hell yeah i'll read a story about a kid-fucking ring run out of a pizza place!

It makes me feel a little better to realize that in order to flip some seats, we only need to reach the 15% of Trump voters who don't believe Hillary deserves to be in jail

Obviously, fake news is a problem, but there are certainly plenty of Trump voters who don't base their point-of-view around conspiracy theories.

I feel like the delegitimization of vociferousness needs to be a key point of attack. These people make waves not because there are so many of them or because their arguments hold any water but because they know that volume (or the textual equivalent thereof) gets attention.

― i need microsoft installed on my desktop, can you help (Old Lunch), Thursday, December 8, 2016 11:00 AM (eighteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, they are good at manipulating twitter and other social media to their advantage in order to amplify themselves

Obviously, fake news is a problem, but there are certainly plenty of Trump voters who don't base their point-of-view around conspiracy theories.

― I know hoes that know Ali Farka Toure (voodoo chili), Thursday, December 8, 2016 11:17 AM (five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Maybe not, but I kind of feel like the majority catch wind of all the negative stuff the minority actively believes in and come away with a general sense of mistrust towards those that the minority is actively against. Like not everyone believed the craziest of the Hillary rumors but it was brute forced to a degree that I believe it made the less active/lower info majority say "gee I've been hearing a lot of terrible stuff" based on cumulative over the top headlines etc. constantly in their peripherals.

less social media-oriented media during the bush years though. none, really

― global tetrahedron, Thursday, December 8, 2016 10:25 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the bullshit still got pushed. never forget "mission accomplished", swiftboat etc

Trump's EPA pick has gutted me more than the others, I gotta say. I'm barely old enough to remember Ann Gorsuch, Reagan's pick. My slim hope is that the world economy has shifted too much in eight years to return to turning West Virginia into a fracking site.

I think it would be a mistake to abandon fact-checking and whatnot, but it's also a mistake to think "Oh the voters are just misinformed and if only we could get them the right facts..."

that guy is fucking terrible! his only experience in the field whatsoever is being critical of the EPA in defence of oil companies. It's insane xp

as AG of Ok he tried to sue colorado for legalized weed

xxxp yeah that pick really stings, the idea that you could nominate someone who spent their career fighting the EPA as the god damn head of the agency is just mind-blowingly evil

In other news, I just hired the guy who's robbed my bodega eight times as my new cashier.

I mean, fuck it, we have a president elect who pretty demonstrably doesn't understand or give a fuck about governing or the country he's soon to be in charge of. Maybe up really should've been down this whole time!

betsy devos hurt badly too. so depressing.

I dug this "On the Media" bit with George Lakoff:

http://www.wnyc.org/story/george-lakoff/

BROOKE GLADSTONE: For the next four years, what would your advice to working journalists be?
GEORGE LAKOFF: If you're reporting, you’re reporting on what he says. Now, however, when you report on what he says and it's a lie, you can give a positive background. For example, he says, you know, he’s saved a thousand jobs – not exactly. Carrier Air Conditioning is going to send to Mexico 1,300 jobs of their 2,000, so two-thirds of the jobs are going to Mexico. That could be your lead. He got Mike Pence to pay $700,000 a year from the Indiana state budget directly to Carrier, part of the deal. So the taxpayers are paying the owners of Carrier to keep some of those jobs, one-third of them, when two-thirds of them are going. Now, that’s very, very different from the reporting that says he saved a thousand jobs. And The New York, Times, in their reporting, started by pointing out that all the companies near Carrier, even within a mile, are going to Mexico and nothing is being saved. So that part of the truth isn't being reported, if you report just on what he says.

― THE SKURJ OF FAKE NEWS. (kingfish), Wednesday, December 7, 2016 3:03 PM (yesterday)

i know this is not the party line on this but...all this guy seems to be calling for is spin. which, ok, if you're a linguist (as this guy is) and not a journalist, i can see why that would be attractive

Trump was considering Harold Hamm for EPA, then one-upped that and said "what if I just hired Hamm's LAWYER!"

http://mediamatters.org/research/2016/07/22/three-things-media-should-know-about-harold-hamm-trump-s-leading-pick-energy-secretary/211836

and fucking ben carson for hud too hurts. goddamn it

Yeah almost like how a whole party is anti-government and pro-freedom yet strives to run the government so they can restrict freedoms.

xposts

otm man alive

I think it would be a mistake to abandon fact-checking and whatnot, but it's also a mistake to think "Oh the voters are just misinformed and if only we could get them the right facts..."

As long as 50+ million people think your facts are merely YOURS, and they have THEIRS (which they are perfectly happy with), the effort may be depressingly futile.

xxxp yeah that pick really stings, the idea that you could nominate someone who spent their career fighting the EPA as the god damn head of the agency is just mind-blowingly evil

― frogs

check this out: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3418-2004Jul21.html

As long as 50+ million people think your facts are merely YOURS, and they have THEIRS (which they are perfectly happy with), the effort may be depressingly futile.

― troops in djibouti (Ye Mad Puffin), Thursday, December 8, 2016 11:52 AM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

And while I don't want to draw false equivalencies, I see plenty of people on the democrat side running with unverified stories that *feel* right to them, e.g. a lot of the stuff that went around about russian interference with the election. Not saying this didn't happen, but some of the stories were pretty shaky and people just ran with them.

the idea that you could nominate someone who spent their career fighting the EPA as the god damn head of the agency is just mind-blowingly evil

Pretty sure I've told the story before of how I was working for the HHS Office on Women's Health in 2001? Most Feds in most departments soldier on and do the jobs they set out to do; others get sidelined by wacky changed priorities from above.

re: agency heads opposed to the agencies, here's another one: http://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-expected-to-name-fast-food-executive-andy-puzder-as-labor-secretary-1481210445

stomach-turning.

check this out: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3418-2004Jul21.html

lol I did not know about this

Normally Linda McMahon would probably the most "lol, you're surely just trolling now" pick so far. Yet I know actual people who are likely going to have to struggle under the very real consequences, so I'm not yukking it up anymore.

xxxp yeah that pick really stings, the idea that you could nominate someone who spent their career fighting the EPA as the god damn head of the agency is just mind-blowingly evil

― frogs

check this out: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3418-2004Jul21.html

― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, December 8, 2016 11:52 AM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

thanks for posting that -- it is hardly comforting in any way but apart from the truly wacko general flynn and ben carson are there any appointees that wouldn't be just be typical shitty GOP ones?

betsy devos sounds like someone GWB would nominate

xposts
yeah, she was obviously kind of legendary among the old school at EPA. when i first started i would ask about how shitty it was under stephen johnson, and often the answer would eventually turn to something like "well of course it was nothing compared to Gorsuch". it's interesting that even reagan was human enough to put William Ruckelshaus (the first EPA administrator, back in 70-73) back in charge after the Gorsuch debacle. he was actually pretty good. it's strange to think of a time when republicans weren't necessarily enemies of human health and the environment

Debilitating brain drain from the federal government is still probably a couple of years off; as YMP states, people soldier on for the most part. The non-political leadership positions, like career folks in policy offices and career staff positions close to the appointees, and executives who directly report to the appointees - those will probably turn over fast.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/12/liberal-civil-servants-horrified-at-trump.html

i know this is not the party line on this but...all this guy seems to be calling for is spin. which, ok, if you're a linguist (as this guy is) and not a journalist, i can see why that would be attractive

I don't think so; spin operates at a more superficial level than the deeper idea architecture

His response seems more an effort to change how your bog-standard reporter reports this stuff, to change it from the lazy-ass received wisdom practitces they get from their colleagues

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/12/6/1606610/-With-Biden-in-the-chair-on-Jan-3-the-Senate-can-confirm-a-renominated-Merrick-Garland-Here-s-how

a thought from overseas: Americans abroad are frequently thought of by locals as big and bumbling, rich but undiscerning, easily taken advantage of, in short, marks. "Not all Americans abroad": but enough. They're easy money.

the US president-elect and his advisors all seem to be tangled in various foreign intrigues presumably in order to get rich quick. With Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, Taiwan, etc. Are they marks too? does the US government become a mark?

Throwing the entire preamble about expats out as being goofy and a little offensive, you are OTM on the second part hoo boy and how.

Trump is sitting pretty now because he's indisputably King Con of the US but I can see him (and by extension us) getting played pretty hard by confidence men of other nations, yep.