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DonViejo

(60,536 posts) Mon Oct 8, 2018, 08:15 AM Oct 2018

Disastrous Choices By Journalists Follow Kavanaugh Confirmation

Matt Gertz

October 8, 2018 3:43 am

Journalists made some terrible choices this weekend in the wake of Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation as a Supreme Court justice. At times, those decisions involved minimizing the fact that he was credibly accused of sexual assault, puffing up President Donald Trump’s accomplishments, and rampantly deploying “both-sides” journalism. This coverage is a fitting conclusion to the often apathetic reporting in the early stages of the Kavanaugh nomination fight.

Take a look at the news alerts several outlets sent Saturday in the wake of Kavanaugh’s confirmation. Reading some of them, you’d never know multiple women had reported him for sexual misconduct:

Link to tweet

The New York Times’ treatment seems particularly noxious, framing a dispute over whether the nominee had attempted to rape Christine Blasey Ford — and if it should matter if he had — as a “partisan battle”:

Link to tweet

Meanwhile, the focus of media coverage is now moving to what Kavanaugh’s confirmation means for President Donald Trump. The Times’ Peter Baker authored a news analysis piece concluding that because of Kavanaugh’s confirmation, Trump’s announcement of what he described as “an ambitious and elusive new trade agreement with Canada and Mexico,” and new jobs numbers, “this may be the best week of his presidency so far.”

But, as Baker himself admits, the “continuing fall in unemployment to 3.7 percent was built on the recovery [Trump] inherited from Mr. Obama.” The trade agreement is not particularly “ambitious” and it isn’t really “new.” As the Times report Baker cites points out, while Trump is eager to brand the accord as the entirely original result of his brilliant deal-making, it largely maintains the structure of NAFTA (which Trump has long derided), while adding some “innovations” — many of which were previously agreed to in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (which Trump also bashed on the campaign trail) — and some cosmetic alterations (like changing the treaty’s name). Baker adds that “America has been ripped apart by the battle over Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination, fraught as it was with gender politics that Mr. Trump seemed eager to encourage” — an almost genteel description of the horrific way Trump publicly mocked Ford and called her a liar.

more
http://www.nationalmemo.com/the-disastrous-choices-journalists-are-making-in-the-wake-of-kavanaughs-confirmation/

5 replies

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Disastrous Choices By Journalists Follow Kavanaugh Confirmation (Original Post) DonViejo Oct 2018 OP

That's the "liberal media" for ya'. That's how these dipshits have enabled Guy Whitey Corngood Oct 2018 #1

I have my own problems with the NYT, but SkipG Oct 2018 #2

No they shouldn't, but when they starting blaming Democrats and Obama for causing the republicans to still_one Oct 2018 #4

NY Times has been doing this bullshit for sometime now, which is why I cancelled my subscription still_one Oct 2018 #3

K&R! Especially MSM broadcasters have mud on their faces... Anon-C Oct 2018 #5

Guy Whitey Corngood

(26,505 posts)

1. That's the "liberal media" for ya'. That's how these dipshits have enabled

Reply to DonViejo (Original post)

Mon Oct 8, 2018, 08:23 AM

Oct 2018

the current pathetic state of affairs.

SkipG

(70 posts)

2. I have my own problems with the NYT, but

Reply to DonViejo (Original post)

Mon Oct 8, 2018, 08:41 AM

Oct 2018

this piece by Gertz seems to assume the newspaper should behave like a left-wing Fox News. Tsk.

still_one

(92,409 posts)

4. No they shouldn't, but when they starting blaming Democrats and Obama for causing the republicans to

Reply to SkipG (Reply #2)

Mon Oct 8, 2018, 09:19 AM

Oct 2018

reject climate change, there is something that is not right.

They have been pushing the false equivalency memo for quite sometime now, I assume thinking that it gives them the "appearance" of objectivity, when in fact it dilutes and distorts the story they are reporting

"The Republican Party’s fast journey from debating how to combat human-caused climate change to arguing that it does not exist is a story of big political money, Democratic hubris in the Obama years and a partisan chasm that grew over nine years like a crack in the Antarctic shelf, favoring extreme positions and uncompromising rhetoric over cooperation and conciliation.

“Most Republicans still do not regard climate change as a hoax,” said Whit Ayres, a Republican strategist who worked for Senator Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign. “But the entire climate change debate has now been caught up in the broader polarization of American politics.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/03/us/politics/republican-leaders-climate-change.html

They do this constantly. There are plenty of examples.

I know someone who was on the FEC and the times presented a story how both sides refused to compromise. It was a complete distortion of the facts. It was the republicans on the committee that would not compromise.

The person I know did write a response to the distorted article, which did appear the next day, on the inside pages of the Times, and was gone by that afternoon.

The Times is not the paper it used be, and the Judy Miller fiasco was just the beginning of its downward mediocrity in my view

That is why over a year ago I cancelled my subscription to the NY Times, and subscribed to the Washington Post.

As far as media outlets, if someone is looking for truely objective news Bloomberg comes pretty close