Trump does enjoy squalling about the mean, nasty, unfriendly, uncomplimentary major news sources, and now they keep talking about ugly stuff. You know, the actions the White House has actually taken?
This morning, at CPAC, Trump reiterated his call that the news companies are “The enemy of the people!” (Another example of how, if you control the language, you control the argument. “Fake news!” was the word coined for pro-Trump agitprop.)
So today’s White House press conference… wasn’t. Instead, Press Secretary Sean Spicer held an informal briefing that specifically barred the New York Times, NBC, CNN, the Los Angeles Times, Buzzfeed, and Politico.
They invited Fox News, Breitbart and the Washington Times — all good, sympathetic, conservative, and complimentary — along with CBS, ABC, the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Time and the Associated Press. And, presumably, the Christian Broadcasting Network.
To their credit, AP and Time chose not to go to such a one-sided event. And bad on CBS, ABC, the WSJ, and Bloomberg for saying, in effect, “Sure, fine, whatever.” What a travesty.
Trump tweet from a half hour ago:
FAKE NEWS media knowingly doesn’t tell the truth. A great danger to our country. The failing @nytimes has become a joke. Likewise @CNN. Sad!
How bad is the Russia story? This looks like the White house is running so scared, they’ve throwing away whatever ethics they managed to preserve up until now.
