DONALD J. TRUMP, until now a Republican problem, this week became a challenge the nation must confront and overcome… The party’s failure of judgment leaves the nation’s future where it belongs, in the hands of voters.
I have such mixed feelings about this Washington Post editorial, some of it because of the “mired inside-the-Beltway” mentality. Most of it rests in the “it’s pretty damn late to be doing your job” category.
It does little to acknowledge the anger and frustration that propelled this man to this place in history.
The Trump litany of victimization has resonated with many Americans whose economic prospects have stagnated. They deserve a serious champion, and the challenges of inequality and slow wage growth deserve a serious response.
That’s it.
But in December, Pew reported:
Fully 49% of U.S. aggregate income went to upper-income households in 2014, up from 29% in 1970. The share accruing to middle-income households was 43% in 2014, down substantially from 62% in 1970.
What has the Post said about this issue since it opined in 2014 that middle-class stagnation was “a threat”? Even with middle class wealth (not income) being defined as $50,000 – $500,000 (not a realistic comparison), Americans are “worse off” than the global middle class.
The Post fact-checked Mitch McConnell but as far as I can tell has made no calls (“serious response”) in the past year for public policy changes. And not a lot in the way of analysis.
Moreover, it is unlikely to persuade anyone who does not already believe that “Donald Trump is a unique threat to American democracy.” Those folks don’t read the WaPost.
Finger pointing is misplaced
The Post wags its finger at the party, as though “the party” is an entity with agency.
VOTERS who identify with the GOP selected Donald Trump in the caucuses and primaries prior to the convention. And that selection was not to-the-wire like it was on the Democratic side.
Consequently this week, “the party” had its HANDS TIED because of VOTERS.
Blaming the GOP, today (well, technically, Friday), for something that voters led over the course of several months is counterproductive.
There is no mea culpa
The editorial does not acknowledge, much less absolve, the media — as an economic sector — of its role in Trump’s elevation to the top of the GOP ticket.
Granted, I followed this week’s events tangentially (unlike one of my friends, who has a mental constitution to feared: she took it all in), but I did not see this until now:
With one exception (Bob Dole), the living Republican presidents and presidential nominees of the past three decades all stayed away.
WHAT?
Why did I not know this? Might it be because it wasn’t an MSM story? (NPR being an exception but they are not profit-driven-MSM.) Or because Presidents Bush (41) and Bush (43) made their announcements back in May, it was somehow reduced to “old news”?
The most illustrative/information headline is from … Breitbart News. The story is comprehensive and well-done.
Why was it not newsworthy enough to be its own story, repeated a few different ways, this week?
Just another example of how the media, as a group, are complicit in Trump’s rise to power through news choice.
What is the media’s role during the nomination process?
Yes, the Post editorial board makes a compelling and reasoned case as to why this man should not be president.
But here’s the rub.
What this editorial makes clear is that TRUMP WASN’T QUALIFIED TO BE A NOMINEE.
The real estate tycoon is uniquely unqualified to serve as president, in experience and temperament… there is nothing on Mr. Trump’s résumé to suggest he could function successfully in Washington… He also is contemptuous of fact. Throughout the campaign, he has unspooled one lie after another… Worse than the flip-flops is the absence of any substance in his agenda… He doesn’t know what is in the nation’s founding document… Worse, he doesn’t seem to care about its limitations on executive power.
But the media not only treated him like he was equal to all the other GOP nominees — the media as an economic sector GAVE HIM FREE TIME AND INCHES. Over. And over. And over.
Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy [analysis] shows that during the year 2015, major news outlets covered Donald Trump in a way that was unusual given his low initial polling numbers—a high volume of media coverage preceded Trump’s rise in the polls. Trump’s coverage was positive in tone—he received far more “good press” than “bad press.” The volume and tone of the coverage helped propel Trump to the top of Republican polls.
The picture did not change in 2016. A subsequent Shorenstein Center report showed that media gave Trump more coverage than each Republican candidate every week. And except for one or two weeks in February, more coverage than any candidate, Democrat or Republican.
Until the WaPost editorial board can look in the mirror and see their own culpability as well as the culpability of the media sector, then own up and tell us what they’ve learned and how they are going to change, I cannot do much more than read this and SMH.
:: Follow me on Twitter, @kegill
:: Kathy E. Gill
:: Updated at 7:40 pm with chart from Harvard with 2016 media coverage.
Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com