Trump Unloads on Media Scoundrels

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STEPHEN LENDMAN

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EditorsNote_WhiteWatching Trump castigate the media barons and their henchmen—media stars, top editors and tv producers— is sweet indeed, a refreshing, truly unprecedented spectacle, and these bastards deserve every ounce of venom The Donald is hurling at them. Fully complicit in horrendous crimes, including devastating wars and plotting more, they should be flogged in the public square. That said, let us never lose sight of the fact that Trump represents just one wing of the plutocracy, currently in conflict with the other wing (the one still licking its wounds) supporting Hillary and the Media/MIC establishment and its Neocon project of constant wars and US hegemony at any cost, an enterprise that until Nov. 8 vociferously included the entire whorish liberal commentariat and their numerous ramifications throughout American culture.
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Yea, Trump is no champion of the working class, not by a long shot, but a pampered egotist who, in this case, is nonetheless justified in being irate at the treatment he received from the media whores. While the tongue lashing he already gave them is well deserved, and more may come when he meets with the supremos of the New York Times and WaPo, two enormous engines of imperial hypocrisy and disinformation, eventually we bet that class interests will prevail and make for nice nice among them, or else Trump will move out of their orbit into no man’s land with completely unpredictable consequences. Indeed Trump’s “more rational” voices are already joining the system-wide “normalization” effort on behalf of Trump and his momentary opponents.  In all cases, let us keep calm, flexible in our responses, and remember that the enemy of my enemy may not necessarily be my friend. Ergo, we must NOT let our guard down. Trump, a plutocrat with autocratic tendencies illustrates the wisdom of this maxim in glowing technicolor. Let him show us the money before believing an iota of what he says.
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All the above notwithstanding, from the start of his campaign Trump has broken all rules of Omertá holding the filthy secrets of the plutocratic establishment within its carefully hidden folds. That’s what happens when ruling class factions clash: some truth manages to bubble up to the surface, where the hoi polloi, at last, can get a measure of reality about the situation confronting them. —PG


Media scum troop up to Trump Tower to pay obeisance and meet with the new man in charge. 


Top media executives & stars meet with Trump. Click here for more info.

NBC's Chuck Todd and Lester Holt; CNN's Wolf Blitzer and Erin Burnett; CBS's Norah O'Donnell, Charlie Rose, John Dickerson, and Gayle King; and ABC's George Stephanopoulos, David Muir and Martha Raddatz were some of the anchors seen entering Trump Tower shortly before 1 p.m.

Several executives from the network news divisions were also spotted on the way into Trump Tower, including ABC News president James Goldston; CNN president Jeff Zucker; Fox News co-presidents Bill Shine and Jack Abernethy; NBC News president Deborah Turness; MSNBC president Phil Griffin; and CBS News vice president Chris Isham.

There was much for the group to talk about. Trump has long-standing relationships with many in the TV news business -- but he also waged an anti-media crusade during his campaign for president. 


Throughout America’s just concluded political season, major media reporting was scandalous, near-entirely one-sided for Hillary, shamelessly anti-Trump, inventing reasons to denigrate him. It’s why I call the lot of them scoundrels. In his day, famed journalist George Seldes (1890 – 1995) railed against “prostitution of the press.” 

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He called fourth estate presstitutes “the most powerful force against the general welfare of the majority of the people.” For Gerald Celente, they’re “shills, sellouts and media whores.” Paul Craig Roberts calls them “presstitutes.” So do I, explaining they substitute advocacy for journalism, sinking to the level of press agents for wealth, power and privilege – keeping readers and viewers misinformed and distracted. The New York Times is my prime target because of its global influence. On domestic and geopolitical issues mattering most, it’s a lying machine, publishing state and corporate propaganda, suppressing what’s most important to know.
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Throughout the scoundrel media universe, managed news misinformation substitutes, glorifying wars in the name of peace, claiming they’re about democracy building. Aggressive wars are called liberating ones. Mass slaughter and destruction are portrayed as humanitarian intervention. Carving up continents for profit is considered economic development. Exploiting workers as virtual serfs is called jobs creation. 
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CNN's Zucker: one of the top media scoundrels in the Western universe.

CNN’s Zucker: one of the top media scoundrels in the Western media sphere.

On Monday, around two dozen television media bosses and anchors visited the president-elect in Trump Tower for an off-the-record meeting. Was it to kiss the ring they once cursed?  According to the New York Post, it was a “f…ing firing squad,” Trump unloading on attendees. He blasted CNN president Jeff Zucker. According to an unnamed source, he said “I hate your network. Everyone at CNN is a liar and you should be ashamed.”

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“The meeting was a total disaster,” said the source. “The TV execs and anchors went in there thinking they would be discussing the access they would get to the Trump administration, but instead they got a Trump-style dressing down.” He “kept saying, ‘(w)e’re in a room of liars, the deceitful dishonest media who got it all wrong.’ He addressed everyone in the room calling the media dishonest, deceitful liars.” 
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NYT publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. meets with Trump on Tuesday, his publication and the Washington Post the lead anti-Trump print media throughout the campaign – some of the worst pure rubbish I read and reported on since mid-2015 when Trump and Hillary announced they’re run for president. Politico reported Trump saying he wants a “reset…fairness…the truth” henceforth. His campaign manager Kellyanne Conway called the meeting “very candid and very honest,” adding the president-elect “did not explode in anger.”
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Trump isn’t one to mince words. While campaigning, he blasted media misreporting about him numerous times in stump speeches. On all important issues, state and corporate advocacy journalism substitutes for the real thing.

NOTE: ALL IMAGE CAPTIONS, PULL QUOTES AND COMMENTARY BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS • CONTINUE THE DEBATE ON OUR FACEBOOK PAGE. CLICK HERE. 


ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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STEPHEN LENDMAN lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."  ( http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html ) Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com



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