Media Politicize

Can’t Praise Too Much!

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Article in the New Republic by Greg Sargens, 5/12/25

Headline:  “Trump Press Sec’s Fawning Over Him to Media Takes Scary, Cultlike Turn”

Subhead:  “As Karoline Leavitt goes full North Korea in her obsequious praise for Trump, a sharp observer of Trumpism explains what all this says about the “MAGA aesthetic” and its likeness to authoritarian propaganda.”

“In her most recent media briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt went full North Korea with a number of worshipful monologues about Trump. Yet at around the same time, another journalist’s criticism of Trump caused him to explode in a wild, triggered fury that undercut the image Leavitt tried to project of a leader who is strong, calm, and in command of events. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://newrepublic.com/article/195103/trump-press-sec-fawning-media-takes-scary-cultlike-turn

 

Journalism: Holding Feet to the Fire

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Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 5/13/25

Headline:  “Opinion | Instead of answering legitimate ethics questions, Trump goes to his playbook and lobs insults at a reporter”

Subhead:  “He attacked ABC’s Rachel Scott after she questioned why he’d accept a $400 million jet from Qatar to use as Air Force One”

“Holding the powerful to account. That’s a key role for journalists.

“Among those in power are government officials. So whenever there is potential wrongdoing or misbehavior or shady business practices by our elected officials, it’s the duty of journalists to dig in and then confront those officials. . .”

“Journalists should press the president about whether it really is OK to accept such a gift from a foreign country. And that’s exactly what ABC News’ Rachel Scott did on Monday.

“Instead of answering these legitimate questions and explaining to Scott, to the media and, really, the rest of the country and world his rationale, Trump instead chose to attack Scott. . .”

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/qatar-give-us-plane-trump-ethics/

Media not Kowtowing Enough?

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Article in The Guardian by Adam Gabbatt, 5/11/25

Headline: “Trump complains the US media aren’t bending to his will. Aren’t they?”

Subhead: “Despite owners and networks forsaking journalistic independence, Trump continues to threaten journalists”

“In the telling of Donald Trump and his Republican colleagues, the US media is fake news, stocked with “radical-left monsters” who are guilty of “illegal” reporting on the president.

The reality is different.

Since the president’s election, a number of US news organizations have appeared to bend to his will, with a growing number of examples of billionaire owners seemingly setting aside journalistic independence in favor of staying in Trump’s good grace.

Despite that acquiescence, Trump has continued to threaten journalists, branding pollsters ‘negative criminals’ who ‘should be investigated for election fraud’ . . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/11/trump-media-journalists-60-minutes

Kitsch in the Media Now?

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Article in The Guardian by David Smith, 5/10/25

Headline:  “Crass, flashy, outrageous: Trump media blitz redefines meaning of presidential”

Subhead:   “White House communications have adopted a Trumpian air that’s ‘either completely malevolent or completely brilliant’ “

“. . .Over the past three-and-a-half months, the US president and his team have launched a relentless media offensive based on crass language, flashy tactics, shock-value videos and social media memes and posts that are outrageous by design. They have used platforms and personalities to bypass traditional outlets and directly engage the Maga (Make America great again) base. They have found new ways to drown out critics, goad opponents and antagonise the world.

“The embrace of viral far-right culture has nurtured a parallel information ecosystem through pro-Trump outlets enjoying a significant growth in influence, access to power and financial investment. . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/10/trump-media-white-house-communications

Public Media Threat by the State

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Josh Hersch, 5/9/25

Headline:  “The Threat Is Very Real”

Subhead:  “NPR’s Katherine Maher on the fight to save public media.”

“Last week, Donald Trump issued an executive order calling for the end of funding for NPR and PBS. It’s the latest attempt by conservatives to cut back on support for public media, and in particular target NPR, which they view as having a liberal bias.

Katherine Maher, NPR’s CEO, says that perception is deeply unfair—and notes that the vast majority of the funding for public media goes to local stations, which are widely trusted across the political spectrum.

But the battle to insulate NPR from political influence is not easy—and, as Maher explains, it’s facing its toughest challenge yet. . .”

https://www.cjr.org/kicker/npr-pbs-katherine-maher-federal-funding.php

Public & State Media Not the Same!

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Article in FAIR by Ari Paul, 5/6/25

Headline:  “Taibbi Cites Government Attacks on Media to Defend Government Attacks on Media”

Subhead: “Cuts to PBS, NPR Part of Authoritarian Playbook.”

“Going after public broadcasters is part of the neo-fascist playbook authoritarian leaders around the world are using to clamp down on dissent and keep the public in the dark.”

“. . .Taibbi asked, “How nuts do you have to be to think ‘strong state media’ doesn’t have a dark side? . . .”

“Taibbi’s main trick is to pretend that ‘state media’ and ‘public media’ are interchangeable. They’re not. State media consists of government propaganda outlets that answer directly to executive authority, rather than independent editors. Public media are independent outlets that receive taxpayer subsidies. As I wrote in my piece, NPR “only gets 1% of its funding directly from the CPB,” the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. . .”

https://fair.org/home/taibbi-cites-government-attacks-on-media-to-defend-government-attacks-on-media/

Local Small Stations Hurt the Most?

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Andrew Mercein, 5/8/25

Headline:  “Rural and Tribal Public Radio Stations Brace for Funding Cuts”

Subhead:  “Small broadcasters fear they will be unintended victims of national culture wars.”

“Today, stations like KSTK (Wrangell, Alaska) are facing an existential crisis. Last week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to cease all funding to NPR and PBS and to eliminate indirect sources of public financing like the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributes hundreds of millions of dollars annually to stations nationwide. The move could wipe out funding appropriated through 2026 and 2027, endangering stations that already operate on razor-thin margins. “If CPB funding disappears, I don’t know how we’d survive,” said Cindy Sweat, KSTK’s general manager. . .”

https://www.cjr.org/news/npr-pbs-cpb-trump-public-radio-funding.php

How Dare They Ask A Question?

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Article in Huffpost by Lee Moran, 5/5/25

Headline:  “Donald Trump Flips Out At Wall Street Journal Reporter: ‘You Hear Me? What I Said?’ “

Subhead:  “The president melted down over a simple question on board Air Force One.”

“Donald Trump flipped out at a journalist for The Wall Street Journal on board Air Force One on Sunday.

“The journalist drew Trump’s ire after asking about talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin amid the U.S. president’s effort to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine over the former’s invasion of the latter.

“Trump asked which outlet the reporter worked for, a tactic he’s resorted to frequently during his second term.

“When told The Journal, he then railed: ‘That’s what I thought. Boy, you people treat us so badly. Wall Street Journal has truly gone to hell. Go ahead, yeah. Rotten newspaper. You hear me? What I said? It’s a rotten newspaper.’ . . .”

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-wall-street-journal-reporter-question_n_681857cee4b08041c58c79f1?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=us_main

Some of the “New Media”

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Article in The Guardian by Richard Luscombe, 5/5/25

Headline:  “Maga media mob: meet the new rightwing faces in the White House briefing room”

Subhead:  “A banjo player and a Black Maga influencer, among others, now attend Trump administration press briefings”

“A disgraced ultra-conservative banjo player ousted from his Grammy-winning band; a far-right conspiracy theorist with alleged ties to Russia; a TikTok creator known as ‘Maga Malfoy’ for his resemblance to the Harry Potter character; and an extremist social media ‘influencer’ once banned from Twitter for posting a video depicting sexual abuse of a child.”

“These are just some of the ‘new media’ personalities courted by the White House to take part in a series of alternative briefings championed by Donald Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt. . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/05/white-house-briefing-rightwing-media

Social Media Posts – In What Language?

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Article in The Guardian by Adam Gabbatt, 5/3/25

Headline:  “Trump’s Truth Social posts make no sense – what do they say about his mentality?”

Subhead:  “The president’s little used social media platform offers him a forum for his nonstop haranguing and score-settling”

“No political leader has used social media quite like Donald Trump. But his recent posts on Truth Social, the social media platform he founded in 2021, have become increasingly bizarre: the president using the lack of scrutiny afforded by the platform’s small user base to truly let loose.

“In the hundreds of ‘Truths’ since he took office, Trump has variously used Truth Social to reimagine himself as a king and to urge Americans to ‘BE COOL!’ as the stock market tanked in the wake of his trade war, the president’s seemingly random use of capital letters, punctuation and inaccurate spelling consistent across the messages. . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/03/trump-truth-social-media-posts