After whining about Trump criticizing them for two years, the media instantly abandoned all pretense of objectivity and turned into a pure political propaganda machine to push the "kids in cages" story. Some of the sloppiest and most dishonest reporting of the modern era.
The nearly universal media formulation that Trump is ending "his" child detention policy is Goebbels-level propaganda. The point of exposing all those photos of kids in cages under Obama wasn't to play gotcha. It was documentary proof the policy existed before Trump.
There *is* a Trump policy that could be fairly criticized, but it wasn't the detentions. It was, and at the moment remains, the "zero tolerance" policy for immigration lawbreakers. That's not remotely how the media coverage and Democrat political assault were framed.
Now we get to watch as the media clumsily pivots, like a semi truck skidding on a wet highway, to explaining the long-standing laws that will figure prominently in legal challenges to Trump's executive order.
There was no excuse not to explain that to readers in the first place. NONE. That's the POINT of having professional "journalists." They're supposed to thoroughly research subjects, "fact-check" claims (even from Democrats!) and explain the full context of news events.
But telling the truth wouldn't have helped the Democrat political campaign, would it? Headlines about Trump throwing kids in cages get clicks, stoke outrage, and intimidate Republicans. Headlines about zero tolerance for lawbreakers make people wonder what the fuss is about.
Trump might be thinking that his EO will push the media into covering the issue more accurately, and eventually it will, but in the short term it's being used to validate and ratify their dishonest claim that it was "his" policy all along.
It's beyond ludicrous that the president has to write an executive order in the uncertain hope that it will force 90% of the Democrat media to honestly report the details of what they presented as the most important story in the world.
It's beyond ludicrous that watchdogs have to jump on a tidal wave of "news" stories and debunk them one at a time. The media's conduct over the past few days is an utterly devastating indictment of their professionalism. It should never be forgotten.
It would not have been difficult to cover this story accurately, with full context and reference to events like the false start for the Democrat political hit a few weeks ago, when they used Obama-era detention photos to launch a viral attack on Trump, then hastily deleted it.
It only takes a few extra words to accurately describe Trump's policy differences from Obama, but instead "Trump's detention of children" became the lazy formulation, repeated hundreds of times by reporter-activists who would howl if conservative media did it to a Democrat.
You'll never see a controversial Republican policy turned into the "property" of his Democrat successor by lazy reporters. This is a "mistake" they only make in one political direction. They even falsely tried to claim Fast and Furious was just Obama continuing a Bush policy!
And now there are media outlets retroactively blaming Trump for abuses that actually happened under Obama, filing misleading stories about events from 2016 and earlier, but slyly inserting references to Trump while leaving Obama's name out of the piece.
In addition to calling out the media for Democrat partisan bias, we should also mourn the damage to our civic culture inflicted by this kind of activist "journalism."
Media defenders are quite correct about the role they SHOULD be playing. It's important for voters to understand the full situation and the legal environment politicians operate in. The people need to know if laws passed with good intentions produced bad results, and why.
But instead of cold, hard facts, the media gives us mind-reading about the alleged "intentions" of each administration. Do you think Obama WANTED to put alien children in cages? Of course not. He did it because he HAD to.
The media was busy trying to conceal Obama's role in the policy instead of honestly explaining the legal and political environment. Not a single reporter in the DNC Media would tell you he or she thinks Obama put kids in cages because he's a sadist or uncaring brute.
Their job was to explain to you WHY Obama did that. It's interesting and relevant. But you see, telling that story would have obliged the media to recall Obama's migrant surge, and the Obama administration's desperation to deter people from throwing their kids at the border.
If the media told you the full story of the laws governing illegal immigrant detention, they would have to tell you how much smaller the number of illegal alien children was when those laws were passed. They would have to tell you why the numbers exploded.
The media certainly didn't want to focus coverage on Trump's "zero tolerance" policy because that's such a... nuanced discussion. It's hard to get people worked up about a zero tolerance policy for lawbreakers. There sure wouldn't be much outrage about "ending catch-and-release."
You could fairly criticize the Trump admin for ending catch-and-release without making adequate preparations for the number of families involved... but again, you'd have to explain why there are so many MORE of them than when the laws controlling detention were passed.
The media didn't want to do that. They didn't want to cover ANY aspect of this that was uncomfortable for Democrats or distracted from the "Trump is a monster who puts kids in cages" narrative. They wanted to paint Trump as both fully culpable and utterly unreasonable.
As soon as you admit Trump was neither fully culpable nor utterly unreasonable, the whole Democrat political narrative collapses. We would transition to a rational and productive discussion of policy instead of an emotional freakout. The Dems didn't want that.
The media's job is to foster rational discussions. "Democracy dies in darkness" is supposed to mean "voters need complete and accurate information," not GET TRUMP! They just proved beyond all doubt that they'll compromise journalism to sustain Democrat emotional narratives. /end
ADDENDUM: I can't stress enough that the full details of the child detention issue are not buried secrets. DNC Media outlets are ignoring what their own papers and TV shows reported over the past 10 years. When ALL of them do it, it's a deliberate policy, not lazy reporting.
