A perfect opportunity to test some of the ideas I wrote about here. It shouldn’t be a total non-story that literally everything Trump says in trying to appeal to voters is an egregious lie. us19.campaign-archive.com/?u=8855a23519a…
See, I think it’s an extremely important point, part and parcel of the larger story, which is that Trump’s appeal to military families is a lie and and he in fact disdains them.
More generally, I think it’s completely insane that Trump tells these demonstrably false lies about literally everything and it’s just treated as background noise, rather than treated with the alarm it deserves.
If in 2012 Obama had abruptly started telling seniors he was responsible for creating Medicare Part D, it would’ve been astonishing.
If he was in court trying to conceal years of tax returns from prosecutors, the “what is he hiding???” drumbeat would’ve been relentless.
I know, and have written over and over again, that Democrats feed this imbalance by not beating the drums themselves, the way Republicans would, but we as journalists don’t need permission from one of the parties to be astonished and fixed on something.
Set aside everything in Goldberg’s piece, for instance, and think of this: Trump is trying to attract votes from military veterans by telling them he signed a bill that created a benefit for them that a different president actually signed. What the hell?! That is ludicrous.
It says ~something~ about national political journalism that Trump told that one lie dozens and dozens of times before a reporter on the White House beat asked him about it (and he walked away).
In a report leading with Trump’s non-credible denial, the Times asserts that Trump has made “veterans care [a] pillar[] of his campaign,” without even a passing note that the main appeal on this score (that he “signed veterans‘ choice) is an outright lie. nytimes.com/2020/09/04/us/…
This is a really welcome challenge to the press from Biden, along the lines of this week’s newsletter, but hopefully just a start. Trump is a fraud, his whole campaign is built on defrauding the public.
There’s one wrinkle to Trump’s budget lying. Smart bet is GOP leaders just let him steal money for 4 more years then try to extort a future Dem POTUS to gut Medicare, but if Trump wasn’t lying about this, he’d just be reviving his other false promise to leave entitlements alone.
Fauci gets it. Everything is a lie because the only thing that he cares about is re-election, and he has a dismal record and nothing to offer that’s both constructive and real.
Every single appeal to voters is a fabrication. Frequently the government manipulates evidence to make these lies seem true. cnn.com/2020/09/09/pol…
When Trump says something meant to convince people to vote for him, at least 99 times out of 100 it is a lie. latimes.com/politics/story…
Occasionally he’ll say something about, like, judges that isn’t totally fictional, but that’s about it.
A government-wide conspiracy to abet Russian interference in the election on Trump’s behalf, and deceive the public into thinking other governments are the real culprits, and working to help Biden. Lies all the way down.
It’s this ethic—say whatever you think you have to say to prevail or get out of a jam—applied to a national referendum on his presidency. That’s why every facet of the re-election message is dishonest.
Everything the incumbent president says in the hope of winning votes is a lie. Good to correct the individual lies, but that overarching seems like a big story on its own.
Apparently nobody cares, but to me, it is important not just to correct the outpouring of lies as they come but to reckon with the thematic point that nothing the incumbent president says when he’s appealing to the public for votes is true. apnews.com/ec85b88102464c…
A more productive way to cover this kind of thing would be as part of a larger CaMpAiGn NaRrAtIvE about how no part of Trump’s appeal to voters is true. I mean, as I understand it from my time in the biz, “the news” loves a good CaMpAiGn NaRrAtIvE.
New: I don’t know how things will shake out early next year, but I think it was a mistake for Dems to agree to decouple certain domestic appropriations from defense (sorry, the “ladder approach”) as ransom to the GOP to avoid a Thanksgiving shutdown. offmessage.net/p/shoots-and-l…
This all happened very fast, and because the Freedom Caucus is mad and Republicans are cosplaying Street Fighter, most of the coverage has taken it as a given that Mike Johnson caved. I’m not so sure. offmessage.net/p/shoots-and-l…
Democrats have conceded “take it or leave it” leverage that comes with omnibus bills and clean CRs, allowing Republicans in principle to demagogue their way to full defense appropriations while shutting down or gutting other departments. offmessage.net/p/shoots-and-l…
SOME PROFESSIONAL NEWS: Thursday was my last day at Crooked Media, today I launch a new, independent venture. It’s called Off Message and I hope you’ll join me by subscribing. offmessage.net/p/welcome-to-o…
If you’ve followed my work in recent years, you know I’ve been consistently concerned that the liberal and Democratic Party tendency to hyper-caution is a bad fit for a zero-sum fight against authoritarianism. offmessage.net
At the same time, I’ve been heartened by the many exceptions. Most recently, the 1/6 Committee, the Fetterman campaign, Jack Smith, Fani Willis, the clear signal from 2022 voters that they will prioritize democracy and basic rights over any policy issue or picayune grievance.
Our media in response to a basically good jobs report, my god…
Ok, I went and looked. In March, 2019, BLS reported that the economy added 196,000 jobs. Here’s how the same media interpreted that finding for news consumers.
In August of the same year, the economy added 164,000, before revisions. Here’s the story the public heard about it.
I think another way to look at the dynamic Greg describes here is that McCarthy, other GOP leaders, Fox, et al have trapped themselves. They could get together, smoke-filled room style, and solve their collective-action problem, but refuse to. washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/…
The Times, similarly, sees a story about Trump’s strength, but I see a mirror image story of GOP weakness.
The Times could’ve inverted the emphasis: DeSantis CRUSHES Trump among GOP voters who say Trump committed serious crimes. My takeaway isn’t really about how well or poorly DeSantis is doing vs Trump, it’s that there are so few GOP voters who know or admit Trump committed crimes.
Newsletter! (Yesterday’s.) I looked at the bafflement among It’s The Economy, Stupid liberals over why Joe Biden remains unpopular, despite a very strong economy. https://t.co/rCFqy2WxeKmailchi.mp/crooked.com/bi…
One possible explanation is, I think, pretty obvious… https://t.co/9XgiG6qbFWeepurl.com/gQH7lz
The best alternate explanation, consistent with the theory that a good economy helps incumbents like clockwork, is that there’s a lag between the economy becoming good and the public catching up. I hope it’s correct, but it’s a gamble and there are reasons to imagine it’s wrong.