Back in February, I asked a question in my Stop the Presses newsletter: “Is the New York Times neutral on the future of democracy?”
They keep answering that question In a disturbing way. stopthepresses.news/p/is-the-new-y…
We’ve got to keep holding the media’s feet to the fire. Please consider subscribing to my free weekly newsletter. stopthepresses.news

Here’s what happened to us. 🧵
Mid-2000: Theresa LePore, elections chief in Palm Beach County, Fla., reacts to a long list of presidential candidates by devising a confusing “butterfly ballot,” a 2-page display with candidate names on alternating sides of a central punch column. November 2000: The presidential race between Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W. Bush hinges on a close vote in Florida. Fringe candidate Pat Buchanan does oddly well on Palm Beach’s “butterfly ballot.” A study later says 2,000 Gore backers mistakenly voted for Buchanan.

What does “Make America Great Again” really mean? It’s nostalgia for the worst aspects of America’s past. A thread. 🧵
1. MAGA means a rollback of child labor laws. 2. MAGA means tolerance of corporate pollution, like the Love Canal disaster in New York.

After Republican Rep. Eric Burlison said today on Fox that Biden’s debate handlers might “jack him up on Mountain Dew,” I looked into the connections between the soft drink and right-wing America. Here’s a 🧵on what I found. 1/9 1940s: Mountain Dew was born in what’s now red-state America. Brothers Barney and Ally Hartman developed it in Knoxville, TN. One of its slogans was: “It’ll tickle your innards!” Pepsi-Cola bought the brand in 1964. 2/9

southernthing.com/mountain-dew-h…
contact.pepsico.com/mtndew/article…

I’m a critic of the New York Times’ weak coverage of the rise of American fascism. But perhaps it’s my fault for irrationally wanting the Times to be better than it is or ever has been. As I note in this 🧵, there’s a long history of very wrong reporting in the Times. 1/20 In 1903, the New York Times said invention of a workable flying machine would take the “continuous efforts of mathematicians and mechanicians in from 1 million to 10 million years.” Sixty-nine days later, the Wright Brothers made their famous flight. 2/20 timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1…

This is a New York Times story about Trump and the Republicans smearing Biden with video fakery.
Yet the headline not only fails to name Trump and Republicans as the cheap-shot artists but casts Biden as struggling to cope “as he battles age doubts.”
Why is NYT doing this? The New York Times headline actually spreads the right-wing disinformation. This keeps happening with the Times. It’s becoming harder and harder to think it’s just poor judgment on the copy desk.

The Republican Party is not a normal political movement – it’s a criminal gang led by a convicted felon. This 🧵 lists some of the shady characters associated with Team Trump.

CONVICTED FELONS
* Trump. 
* Paul Manafort, former Trump campaign chief, tax fraud and bank fraud CONVICTED FELONS 🧵
* Rick Gates, former Trump deputy campaign chief, lying to FBI
* Roger Stone, Trump adviser, witness tampering and lying to Congress
* Michael Flynn, former Trump national security adviser, lying to FBI
* George Papadopoulos, Trump ex-adviser, lying to FBI

This story is an example of how Trump manipulates major media, in this case the Washington Post. The headline – which is the only thing many people read – suggests Trump reached out to Detroit’s Black voters to address their crime crisis. Two big problems with that. 🧵1/4 It’s the third paragraph before we learn that the audience “was not predominantly Black.” The story says in the 17th paragraph that “No one in line identified themselves to a reporter as a member of Sewell’s church.” It’s Astroturfing – fake grassroots support. 2/4

I’ve been thinking about lower-level staffers at the Murdoch “news” outlets and Sinclair TV. They’re not calling the shots when their bosses spread disinformation.
I want to tell them: Quit now! Save your careers and self-respect!
But there are nuances, so I wrote this 🧵. 1/12 Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News and NY Post lie constantly. Fox paid a $787 million settlement for lying about the 2020 election. To Murdoch, that was just the cost of doing business, because his business is hoodwinking the American people to boost right-wing politicians. 2/12

I’ll never forget the time Trump called for “termination” of the Constitution and the New York Times put it on Page 13. 🧵 1/9 Here’s the NYT front page for Dec. 5, 2022. Important stories about Russia and Iran. Promos about K-Pop and college football. Nothing about Trump’s call to terminate the Constitution. 2/9

Nikki Haley’s endorsement of Trump is her play for the VP slot. And she might get it. Trump could use her to pretend to be a moderate. Of course, he’s not and she’s not either – despite the media pretending she is. Here’s a🧵about Haley’s extremism. 1/8 Nikki Haley depicts herself as a moderate on abortion — and many journalists have gone along — but she has said if a six-week abortion ban had arrived at her desk as South Carolina’s governor, she would have signed it. 2/8 washingtonpost.com/elections/2023…

About six decades ago, a group pushed for doubling immigration, cracking down on polluters and leaning on businesses for fair hiring. It did this in a radical document called the 1960 Republican Party platform.🧵 1/12 presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/repu… GOP 1960: Bring in twice as many immigrants, if not more.
MAGA 2024: Immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.” 2/12

This is not normal.🧵
A candidate for president is explaining how a worm ate part of his brain while a rival who’s an ex-president is “cursing audibly” in court while listening to a porn star describe lousy sex with him while a key supporter who wants to be the ex-president’s … (Not normal, cont.🧵)
… running mate is bragging about shooting her dog in the head in a gravel pit and saying the current president ought to execute his own dog. Meanwhile, a Supreme Court justice whose wife plotted to overthrow the government is ruling on cases involving …

The New York Times has made it clear in recent public comments that it doesn't think the defense of democracy is part of its job. This failure to meet the moment is a shameful surrender. 🧵 1/10 In a new interview, NYT Executive Editor Joe Kahn downplayed the preservation of democracy as an issue this year.  He thinks immigration is No. 1, based on unnamed polls. But that’s not even true. Many polls say the economy. 2/10

The New York Times keeps putting vague headlines on stories about MAGA fascism. It happens so often that I don’t think it’s accidental. A proper, direct headline for this story would be:
“Trump’s Rhetoric Gets More Radical and Divisive.”
That’s what the story says. Here’s a gift link for the NYT story by @chashomans. It’s generally an accurate and alarming story about the Trump threat to end democracy. nytimes.com/2024/04/27/mag…

🧵
Ginni Thomas is still getting away with her J6 coup plotting.
Clarence Thomas is still ruling on cases involving his insurrectionist wife.
Steve Bannon is still out of jail and doing a podcast. 🧵
Gen. Michael Flynn, who was pardoned for his treachery, is still promoting his anti-government message, is still collecting his military pension, and is promoting a new movie.
Fox News is still lying after paying a $787M settlement for its past lies.

Today’s Trump trial testimony reminds us of how mainstream media – including the New York Times, Washington Post and Politico – were badly played by Trump in 2016. An example: The National Enquirer’s Trump-inspired hoax linking Ted Cruz’s dad to the JFK assassination.🧵1/7 The Enquirer’s David Pecker testified that the tabloid faked a photo of Ted Cruz’s dad with Lee Harvey Oswald to help Trump’s campaign in 2016. He said the tabloid “mashed” 2 photos together. “That’s how that story was prepared — created, I would say.” 2/7
nbcnews.com/politics/donal…

A few days before Biden’s inauguration in 2021, Rep. Ralph Norman secretly urged the White House to declare martial law to keep Trump in office.
In the last 15 months, the New York Times has mentioned Norman in 44 stories without recalling that fact.
That’s coup amnesia.🧵1/6 The latest New York Times mention of the traitorous Ralph Norman was published today — with nothing about his text suggesting that Trump enlist the military in a coup in 2021. To the Times, Norman is just a GOP congressman doing GOP congressman things. 2/6
nytimes.com/2024/04/18/us/…

Republican politicians keep spewing violent rhetoric. Not all voters are aware of this, so we must keep warning them. And we mustn’t normalize it. The GOP’s gun-waving craziness endangers our country. This thread includes some shocking examples. 1/13 This week, Sen. Tom Cotton called for people to “take matters into their own hands” if protesters block roads. Cotton wants protesters thrown off bridges. He said if protesters glue their hands to cars, they should have “their skin ripped off.” 2/13

https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1779939134045299168

Many Americans still underestimate Donald Trump. They think he’s a cartoon character in a show called politics. They don’t think a Trump victory this year would harm their lives. They’re wrong. In this thread I look at off-base predictions about Trump over the years. 1/15 Trump was such a joke in 2011 that Comedy Central broadcast a roast of him. Seth MacFarlane said it was “fucking delusional” that Trump talked about running for president. 2/15

I saw another right-wing cheap-shot artist describe Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker as a child of privilege. That would be true if money was the only thing that mattered. But Pritzker lost both of his parents by the age of 17. A thread. 1/7 J.B. Pritzker’s father died of a heart attack at age 39, when J.B. was 7. His mother was an alcoholic, and J.B. would check on her at night because she drank and smoked in bed and he was afraid she’d set the sheets on fire. 2/7
chicago.suntimes.com/2022/5/13/2306…