How Trump Gets Away With Calling The Media Fake News

Of all the countless disturbing aspects of Donald Trump’s personality, the one that bothers me — and I suspect, many people — the most is his compulsive, pathological obsession with saying things that are blatantly false. The sheer pace and volume of these falsehoods is staggering. That Trump can say/tweet these things so openly and unashamedly, time after time after time, makes it hard to conclude that this guy is not mentally disturbed.

Then, adding insult to injury, for him to accuse the media of being “fake news” for reporting on these falsehoods is a height of hypocrisy that is only surpassed by its unmitigated obnoxiousness. I think it’s safe to say that we have never before witnessed anything close to this in the political history of our country.

What I find just as disturbing is the media’s pathetic inability to nail this fucking jerk for his astounding hypocrisy. Do you remember that incredible February 16th press conference when he spent 77 minutes lambasting the press and boasting about himself? (falsely, of course) That was sickening. To hear him go on and on about the “dishonest media”, standing at the podium pointing his finger and thundering “you are fake news” made me wish that the CNN reporter would go up to him and punch him in the face.

But as a progressive, nonviolence is one of the tenets I hold most dear. It is a principle I believe in as fervently as conservatives believe in cutting taxes for the rich. So, while his loutish behavior provoked an uncharacteristic response from me, a much more satisfying action by the CNN reporter would have been to nail Trump on his hypocrisy.

  

And NBC reporter Peter Alexander came close to doing that. After Trump falsely claimed that his electoral win was the biggest since Reagan, Alexander corrected him then asked, “Why should Americans trust you when you accuse the information they receive as being fake when you’re providing information that’s fake?”

That was a great question and it actually did nail Trump to the wall. Unfortunately, just like jello, Trump was able to slither his way off the wall. The reporter had the opportunity to drag Trump over the coals on that — which is exactly what Trump deserved —  but he left him off the hook.

Trump managed to deflect the impact of the question by answering “I don’t know. I was given that information.” Then he threw a distraction at the reporter by saying, then asking “We won by a very, very big margin… do you agree with that?” The reporter shrugs “you’re the President” then sits down! This was more a case of the reporter’s ineptness rather than Trump’s cleverness. I gave a detailed report on this interaction in a previous post: liberalbabyboomer.blogspot.com/…

You could tell Trump knew he was nailed but then when the reporter — instead of a follow up question — answers Trump’s question with “you’re the President”, he allowed Trump to say “OK thank you. That’s a good answer.” In his mind and the mind of his supporters he had nullified the question with a perfectly reasonable excuse. Trump did indeed nullify the question but his “excuse” was complete nonsense.

Why do I say Trump nullified the question? Because that interaction should have been the main takeaway from the press conference. But it was just a side bar in the subsequent reporting.
I mean, here is the Asshole-in Chief -- The King of Fake News -- pointing and thundering for 77 minutes about the “Fake News Media” and their dirty low down dishonest reporting and then he blurts out a blatant falsehood that he had already made and been corrected on in the past! He also made about a half dozen other incorrect statements in this presser.

I checked the right-wing media later and they completely ignored this interaction. I didn’t hear a single talk show host try to address it. Didn’t hear it brought up on Fox News. 

On the contrary, the right wingers were jubilant after this. I heard Ann Coulter gush and giggle like a schoolgirl. “It was magnificent!” “I was in heaven.” As far as the right-wingers were concerned, Trump gave the biased liberal press the shellacking they deserved. This was the moment when the right-wing media started to use the phrase “Fake News” every single time they referred to the “media” (excluding themselves, of course).

If only the reporter had responded, after Trump used the excuse “I was given that information”:

“The information you were given was fake, Mr President. You then gave Americans fake information.” It would not have been impertinent for the reporter to then state the obvious: “You have a very long history of reporting fake news as real news. You obviously can’t tell the difference between fake news and real news.”… and then repeat his question “Why should Americans trust you when you accuse the information they receive as being fake when you’re providing information that’s fake?”

Wouldn’t it have been “magnificent” if the reporter had followed up his question like that?
I know I  would have been “in heaven” if he had. Wouldn't it have been marvelous to hear Trump try to answer that question again? Do you think the right-wing media would have been so jubilant?

In my next post I will examine time magazine’s pathetic attempt to hold Trump accountable in their March cover story “Is Truth Dead?”