I get why President Trump hates certain media outlets. Honestly, I think his list is far too small and should, honestly, involve every single one of them. Not because they’re nasty in their coverage of him, though many are, but because they all really, really suck at their jobs.
First off, let me just say that the idea of an “objective” media is a myth. It’s a modern-day concept that never actually existed on any sort of scale. Look back to the founding of the country, and you will find newspapers with the names of political parties in their names. That wasn’t a coincidence, and the parties did not take their names from the newspapers; it was the other way around.
The media were always cheerleaders for one side or another.
It wasn’t until World War II and the Cold War, when the sides were unambiguously good and evil, that the idea of objectivity came into fashion. Not out of professionalism, but because the American public would not patronize any news outlet extolling the virtues of the Nazis or the communists. Faced with that, they claimed objectivity – which also, by the way, allowed them to cover enemies of this country in as fair a way as the public would accept, particularly during the Cold War.
The correct way to think about the press is not objective, but adversarial. The press, in an ideal world, would be adversarial to every politician, no matter the party. Every politician has things they’d rather not talk about or not be asked about. Those are, more often than not, the questions that should be asked.
That’s not what is happening with Donald Trump. With President Trump, all they focus on is the negative, to the exclusion of everything else. I get why he hates them; I hate them too.
The better way to handle the press, in my opinion, is not to ban any of them, but to call a small group, along with the pool cameras, into the Oval Office for reasons you do not tell them, then rip apart whichever one of them did something egregious in their story on that day. “Reporter X from this outlet reported this. It is not true. Here is Secretary so-and-so to tell you what the truth is. We were not contacted. Their sources are anonymous; we’re here right now to say they are lying. Here are documents and others associated with the story to point out other things that are wrong in the story. Any questions?”
Rip a couple of reporters apart for their hackery and you will soon have a press corps worried that they’ll be next if they get something wrong. Fear and shame are great motivators, much more effective than banning.
Then freeze them out – meaning no one (LITERALLY no one) talks with them, no matter what position they hold. Don’t feed the animals, and the animals get very hungry and change their behavior.
I love watching airheads from CNN or MSNOW get chewed out for their networks’ biased coverage, but I’d love more for them to be treated like Fox or James Rosen and simply be treated like they do not exist. There is nothing like a giant dose of your own medicine to send the message of just how awful a doctor you are.
They’re never, ever going to be fair; don’t waste your time treating them like they are. With all the resources of the White House, there is no way each egregious story could not be so thoroughly researched and dissected from the podium or the Resolute Desk that even the most committed leftist would turn red in the face.
Add in a dash of history of how those very same organizations, and even some of those exact people, sucked up to Barack Obama and Joe Biden and you’ve got the makings of an educational opportunity for the ages.
With the influence of social media, there is an even better chance to circumvent the leftist media completely while using them to educate the public about just how awful they are.
I despise these people, mostly because they don’t do their jobs in any way that is effective in educating the public about the doings of their government. They live in fear of Republicans, especially those named Trump, and kiss the colons of Democrats. Use them against themselves and humiliate them in the process. How much fun would that be?
Derek Hunter is the host of the Derek Hunter Show on WMAL in Washington, D.C., and has a free daily podcast (subscribe!) and is the author of the book Outrage, INC., which exposes how liberals use fear and hatred to manipulate the masses, and is the host of the weekly “Week in F*cking Review” podcast where the news is spoken about the way it deserves to be. Follow him on X at @DerekAHunter.
