This article was published by the McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Wednesday, June 15, 2016:
The brouhaha over Donald Trump’s revocation of press credentials from the Washington Post has reignited the question: can the press lie in order to prove a point or promote an agenda?
The Donald doesn’t think so. On Monday morning, following the massacre in Orlando, Trump said this on Facebook:
I am no fan of President Obama, but to show you how dishonest the phony Washington Post is, they wrote, “Donald Trump Suggests President Obama Was Involved With Orlando shooting” as their headline. Sad!
Twenty minutes later he pulled the plug on WaPo journos:
Based on the incredibly inaccurate coverage and reporting of the record-setting Trump campaign, we are hereby revoking the press credentials of the phony and dishonestWashington Post.
Just how phony and dishonest is revealed by a close look at the offending article that ticked Trump off. The Post changed the headline, and the lead paragraph, 90 minutes after the original article appeared, softening their claim and lending credence to Trump’s charge. The original article’s lead read:
Trump seemed to repeatedly accuse President Obama on Monday of identifying with radicalized Muslims who have carried out terrorist attacks in the United States and being complicit in the mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando over the weekend, the worst the country has ever seen.
The new headline now reads “Donald Trump Seems to Connect President Obama to Orlando Shooting” and the lead paragraph which now reads:
A day after 49 people were killed in the worst mas shooting in U.S. history, Donald Trump seemed to imply that President Barack Obama might have been connected, in some way, with the attack.
A spokesman for the Post claimed that it made the change on its own, without input from Trump or his campaign: “We changed the headline shortly after it posted to more properly reflect what Trump said. We did so on our own; the Trump campaign never contacted us about it.”
That’s all the proof one needs: “to more properly reflect what Trump said.” Accuracy, it seems, isn’t as important as the message: Trump is a conspiracy freak.
Trump’s revocation of privileges now denies the Post’s journalists, photographers, and other staff members access to press seating, travel with the campaign, or media-only events such as press conferences. However, they may attend any of Trump’s public events, just like everyone else.
The Post has lots of friendly company. Along with the Post, Trump has withdrawn press privileges from journalists with Gawker, BuzzFeed, Foreign Policy, Politico, Fusion, Univision, Mother Jones, the New Hampshire Union Leader, the Des Moines Register and the Daily Beast. A quick internet search reveals that each of these has a leftist slant that promotes the “neverTrump” meme.
How can they do this? How can they get away with slanting the news in order to fit an agenda? A lawsuit brought by two employees of Fox News settled the matter a decade ago. When two honest journalists discovered that there are many health risks related to bovine growth hormone (BGH), Fox was delighted. Supermarket chains were selling milk treated with it, and it was a big story.
It would be an even bigger story, thought Fox, if the journalists could be persuaded to publish false statements attributed to Monsanto executives. The journalists refused, and they were fired. They sued Fox.
To make a years-long story short, the Fox attorneys said they had every right to lie, to distort the facts, and to publish falsehoods. The court agreed with Fox. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case on appeal.
So, yes, the media is free to lie, to distort, to twist, to modify, to ignore facts, to promote falsehoods. The Donald is just now learning the truth about media falsehoods.
Sources:
Project Censored: The Media Can Legally Lie
The Blaze: Trump Bans ‘Phony and Dishonest’ Washington Post Reporters From Attending His Campaign Events
Trump’s announcement on Facebook
NPR: Donald Trump Bans ‘Washington Post’ From Campaign Events
Washington Post: Trump revokes Post press credentials, calling the paper ‘dishonest’ and ‘phony’
Politico: Trump: I’m revoking ‘dishonest’ Washington Post’s credentials
Reuters: Trump revokes Washington Post’s campaign press credentials
History of the Washington Post
The updated article: Donald Trump seems to connect President Obama to Orlando shooting
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