|
There is fake news, but it isn’t coming from the New York Times, the Washington Post, MSNBC or CNN. It’s coming from Fox (really fake) News. From InfoWars, which is bizarrely using the First Amendment to defend against the suit by Sandy Hook parents who have suffered death threats because of Alex Jones’ assertions that the massacre of their 6 years olds was staged and they were “crisis actors.” It’s coming from Breitbart and the right-wing blogosphere, mounting propaganda and disinformation campaigns orchestrated by White Supremacists and Russian agents with an aim to sow chaos and disrupt democracy by using our own freedoms against us. But Trump’s attacks on “mainstream” media are mostly because a free and independent press is exposing his corruption and ineptitude as well as the Trump Crime Family and the rest of his administration, and are doing the investigations that relate to the Mueller probe (in the absence of the oversight that Congress is supposed to provide). The Orwellian campaign, part and parcel of every wannabe dictator’s handbook, is meant to undermine Mueller’s investigation and counter any skepticism about the legitimacy of his presidency. Trump said it plainly, “Do not believe what they say; believe what I tell you.” It used to be (two years ago) that the State Department, recognizing the importance of a free press to the propagation of democracy and human rights, would actively support the creation of a free press. But under Trump, its mission statement no longer includes “supporting human rights” and it no longer promotes a free press. Just this month, the State Department withdrew a $700,000 grant for a media enterprise to counter the state-run press propping up Hungary’s increasingly authoritarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. And across the globe, other despots are picking up the same “fake news” phrase to justify and nullify press reports of their corruption and malfeasance. Trump has long ago crossed the line to merely undermining the credibility of respected news organizations to actively inciting violence, calling out the reporters who dutifully follow his increasingly fascistic rallies “Enemies of the People.” Someone will get hurt, New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger warned. That only prompted Trump to heighten the rhetoric in a twitter tirade: “When the media — driven insane by their Trump Derangement Syndrome — reveals internal deliberations of our government, it truly puts the lives of many, not just journalists, at risk! Very unpatriotic!” But journalists have already been murdered, and not just by Putin or Mexican cartels. “Last year was the most dangerous year ever for journalists,” reported Jason Rezaian of the Washington Post, who was himself imprisoned by Iran. “Eighteen journalists were killed around the world in 2017, a record number were imprisoned and threats against the press seemingly have become common, even in the West. Don’t expect that to change in 2018.” That’s not just in faraway places: five journalists were shot dead at the Maryland Capital Gazette in Annapolis by a gunman who did not consider them human beings worthy of living. Trump has acted in many ways to attack and curb the press: he has done his best to stop the merger between AT&T and Time Warner (because of his feud with CNN), has threatened to pull licenses from some stations (even though that is not actually possible), and has issued punitive tariffs on newsprint, trying to push newspapers into bankruptcy, another method he uses to destroy his enemies, as when he goes after Amazon’s postal rates to get Jeff Bezos’ Washington Post. He has withheld press credentials and even refused to take questions from reporters he does not consider friendly, in order to send a clear message: play ball with me or I will ruin your livelihood. He has called for liberalizing libel laws, which he abused liberally before occupying the Oval Office. The reason that 95 percent of the coverage of Trump and his corrupt administration is negative is because 99 percent of what he has done since being installed by the Electoral College (with an assist from Russia), is odious (though it is important to distinguish the news pages from the editorial/opinion page.) The press did not fabricate migrant babies forcibly taken from their mothers and the fact that dozens may be permanently orphaned; nor did they fabricate a meeting between Don Jr., Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner with Russians allied with the Kremlin in Trump Tower in June 2016 to “get dirt on Hillary.” There is a reason why freedom of the press is enshrined specifically in the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, and it goes back to the Zenger Trial in colonial America. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Ben Franklin and the other founders saw the press – the Fourth Estate – as a critical watchdog against abuses of power and the powerful. A free press is as vital in school board meetings as in cabinet meetings. And journalists know they are risking their lives in exposing wrong-doing. “An evil magistrate intrusted [sic] with power to punish for words, would be armed with a weapon the most destructive and terrible. Under pretence [sic] of pruning off the exuberant branches, he would be apt to destroy the tree.” Ben Franklin wrote that in an essay, “On Freedom of Speech and the Press” 50 years before the Constitution was written. “The liberty of the press is essential to the security of the state,” declared John Adams, second president. Karen Rubin Great Neck
|
|
|
Notes |
