Trump can thank the 'fake media' for his presidency
This fact has been bothering me for a long time. Just like how "Morning Joe" pumped up Trump for well over a year and then turned on him the last few months. (Better late than never). However, Joe Scarborough was one of the reasons Trump got so much free and relatively good press. The article, by Warren Olney, really shines a light on the culpability of the media.
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Of all the disputes about “fake news,” none is more richly ironic than President’s Trump’s attacks on CNN.
After all, the current head of CNN Worldwide, Jeff Zucker, helped design “The Apprentice” to make household words out of “Donald Trump” and “you’re fired” back when he was head of NBC Entertainment. As president and chief executive of CNN 10 years later, Zucker became the giver who kept on giving.
Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan has described his contribution this way: “It was Zucker who gave Trump astonishing amounts of free exposure in the Republican presidential primary on the cable network, continually blasting out his speeches and rallies — often unfiltered and without critical fact-checking.”
During the election season, I saw entire Trump rallies carried live by CNN, interrupted only for mandatory commercials. Not only was there no critical fact-checking, there was no serious effort to provide context for viewers. Never raised, let alone answered, was the question: Why should a developer with a shaky reputation and no relevant experience be seriously considered for the most powerful job in the world?
One explanation came from Trump. Comparing himself to Arnold Schwarzenegger, Trump said he was a “ratings machine.”
It’s no secret that ratings are what determine political coverage on television. Trump built an audience with creatively disgraceful behavior. “It may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS,” that company’s chairman and chief executive, Les Moonves, told advertisers in early 2016. “It’s a terrible thing to say, but bring it on, Donald. Keep going.”
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-olney-trump-zucker-cnn-20170714-story.html
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