Just saw this. Around noon I was drafting a post in my head on a topic raised by that lede but then had a meeting I had to get to. The post was to be entitled, "Demagoguery Dies in Darkness," a pastiche on WaPo's slogan "Democracy Dies in Darkness" for Donald Trump would never have happened had the media, mainstream and, as here, social, had not spread Trump's demagoguery. This is not original. It has been written here and elsewhere, including the Times, during the campaign and after: ~$4 billion in free advertising through the election; the Huffington Post originally decided to relegate Trump's nonsense to the entertainment section, taking it off their front page. But if they ever did I sure as hell missed it.
"Bad money drives good money out" it is said of counterfeiting and nothing spells money like T-R-U-M-P. It's a race to the bottom for the Huff Post, for the Gray Lady, for Chief WaPo. Just ask the Times. Spreading Trump's demagoguery has improved their bottom line. So now we have ledes like that at top drawing eyes and advertisers bucks to "analytical" articles, because that's what we do at The New York Times, we give you "analysis." Under the guise of analysis, with the fig leaf of quotation marks, the Times repeats, spreads and amplifies Trump's lies and distortions, which do in fact "erode," just as the lede says. Trump's lies and demagoguery erode trust--in The New York Times, as well!--they erode the "currency" of "All the News That's Fit to Print," they erode public discourse, they erode "news,"--There is nothing "new" about what Trump does. Why cover it?--they erode our politics, they erode democracy itself. All in the name of more debased money redounding to the benefit of one person: Donald Trump. Democracy does die when a free press cannot shine a light. It also dies when a magnifying glass concentrates that light in a burning, destructive beam.
"Bad money drives good money out" it is said of counterfeiting and nothing spells money like T-R-U-M-P. It's a race to the bottom for the Huff Post, for the Gray Lady, for Chief WaPo. Just ask the Times. Spreading Trump's demagoguery has improved their bottom line. So now we have ledes like that at top drawing eyes and advertisers bucks to "analytical" articles, because that's what we do at The New York Times, we give you "analysis." Under the guise of analysis, with the fig leaf of quotation marks, the Times repeats, spreads and amplifies Trump's lies and distortions, which do in fact "erode," just as the lede says. Trump's lies and demagoguery erode trust--in The New York Times, as well!--they erode the "currency" of "All the News That's Fit to Print," they erode public discourse, they erode "news,"--There is nothing "new" about what Trump does. Why cover it?--they erode our politics, they erode democracy itself. All in the name of more debased money redounding to the benefit of one person: Donald Trump. Democracy does die when a free press cannot shine a light. It also dies when a magnifying glass concentrates that light in a burning, destructive beam.
