Call it ‘fairness first’: WaPo writer urges anti-Trump media to abandon all neutrality

washington post margaret sullivan trump
Washington Post blogger Margaret Sullivan, a “media columnist,” exhorted everyone in the media to be harder on President Trump and to promote their anti-Trump opinions as straight news. (screenshot)

In a shockingly oblivious show of sanctimony and self-delusion, a Washington Post blogger urged everyone in the media to be even harsher in their coverage of President Trump and to push their anti-Trump opinions as objective news.

Fox News analyst Brit Hume — a frequent Trump critic — was shocked at WaPo “media columnist” Margaret Sullivan and her call to “abandon neutrality” when covering Trump. Why? Because the media were never “neutral” in covering the President to begin with.

Hume called Sullivan’s exhortation to “abandon neutrality” a “complete misnomer.”

Hume explained: “This is simply an argument for opinion masquerading as ‘news’ coverage. It begins with journalists’ opinion as to which views have merit and which have not. Shouldn’t it be left to readers and viewers to decide that?”

Hume was reacting to a Washington Post column written by Margaret Sullivan that was excerpted on Twitter. It read:

“We need to abandon neutrality-at-all-costs journalism, to replace it with something more suited to the moment. Call it Fairness First.

Now more than ever, with a president feeling empowered and vindictive after his acquittal, we need to apply more scrutiny and less credulity to his increasingly extreme actions and statements.”

Amazingly, Sullivan wants the media to disregard their readers’ repeated requests to provide “just the facts” and to insert their anti-Trump animus into their news coverage.

Sullivan apparently believes that readers are too stupid to make their own judgments about Trump so they must be spoon-fed the “right” opinions. She wrote:

“I often talk to news consumers — citizens by another name — who insist that they want “just the facts” reporting. They’re understandably frustrated that they can’t seem to find that when so many news organizations, especially cable news, seem to have chosen political sides for commercial purposes.

They want news that is unbiased — that doesn’t come with a side helping of opinion. Just tell me what happened, they say. I’ll make my own decisions about what it means.

That sounds good in theory. In practice, every piece of reporting on national politics is unavoidably the product of choices: What’s the angle? Who is quoted? What’s the headline? How much historical context is there?”

Of course, the question is: How much harder can the media be on Trump, considering that over 90% of the coverage is negative? It has been that way since the day he took office.


(Source: Hannity)

Sullivan argued that it’s crucial that the media provide predigested, prepackaged anti-Trump propaganda as straight “news.” Why? Because otherwise, consumers might draw their own conclusions about the President. And the Washington Post can’t have that.

Sullivan said the media must “radically” change its approach to news coverage and must take sides.

“We simply are not getting across the big picture or the urgency. This happens, in part, because those news organizations that haven’t chosen up sides — those that want to serve all Americans — fear being charged with bias.

With Trump unbound, the news media need to change. Yes, radically. The stakes are too high not to.”

By now, everyone (on both the Left and the Right) is well-aware that the media have a left-wing bias.

Former CBS News reporter Lara Logan trashed today’s media as political activists masquerading as “journalists.”

Logan, a former correspondent for “60 Minutes,” says the American media are “85% registered Democrats” who are not objective journalists.

That’s what accounts for the shocking number of mistakes and corrections the media have made in their relentlessly negative coverage of President Trump.

https://twitter.com/samantha_chang/status/1089154015085113344

Unlike in decades past, Lara says the media no longer hide their partisan agenda — and that’s a problem because that is not their job.

“I’m 47 now and I’ve been a journalist since I was 17. The media everywhere is mostly liberal, not just in the US,” Logan said. “But in this country, 85% of journalists are registered Democrats. Most journalists are left or liberal or Democrat. [The media have] become political activists — and some could argue — propagandists.”

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