Newsroom Nastiness

It’s getting downright nutty, even vicious, in many newsrooms as Donald Trump’s presidency is finally upon us. Thursday alone brought several brazen bits of bias, not to mention downright sloppy reporting.

A New York Times piece claimed Energy Secretary-designate Rick Perry had no idea a key purpose of the agency is to maintain US nuclear security. But the story was unsourced and unattributed. And the one person quoted by name says he was misinterpreted.

Plus, Perry’s statement on the day he was nominated says flatly he looks forward to “safeguarding our nuclear arsenal.” (His state, Texas, has the nation’s largest nuclearweapons maintenance facility.)

A grossly snarky Washington Post headline noted that Agriculture Secretary-designate Sonny Perdue “once led a prayer for rain” during a local drought.

The headline could have mentioned that Perdue, who grew up on a farm, is a zealous proponent of Georgia’s poultry and cattle products. But that would have meant passing on the chance to mock religious beliefs.

Another Washington Post headline called David Gelernter, under consideration as Trump’s science adviser, an “anti-intellectual.”

In fact, Gelernter is a visionary computer scientist, a Yale prof who’s written widely on a host of intellectual topics from “Americanism” to the nature of consciousness. He has also, as the Post piece noted, “decried the influence of liberal intellectuals on college campuses” — hardly “anti-intellectual.”

CNN ran a bizarre “Situation Room” segment speculating that a Democratic holdover would become president if a terrorist attack at the inauguration killed Trump, Mike Pence and all the Cabinet nominees.

That same scenario has existed for every other president, without a special CNN segment. So it sounded more like wishful thinking than actual reporting.

This is why Trump distrusts the national media, and why growing numbers of Americans agree.