News media no longer an honest broker of competing interests
Donald Trump’s comments on the media resonated with voters because the news media stopped being an honest broker between competing interests.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press ...,” says our Constitution’s First Amendment. By placing press freedom within the very first of 10 very important amendments, and third in the enumerated list of rights within that, the Founding Fathers signaled how very important freedom of the press would be if our Republic were to survive in reasonable harmony.
Ask most working journalists today why the Founders were so enthusiastic, and they’ll say it’s because the press serves as a watchdog on powerful politicians, corrupt institutions, greedy businesses and outof-control government agencies.
But what does the public do when news reports are overwhelmingly one-sided? It’s commonplace to see major media news stories about the concerns of illegal immigrants who hope not to be deported.
Compare that to the number of stories you saw about an unemployed citizen or legal resident who can’t find a job, or can only find a job with artificially depressed wages. It wasn’t 50-50, was it? The press mostly overlooked the citizens’ concerns.
The construction or hospitality worker with depressed wages, a struggling taxpayer who sees 20 percent of New York City residents receive food stamps, a longtime factory worker who sees her job go abroad — their stories rarely got told. Until Donald J. Trump. In response, the established politicians, the editorial boards of 57 out of 59 newspapers, all told the public to avoid Donald J. Trump.
He was a risk, they said. We don’t know his views, they said. He’s probably just promoting his brand, they said. But tens of millions of Americans had already lost hope, and people who have lost hope are willing to take risks. Electing Donald J. Trump was a risk.
But when he described the news media, his concerns were theirs. He “got it.”