Like DougJ and, apparently, Paul Krugman, I have been horrified by the NY Times this election. So much so that I finally cancelled:
To cancel your @nytimes call 877-698-5635 and make sure you explain you are cancelling for the false balance and journalistic malpractice.
— Hillary's Earpiece (@Johngcole) September 13, 2016
And Paul Krugman asks a good question. Why?:
At any rate, let’s make this happen. They won’t respond to criticism from media experts, maybe market forces will send them a message. And if it were not for the three hours in the evening, I’m this god damned close to pulling the plug on MSNBC.
Trentrunner
Ross Douthat (NYT columnist) just tweeted:
Not at all sure press is getting balance right, but I do think it reasonable to weight scrutiny somewhat based on probability of victory.
Well, there’s one of your fucking problems, right there. As if scrutiny might never affect probability.
Not to mention, while Clinton has generally held a steady lead, it’s NEVER been insurmountable.
We. Are. So. Fucked.
LABiker
I’m having a hard time letting go because of the person in the screen shot.
Villago Delenda Est
@Trentrunner: Douchehat’s head would look so much better on a pike than it does on his shoulders.
Just sayin’.
scav
That Douthat comment really is the next stage in the “We create our own reality.” stream, mashed up with the “to the victor belong the spoils” ethos. The probable victor (as Ross predicts) should warp not only reality but the coverage thereof. Wrapped up in a nutshell with a flag-covered bow on it.
JMG
Douthat was a guy promoted way out of his weight class. As long as nobody read him, he could retain his rep as a thoughtful conservative. Exposure to a mass audience killed that.
Wapiti
@Villago Delenda Est: to paraphrase a Chumbawumba song, “Everybody says he looks better like that!”
eta: the song, I Did It for Alfie, was about a guy who beheaded a marble statue of Thatcher with a cricket bat.
Trentrunner
John Harwood (CBS News) just tweeted:
The reply:
gogol's wife
Krugman’s comment thread is infested with Bernfeelers.
Brachiator
I’ve worked for major newspapers. I have friends who have worked for the NY Times. Hell, I have friends who are (distant) relations of the owners of the NY Times. I think that some of the whining about the MSM is a bunch of hooey.
But not this. Trump has always lived and been a part of NY. It is absurd that the New York papers have not been on his ass much harder than they have been. And much of the focus on Hillary, when other politicians and candidates have done the same thing, or worse, is fucking ridiculous, by any reasonable standard.
The strange thing is that newspapers are dying. Older conservatives (also a dying breed) cannot rescue them, so a right wing tilt does not explain enough. Something more critical is at play. A loss sense of mission. An inability to understand the essentials of a story. A desperate need to pander instead of communicate.
Whatever. A newspaper can have a point of view. It’s foolish to believe otherwise. But it has to play fair with its readers and the people and institutions it covers. Otherwise it has no reason for existing.
The NY Times may have crossed that threshold with its readers.
cynthia ackerman
I’m tempted to subscribe for the first time just so I can immediately cancel.
ETA — and to say FU Douthat
Marianne19
Josh at TPM has a great analysis of the structural issue v
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-crisis-at-the-times-and-that-public-editor-piece
And I also cancelled today.
Hunter Gathers
The Village is still pissed that the Lewinsky Affair didn’t destroy Bill Clinton. As far as they are concerned, consensual sex between two adults in the White House is infinitely worse than anything that Nixon or Dubya did. Since Bill Clinton wasn’t forced from office, his wife must be destroyed at all costs. Very few of them aren’t white males, so they think that the fresh hell a Trump Administration would unleash won’t harm them, right up until libel suits brought by AG Chris Christie against their employers cost them their paychecks and cushy lifestyles. They are nothing but Good Germans.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
I haven’t bothered much with the NYT since early in the administration of W the Strange Idiot Boy. I see I haven’t missed much.
They’ll never learn.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@LABiker: I don’t have a subscription – I just read Krugman online. When I run up against the free article limit I clear the browsing history. I wish there were some way to just contribute directly for Kthulu and not pay a penny for the rest of the shitshow, but I suppose that would still encourage them.
ETA: Villago delenda est, indeed. With a flamethrower.
hueyplong
@cynthia ackerman: I’d advise against that. The NYT would simply spin about how first time subscriptions are up in response to their righteous reporting (while failing to mention the program of immediate cancellations).
“Wave of New Subscriptions In Wake of Coverage”
Is there anything you’ve seen from them lately that indicates they’d play it any differently?
Villago Delenda Est
@Hunter Gathers: Consensual sex is worse than the most obvious war crime since Poland was invaded in 1939.
rikyrah
I am loving watching regular people call them out on their shyt.
Desmond
@gogol’s wife: They’ve never forgiven him for pointing out Bernie’s magical thinking.
rikyrah
The thing is especially on Twitter, people are literally TELLING THE NYT the stories that they want to read about A literal laundry list.
Villago Delenda Est
@Desmond: Fuck the Bernfeelers. With the Clenis.
Hunter Gathers
@Villago Delenda Est: Not only that, but the consensual sex was, by all accounts, enjoyed. Unforgivable. Absolutely unforgivable.
AdamK
I cancelled my NYT subscription years ago, around the time of the Judith Miller mess (anyone else sense a pattern?) and I cancelled my cable last year. I have not missed either one. At all.
Sayne
kthug.jpg :-D
Mister Forkbeard
@Trentrunner: The thing is, he’s not entirely wrong and that’s the line they’re going with.
Back in the primaries, Clinton should (and did) get a hell of a lot more scrutiny than Jim Webb. But that’s like comparing someone who had 70% of the vote to someone who had 1%. In this case, it’s HRC +5 at the most, which means that spending all your scrutiny on her is really putting the thumb on the scale to help Trump, who’s not very far behind and yet is suffering from very little press scrutiny and is frequently given the benefit of the doubt.
James E Powell
I could not agree more. The NYT has a fairly obvious animus against Clinton. When presented with this and asked to explain, the public editor essentially said tough shit, we’re going to keep doing it.
It is wrong to support them.
Marianne19
Hi can I get out of moderation for posting a link to TPM?
Trentrunner
@Mister Forkbeard: Douthat isn’t talking about a Webb-Clinton disparity (30-60 points).
He’s talking about the Trump-Clinton race, which is between 3 and 5 percent right now.
He’s clearly trying to rationalize the horrific disproportion in NYT coverage, and it’s pathetically weak.
Mister Forkbeard
@srv: “We knew that the media hates Hillary for no reason. That means we should be okay with it and keep paying them money to slander her.” >_>
Suzan
I saw Josh’s post which linked to the public editor’s article. After reading that, I too dumped the times (go read the responses, it will make you feel better.) It felt like losing an old friend. I told ’em it was because of the public editor’s comments and the unbalanced nature of its election coverage. I told them I was going to the Wash Post which had been fair this year.
jacy
@Brachiator:
Newspapers aren’t ever going to capture a younger cohort — to do that, they’d have to radically change their model in a way I’m not smart enough to imagine. It’s just not going to happen. So they increasing chase the older cohort, even though that gets smaller and smaller. It’s the same problem as the Republican party, who keep chasing the old white men, even as they become scarcer. In the end, you get a distillation of bad habits or bad ideas.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I’d drop the New York Times, but I don
t subscribe to them. Maybe I should subscribe just so I can drop them…
Mister Forkbeard
@Trentrunner: Oh, I know. And that’s what I was trying to say – maybe I wasn’t clear enough.
The point is that the media is going to say “Hypothetically, in this one case this is how we should behave!” and they’re going to be correct even though that use case doesn’t apply to the current situation. But they’ll pretend that it does, and that’s exactly what Douthat is doing.
eclare
Cancelled today and gave the rep I talked to a (polite) earful about the coverage. She asked several questions, so I hope she took notes to pass along, if anyone cares. Going to check out the Post.
SiubhanDuinne
@Trentrunner:
That’s exactly it. Bobo, Chunky Bobo, Liz Spayd, and the rest, seem utterly oblivious to the fact that for years they have lovingly created and nurtured a narrative which influences readers and voters. So do other papers and magazines and radio/T&V/cable stations, of course, but the Times bears a special weight of responsibility precisely because so many other news outlets across the country (and around the world, for that matter) look to them as a beacon of journalistic excellence.
Fair Economist
@Mister Forkbeard: Extra scrutiny for leaders in the primary is appropiate, because it’s more likely that the populace will have to make a decision on them. In the general, it’s wrong, because the choice is now set. The populace has to make a decision, and they expect *actually* evenhanded coverage – same emphasis on a given scandal no matter who the perpetrator. They are many mlles from that. Light-years, perhaps.
SiubhanDuinne
@gogol’s wife:
Ugh, now I feel all itchy.
Jeffro
Everyone who drops them, be sure to tell them why
Same if you quit watching CNN or MSNBC, etc
Keith P.
Ugh, I’m about ready to cancel my AT&T service out of self-preservation. My phone (a SHITTY MS Lumia 950…I’ve had WinPhones since day 1, but this one SUCKS) was losing wifi and using up my data plan. I spent over an hour last weeks getting a replacement, and it was horrible…transferred 5 times, given runaround. My blood pressure got seriously messed up over it. Got a replacement phone.
Then last night, I got an email saying I was being sent *another* phone. This one never showed up in spite of UPS saying it’s on my front porch. Now, I have to spend another afternoon sorting it out. this really gets to me, since these my blood pressure is so bad, it’s not good for me to have these calls. But how do I avoid having to make them?
Fair Economist
I can’t boycott the Times, because I don’t subscribe. (I almost did about a year ago, but not quite.) I did subscribe to the online WaPo when they started giving Trump a somewhat serious level of scrutiny. They’re far from perfect too but you do what you can.
jacy
@jacy:
I moved my 79-year-old mother in with me this summer. Weekly she asks me why I don’t have a landline and why I don’t subscribe to a newspaper. I haven’t had either for 15 years. The Boyfriend keeps trying to get me to cut the cord with satellite TV, but I need my hockey, so until I can get that ala carte, I’m stuck.
Brachiator
@jacy:
I run across more younger people, especially in tech, who are happy to be uninformed. They just want to follow who their friends follow. News media is dead to them. But chasing a shrinking older cohort does not work.
There needs to be a new model for media, but no one has it nailed yet. Even online tech pubs are failing.
Turgidson
@LABiker:
Use your monthly free articles to read his stuff. That’s what I do. And reading his blog is free unless he posts something that’s almost article-length, in which case you have to use up one of your clicks.
hovercraft
@Villago Delenda Est:
Speaking of Bernfeelers, Katrina Van Derwhatever was on MTP Daily giving her pre convention spiel, Hillary is losing because she is not inspiring and she is not talking about liberal policies, and she is seen as a continuation of Obama’s policies, drones, war, Wall Street, and she is not for using/urging article 2 powers to pardon Edward Snowden who performed a valuable service for the country. She needs to figure out how to become the agent for change. So basically if she doesn’t become Bernie she is going to lose. Oy vey.
Cacti
@James E Powell:
If the NYT can’t find a career ending scandal on the Clinton’s, they’ll invent one.
Thoughtful David
One of the problems with this strategy, I think, is that newspapers don’t really make much of their money from subscriptions. If you have the dead-tree subscription, it mainly pays for the paper, ink, and delivery. They probably make a little more from the online subscriptions. But most of the profit comes from advertisers.
And we ain’t those.
Kay
@Brachiator:
Agreed. Hell, they could probably go thru their own archive and vet Trump. What a weird failure. A former NY Senator and a NY celebrity and the New York Times coverage sucks.
Wouldn’t have predicted that! Right in their own backyard.
Botsplainer
@srv:
Fuck off and die, dickless.
Cacti
@hovercraft:
The editor of The Nation.
And the wife of the foremost Vladimir Putin/Russia apologist in the United States…to whom she gives regular columns to expound on why Vlad is right.
Some lefties still haven’t forgiven the U.S. for winning the Cold War.
Renie
I just spent the last 15 minutes writing out a well thought, documented comment to Ms. Spayd’s column and BOOM, my stupid computer resized its self and I lost the comment. Ugh not re-writing it now. We have had the NYT delivered to our home since we moved here in 1987; my husband reads it daily on the train but doesn’t follow politics much so I doubt he would be willing to cancel.
Spayd’s talk about each candidates’ high unfavorables, doesn’t take into consideration that the NYT was a top player in bashing the Clintons for over 20 years and helping to create her unfavorables, which IMO, are based on false theories and innunendo. Trump’s unfavorables are based on his character. Big difference.
She says “If Trump is unequivocally more flawed than his opponent, that should be plenty evident to the voting public come November.” Who is she kidding? If they don’t report on what Trump does and has done, how will anyone know about the b.s. There is just no comparison between CGI and Trump’s foundation, but she talks as if they are equal charitable foundations that need to be written about. B.S. One is a huge charity endeavor helping millions of people and the other is a scam (like his University) that benefits him.
The media has really gone over the cliff in this election.
Trollhattan
@srv:
You’re taking Aleppo faith there.
Roger Moore
@Trentrunner:
IOW, if there’s no horse race, we should work on making one.
NotoriousJRT
Done last week. The C-I-C forum BS was my final straw.
SiubhanDuinne
@rikyrah:
Seriously. As I mentioned in Doug!’s thread downstairs, the pushback both against Liz Spayd’s piece and, more broadly, against the entirety of the NYT’s coverage, was clear, pointed, articulate, brutal, and pretty close to unanimous. I read (well, skimmed) most of the 700+ comments to Liz, and I was really quite stunned at what seemed to be the entire readership rising up as one. Really worth checking out those comments.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
@srv: Holy shit! That would bring you four new electoral votes! No wonder you’re so thrilled!
Blueskies
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Nah, don’t subscribe to NYT just to dump them. Instead, subscribe to WaPo and then tell NYT why you just did that.
Lizzy L
I never subscribed to the NYT, but I do read it online every day. I skip anything it says about Clinton because I no longer trust it. It hurts to say that. I was born on West 13th St., FFS, the Times is my hometown paper. The WaPo is doing terrific work. I hope the editors of the Times come to their senses and realize that they are failing in the primary duty of a free press, which is to report the facts, but I’m not holding my breath waiting for it to happen. And I’m also considering subscribing to The WaPo.
Tokyokie
@Brachiator: I’ve worked for major newspapers as well, and I was horrified as I watched this sort of false equivalency was applied in 2000. And it resulted in the worst president in our country’s history. I was utterly mortified. I knew that Shrub would be a terrible president, that he really wasn’t a guy with whom you’d like to have a beer, that he was a lazy, anti-intellectual child of privilege who could be easily swayed by flattery. How could those who covered him every day not see this?
And now the GOP has harked up Trump, who is worse than Shrub by several orders of magnitude, a man utterly bereft of all positive human virtues. Will The New York Times express its regrets should Trump start lobbing nukes at any country whose leaders he believes didn’t sufficiently shine his shoes with their tongues? Or even if he were to raze the Grand Canyon Lodge and replace it with the Trump Grand Canyon Casino? This country has not faced an external threat to its continued existence since the early 1940s, but one of its major political parties, in an attempt to hold on to white male privilege, has created an internal one. But hey, if the mainstream news media just shovels some more horseshit, maybe they’ll find that Shetland pony in the e-mails or Clinton Foundation or Benghazi or whatever harebrained conspiracy theory the right wing is pushing that week.
gogol's wife
@hovercraft:
Another Putin fan.
SiubhanDuinne
@Fair Economist:
Most of their op-ed columnists are awful, except for Eugene Robinson (and even he seems to come down with a bad case of bothsidesdoititis every now and then), but AFAIC the Washington Post deserves a fucking Pulitzer for the work David Fahrenthold has done in recent days on the Trump Foundation. I hope there’s more to come from him on this topic. He is dogged in committing actual journalism.
Betty Cracker
Already done.
Gelfling 545
@Trentrunner: And he doesn’t think scrutiny of someone who is, to all appearances, wildly unfit for office might take precedence?
jacy
@Brachiator:
Yes. I think it would be wonderful if there was some model that works — and maybe there will be one. My post-college kids are pretty politically plugged in, but they don’t have a “news source.” They hear things from their friends or they watch things like John Oliver or the Daily Show or Samantha Bee. Like I said, I’m not smart enough to be able to imagine something that’s going to replace “traditional” news sources with anybody under 30.
hovercraft
@Cacti:
Yeah I know who she is, and I’ve no use for her and most of the Nation, I put them on the same plane as SALON. She is a ‘mature’ lefty, in that she is more subtle about her purity than say the GG’s and Michael Moore.
Villago Delenda Est
@Botsplainer: William Atherton libelz!
SiubhanDuinne
@Thoughtful David:
I don’t think it’s so much a matter of punishing the NYT in the pocketbook — you’re quite right, they probably won’t feel it — as it is of going on record strongly denouncing the way the Times has covered (and led, and influenced) this Presidential race. In sufficient numbers, that could possibly make a difference. Maybe too late this year — it takes a while for a huge liner to make a u-turn, or even just somewhat change course — but at least a few thousand voices might make them sit up and take notice.
BillCinSD
@Thoughtful David: the prime selling point for advertisers, and what sets the price for ad space, is the guaranteed eyeballs of the subscribers
jacy
@SiubhanDuinne:
I’ve heard several media types saying the words “Fahrenthold” and “Pulitzer” in the same breath today. Maybe that’ll get them off their lazy asses. Ah, who am I kidding?
I do enjoy Eugene Robinson 85% of the time. Which is a pretty good percentage, given my curmudgeon-ness of late.
gogol's wife
@jacy:
If they’re watching John Oliver and Samantha Bee, they’re better informed (at least on politics) than a NYTimes reader.
SiubhanDuinne
@Lizzy L:
Were you really? I lived on West 14th St (pretty much corner of 14th and 5th) for four years.
Tom Q
I’m totally in sympathy with this campaign, but I can’t join it: the Times crossword is an essential part of my day. It’s too great a sacrifice this late in my life.
It’s odd: when I started reading the Times — in the 1960s, when I was a teen — I mainly read the arts and sports sections, and a bit later did the puzzle. It was only after college I added on the political/news coverage. Now, all these years later, I’m back to skipping their news coverage — in fact, sticking with the paper in spite of it
Turgidson
@srv:
I propose a trade. Georgia for Maine.
Gus diZerega
Done! And I explained in some detail why. Thanks for providing the phone number.
TaMara (HFG)
@gogol’s wife: I watched two Samantha Bee segments online today where she just ripped into Matt Lauer and the media’s fascination with letting Trump say whatever the fuck he wants unchecked. Enjoyed every moment of them.
Tom Q
@gogol’s wife: Jon Stewart always said it had to be a lie that people were getting their news from his show, because they couldn’t possibly get the jokes without background knowledge from other news sources. What the people answering those surveys likely mean is that they trust Stewart’s interpretation more than anything they hear from any other source.
CarolPW
@BillCinSD:
Exactly. I cancelled my subscription yesterday, and if I did it a shit-ton of others did too because I’m usually well behind the trend. Fewer subscribers = fewer ad $.
Lizzy L
@SiubhanDuinne: Yep. Well, not really. Technically, I was born in Beth Israel Hospital.
Nominus
I tried to read through Douthat’s timeline on Twitter. JFC, he thinks he’s deeply intellectual but just spouting nonsense. Conservative Intellectual is an oxymoron.
hovercraft
@jacy:
I’m with you on both points, I’d place my pro Robinson at 90 %. Fahrenthold has done yeoman’s work, and the rest of the media should be shamed by his work.
Micheline Gros-Jean
O/T
Hillary is running 7 pts behind Obama with Hispanics in Florida. Parrt of the reason is her poor image. Many believe her to be dishonest. Thanks media.
http://www.univision.com/univision-news/politics/poll-september?hootPostID=c033de995db80f3c78f5236d3aebd3fb
bobbo
@srv:
“within the margin of error” means her lead is most likely 3 points, and the (unlikely) chance that it is 6 points is about the same as the (unlikely) chance that the race is tied.
Aleta
@Renie: And Spayd was unbelievably condescending to readers. An earlier article of hers was insulting to the NYT news staff, I felt. Like this:
Then Sayd printed the note that was sent to news staff about their social media, which included:
Seemed a little odd. As though she’s representing the business management side of the Times more than being an intermediary to readers. Guess advertisers are their business more than journalism any more. Ironic that she herself would be representing a single biased viewpoint within her paper.
gogol's wife
@Tom Q:
My sentiments exactly.
tsquared2001
I sent a furious tweet at Chris Hayes back in September ’15 when he and some Daily Beast writer were just chortling over the concept of a Trump presidency. They were treating Donny’s campaign as one big joke with NO concept of the havoc that could be wreaked.
Hayes responded with (paraphrase) we are only laughing because Trump will never be president. To quote Tony Montana: Well, look at you now, you stupid fuck.*
The NY Times is egregious but let’s not pretend that nearly every media outlet has been completely frivolous with their coverage of the ’16 campaign. The US barely gets a majority of its eligible citizens to vote as it is – if the media could bring voting percentages down to Bevin like levels (30-40 percent range), they and the GOP would be ecstatic. Never forget – The Man plays the long game and while the media’s role USED to be against The Man, that shit has been left in the misty colored memories of time.
*I don’t really believe Donny will win but if Secretary Clinton’s numbers keep getting dampened, then the Senate majority is out of play which in turn will depress voting numbers even more as NOTHING gets fucking done.
Villago Delenda Est
@hovercraft: Fahrenholdt’s work, ironically, is all from public sources. He’s simply doing research into public documents and boiling it down to its essence. No “access” required to do solid investigative reporting…just elbow grease. It’s the opposite of lazy Villager narrative pushing.
Debbie1
@Trentrunner: No, I completely understand the explanation about candidate coverage reflecting probability of winning. See, it’s just like in the primaries when the press began covering Trump seriously when polls (& vote count) showed he had a good chance of winning Republican nomination. Oh, wait…
ThresherK
@bobbo: Yep, I can’t believe SRV doesn’t know what the numbers behind MofE mean.
Oh, wait…
kd bart
They want their horse race and their coverage is designed to see that that happens. A blowout race is bad for the bottom line. Must avoid at all costs including integrity.
singfoom
@Villago Delenda Est: Fahrenholdt does good work indeed. This story just got updated. The Trump Foundation lies about donations
I’d like to think that this story of the Trump Foundation just lying about donations and being fined for it by the IRS will continue and be covered by a larger number of outlets. It’s certainly another point in the “he lies about everything” column, but (Please don’t hurt me Shomi :p ) I despair of most people caring. It’s hard to see it getting into the larger narrative and dominating the daily story.
But I’ll hope for it.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Might not even be 4. Maine splits their EV’s.
Tom Q
@efgoldman: I don’t need just A crossword; I need THAT DAY’s crossword — one that other people I know are also doing. (Among other things, it’s a standard topic of discussion with my father — who was also bellyaching about the Public Editor piece the other day, but would never give up his puzzle despite that.)
SenyorDave
Since the media won’t do it, the debates are now the best chance to show the public that Trump is not fit to be president.
scav
For Everyone in Need of Emergency Break — that is to say, basically everyone, especially those that like Shakespeare. There’s a free Globe A Midsummer Night’s Dream that provides a fine escape hatch in many brain-stretchy-bendy ways. It was live on the 12th, but will be available for the next 6 months. Unsubscribe from the NYT, stomp on their burning ashes (maybe after cutting out the crossword), rant, and then hie thee away to fairyland.
Thornton Hall
@Villago Delenda Est: Exactly!
One of the myths that needs to be exploded is that access leads to news.
Another myth is the value of “investigative” reporting. The investigation in Watergate was done by the FBI. The investigation of My Lai was done by Ron Ridenhower of the US Army. The Abu Grhaib photos were part of a leaked Army investigation. All these great journalistic victories were actually triumphs of democratic government leaking to a free press to get the word out.
hovercraft
@Villago Delenda Est:
Well there’s your problem right there, he’s got no access. To villagers the most important thing is access, so while they may applaud his work, they will never emulate him.
Aleta
As for cable news (which hardly deserves subscriptions either):
-Sept 6, by Zaid Jilani
rikyrah
Colin Kaepernick and the Question of Who Gets to Be Called a ‘Patriot’
SEPT. 12, 2016
Citizenship is citizenship, until appearances get in the way. The world now knows, for instance, that Colin Kaepernick, a quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, is protesting racial injustice — all because of a routine photo, taken during the singing of the national anthem before a preseason game. The photographer, Jennifer Lee Chan, tweeted the image last month, writing, “This team formation for the national anthem is not Jeff Fisher-approved.” Fisher is the head coach of the Los Angeles Rams, who, in an episode of the reality football show “Hard Knocks,” told his team that standing for the anthem was sacrosanct: “It’s an opportunity to realize how lucky you are.” Yet here was Kaepernick, sitting down.
Kaepernick’s sitting was, it emerged, a stance. Two days later, he took reporters’ questions, including one about whether he was concerned that his actions could be taken as an indictment of law enforcement. His answer had teeth. “There is police brutality — people of color have been targeted by police,” he said. Then: “You can become a cop in six months and don’t have to have the same amount of training as a cosmetologist. That’s insane. Someone that’s holding a curling iron has more education and more training than people that have a gun and are going out on the street to protect us.”
That’s one rejoinder to the unconditional gratitude — the compulsory expression of thankfulness for a nation that prides itself on freedom of expression — that the Jeff Fishers of the world demand. If you’re a black man, as Kaepernick is, your ambivalence about patriotic rituals may be a way of asking the same question Fisher raised: How lucky are we, exactly?
Kathleen
@Villago Delenda Est: Well, some say it was a war crime.
debbie
@Brachiator:
But when were the NYC papers ever really on Trump’s ass? Never when I lived there (1970s to 1990s). He’s never earned it, but he’s always received a pass, even when he was screwing Ivana over.
JMG
Those canceling their subscriptions to the Times should also call and/or email (probably better) the media reporter for the avidly anti-Trump Daily News. Because no institution is more sensitive to bad publicity like a media outlet. No institution is less “transparent” than the Times itself for example.
redshirt
Trump won’t win Maine. I’ll take any bet.
Gin & Tonic
@Cacti:
You give Stephen Cohen too little credit for consistency. He was an apologist for the Soviet Union back in the Brezhnev era when he was a junior faculty member at Princeton. USSR/RF, it’s all the same to him, if the US is against it, he’s for it, and has been his whole professional life.
Mike in NC
@SenyorDave:
Sadly, most of us can predict how the media will respond. Trump will “have held his own” merely by showing up on time. They did the same thing with Sarah Palin vs Joe Biden, as absurd as that sounds.
SgrAstar
@LABiker: Me too. Also Tim Egan and the indispensable Charles Blow. The NYT is hanging by a thread.
JMG
For those worried about the Maine poll, the Emerson College poll (no cell phone calls, so handle with care) has Trump up only six in Texas. Maybe that SurveyMonkey/Post survey wasn’t so far off.
I know I’ve said this before, but that’s never stopped me. Because of the unpopularity of both candidates, polls will show no logical pattern because respondents are postponing their eventual decision as long as possible.
Mary G
OK John, with a heavy heart I cancelled my subscription, citing in particular the unbalanced coverage of Clinton and Trump, as week as the public editor’s column, which was both condescending in tone and factually wrong. The operator signed off by telling me that they’d be happy to have me back after the election is over, which pissed me off all over again.
That subscription was on my bucket list, and I only got it June 26th. I probably wouldn’t have done it without your prodding, though I knew I should.
Mnemosyne
@Micheline Gros-Jean:
I can’t help wondering if part of her Florida problem boils down to two words: Elian Gonzalez.
Renie
I told my husband, who is the NYT reader here, about Spayd’s column and that some people were calling to cancel and wound up with better rates. So we tried. When I called and when the woman saw we were 30+ year home subscriber she really got concerned (surprisingly). She asked me for a lot of detail on why I was cancelling, who wrote the article, why I was upset with the coverage, any specifics I had about it. I could hear her typing away and she said she sent the complaint ‘upstairs’ to another department. I was on the phone with her for a solid 15 minutes on this. I got the impression that they had been hearing a lot of complaints about Spayd’s column. However, she never offered a discount to keep us as customers and I knew my husband didn’t really want to cancel. So I told her I would wait 2-3 weeks and see what Spayd wrote next and then decide again. So I got my complaint across and my husband gets his paper. To be continued…
debbie
@JMG:
Yes, he and Reihan Salam were supposed to be the faces of the New GOP. As if.
waysel
I love this plan. It is high time. I only regret I have no subscription to cancel, but I will pass the idea along.
SiubhanDuinne
Here is a wonderful palate-cleanser. Yes, I know some people don’t much care for Keith Olbermann, but for those who do (myself included) this 17-minute clip will most definitely refresh your spirit. I am very glad to see him back.
Regnad Kcin
they lost me years ago
one too many “How to Decorate With Under $500,000” articles
cokane
ya i think when it comes to federal politics/government, the Washington Post has officially lapped the NYT :[
debbie
@efgoldman:
Sadly, Snopes says Trump/NAMBLA isn’t true.
Kay
Should be amusing to watch the NYTimes carefully ignore the NY AG’s investigation of the NY real estate developer.
They’ll probably investigate Clinton, to see if she’s behind it.
hovercraft
@SiubhanDuinne:
Watched that this afternoon, it was nice to see him again after so long. It was kind of long, but he did say going forward they will be only about 6 minutes.
dimmsdale
@Brachiator: I’m going to suggest here that a good deal of the solicitous, tender, respectful treatment of right wing crazies is that the press has been thoroughly browbeaten by the right wing starting during the Reagan years and more or less continuously thru today. Immensely rich and well organized right wing forces (Hillary’s ‘vast right-wing conspiracy,’ if you will) have brought incredible pressure to bear on the press, and the press has learned that their lives are infinitely more comfortable fellating right-wingers than if they hold them to a reasonable journalistic standard (or even, a reasonable standard of decency and dignity of discourse). This is, of course, in addition to the click-baity culture journalism lives in now. Too, I think the bald fact is that pundits and media personalities have a genuine contempt for the Left because we don’t fight back the way the organized right wing does, and those guys DO punch back, and hard, and absolutely relentlessly. Thus the press makes their own lives easier by normalizing hate speech, enthusiastically giving Trump a consequence-free platform to spew stuff that, trust me, wouldn’t have gotten out of the green room thirty years ago–or even into it, and somehow pretending they’re being even-handed.
Micheline
@Mnemosyne: I believe that it’s complicated. A lot of millenials don’t like Hillary for various reasons.
Kay
Remember Lynn Sweet w/Obama? Obama supporters got mad at her but she always seemed to me to have covered him a while and she knew a lot about him. There’s no one like that for Donald Trump, when he’s been a giant loud mouth celebrity for 40 years? No one knew about all the scams, lawsuits, unpaid bills, phony foundation, etc?
NoraLenderbee
WaPo digital subscriptions are $100/yr (National and World) or $150 (+ DC local). Isn’t the NYT around $400?
WaPo subscription
RK
So I gather when Clinton was comfortably ahead in the polls the NYT wasn’t too much of a problem.
JMG
Oh, it all got covered — in the gossip columns. Trump was just another celebrity in NYC, which drips with them. It was only the TV show that made him a national figure, a sanitized national figure. To me it’s simple. The media in a majority white country is never going to tell a significant percentage of white people they’re hateful and stupid to boot. You have to look at the equation from the other side. These are people who work in a business they know is slowly dying. They’re going to hold on to whatever influence they have no matter what it means to the country.
Corner Stone
@RK:
That is correct. If you ignore the last 30 years of their coverage of the Clinton’s.
raven
@NoraLenderbee: WAPO is free online with a .edu email addy.
Major Major Major Major
@Tom Q: can’t you subscribe to just the puzzle?
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Hunter Gathers:
I don’t think that’s it, but I think you’re close.
JFK was widely rumored to be having affairs in the WH or at least during his time as Senator and President. Why didn’t the press treat him like a monster? Well some did, but there’s a critical difference between JFK and WJC.
“Class”.
JFK was a rich guy from a rich and powerful family.
WJC was a poor nobody who happened to be smart and got a good education.
But the upper crust doesn’t care about education – that’s just another piece of paper that can be bought. They can hire smart people by the bushel-full. But “class” is something that they think you’re born or marry into.
Donnie is rich and tries desperately to take on the trappings of having “class”. He can point to his rich daddy and say “I’ve got class”. That’s why he has his ridiculous gold-colored thrones and signs.
Hillary and Bill are just pretenders (in this analysis). They’ll never have “class”. They’re not worthy to have a foundation – only the upper crust with class should have things like that.
That’s why the Clinton Foundation will be investigated and mumbled about until the end of time.
That’s why her “untrustworthiness” and “lying” will be investigated and mumbled about until the end of time.
There’s nothing that Bill and Hillary can do to address these things because it’s not about these things. It’s about “class”.
Look at the NY Times coverage of “the house your $2M can buy” or any of the other things that obviously are primarily of interest to people with $10M+ in some family trust off-shore.
The Times has the coverage they do because their owners and management know that their audience is the upper-crust and they don’t like the Clintons or others who don’t have the “class” that they (think) they do. That is all.
Of course, when someone rich with a high-class family background and marries into a business empire (Kerry) runs, he gets savaged too (look at the stories about his windsurfing). But it’s different. Kerry wasn’t hounded for months on end about Teresa’s foundation with “questions” and “concerns” about “pay-to-play” and all the rest.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
JMG
@RK: Not true. Clinton was further ahead when the story that got the biggest pushback, :the”criminal investigation” lie, was published.
grandpa john
@BillCinSD:
Yep. Ad rates are determined by viewership. Businesses don’t pay money for ads that nobody sees
hovercraft
@Kay:
The NY papers divvied up the beat, the Post and the Daily News covered his personal life, and the Times and the WSJ covered his business. The focus since he was just a bozo real estate ‘magnate’, playboy, they didn’t focus as much on his doings. Obama was always seen as a rising star who was going places, so there were serious reporters watching him closely the entire time. Michael Daly of the Daily News did offer this scathing review of Trump’s 9/11 record Friday night on Chris Hayes.
geg6
@debbie:
Both of them are on Bill Maher’s show a lot. Especially Salaam. They regularly get their asses handed to them. And
tsquared2001
@Kay: There will “clouds” and “questions asked” and “optics” will fit in SOMEWHERE as speculation runs rampant in a NY Times above the fold story that a meeting at the Mena Airport happened between Schneiderman and Sec Clinton that MAY have occurred so it is just politics as usual.
Mary G
@NoraLenderbee: I was getting it for $7.50 every four weeks, so $97.50 a year. That’s how I could afford it. Plus $20 for the crossword.
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne:
Brilliant! I am sharing on FB just to piss off my Trumpster relatives!
Mnemosyne
@Micheline:
Unfortunately, most Millennials are too young to have seen the vast right wing conspiracy in motion and actually think there’s something to all the lies about the Clintons. I would love to buy every registered voter between the ages of 18 and 25 a copy of “Fools for Scandal” by Gene Lyons, or at least the relevant chapters of Al Franken’s “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them.”
They’ve been lied to for 25 years, and the Villagers aren’t going to admit it now.
waysel
@Tom Q: I think you’ll find a Trump presidency to be an essential part of more than just your day.
Mnemosyne
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
That’s also why they supported W for as long as they possibly could. He was The Right Kind, even if he did sometimes put on a cowboy hat to fool the rubes.
JMG
I said this earlier today on an earlier post, but I think Krugman might be getting ready to walk. The Times needs him more than vice versa. The Post, Bloomberg, etc. would give a lot to get him on board.
Mike J
@Tom Q: You can sub to just the crosswords. Much much cheaper than a sub to the paper.
Chris
Regrettably, I can’t do it. I don’t subscribe to the NYT in the first place. I doubt I ever will.
p.a.
This is awesome. Ritholtz.
Frank Wilhoit
It is really much simpler than any of this, which is why it is also a lot more complicated.
The media can’t afford to look like they are taking sides. That’s the simple part.
The hard (really, really hard) part is “look”: (1) to whom? (2) how not?
I don’t have answers and I think that that is for much the same reasons that they don’t either. This is not to defend them, because what they are doing is wrong; but probably every other thing they could do would also be wrong, because they are in a historical position of being ethically obligated to tell a story that their audience is nowhere near being able to comprehend. They could waste all their time and energy doing that, and make no difference today, but put themselves on the right side of history; or they can muddle through, trying to apply bits and broken pieces of what they know how to do, even though the context is different (as in, unprecedented and wrong).
What is that story, which would be so hard to tell? It would be the story of why Trump would be so dangerous, which is not because he is Trump. It is because there would be no institutional checks on him and, more importantly, because there would be no insitutional checks on his followers. It is because all of our [lower-case-]republican institutions have aged out and died where they stood, leaving hollow shells that will flish-whish to dust as soon as anyone walks right up to them and pokes them with an insolent finger.
Clinton == less walking right up and poking.
And that is why she must win. That’s it and that’s all.
Now you tell me how you would tell that story to people who are not remotely intellectually equipped to follow it or emotionally equipped to process its implications. (And no, the applicability of the preceding sentence is not at all confined to the “deplorables” and their dupes and their accessories.)
SenyorDave
@JMG: For those worried about the Maine poll, the Emerson College poll (no cell phone calls, so handle with care) has Trump up only six in Texas. Maybe that SurveyMonkey/Post survey wasn’t so far off.
I work for a very prominent market survey organization, and I can say w/o question that the Emerson College surveys are not considered at all reliable. They are cheap, that is their defining feature. It is MUCH more expensive to conduct a poll that has a representative cell only sample. There is no definitive cell phone listings, the ones that exist are very incomplete and untrustworthy. I read the crosstabs on one of the Emerson surveys and they do a simplistic weighting to correct for the bias (landline is older and whiter than the general population). Take anything Emerson College puts out with a grain of salt.
debbie
@efgoldman:
So you say.
Tom Q
@Mike J: Except I’m an old sort who does the puzzle in the paper, with a pencil.
gogol's wife
@Tom Q:
People can’t comprehend that what you want is a newspaper delivered to your mailbox in the morning so you can go out and get it, bring it in, and do the puzzle on paper. You don’t want it on a computer, and you don’t want to have to go somewhere to print it out. You don’t want to buy book collections of old puzzles. You want the puzzle for that day, and you’d like to maybe go on the Wordplay blog after you’ve done it to discuss it. You want to see what Rex Parker has to say about it. etc.
ed_finnerty
@Thoughtful David: but the advertiser rates are based on circulation
PaulWartenberg2016
find out which businesses buy the full-page ads in the New York Times and send them boycott notices that they should pull said ads. THAT will hurt.
Tom Q
@waysel: And if I thought dropping the Times would be the life-and-death difference between a Hillary or Trump presidency, I’d act on that view. But since this is more a moral gesture/rebuke of the Times — albeit one of which I fully approve — not an existential choice, I weigh other concerns.
grandpa john
@Aleta: What we sometimes forget is that these fuckers are using publicly owned radio/tv frequency band widths to fuck over the public
Tom Q
@gogol’s wife: Definitely yes to Rex Parker. If only to violently disagree with him.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Tom Q: And clearly, having today’s crossword puzzle trumps any moral gesture on your part, because priorities.
gogol's wife
@efgoldman:
Well, I’m just saying that “subscribe only to the puzzle” doesn’t work for me. Plus I also want the arts coverage (although it gets worse and worse).
raven
@gogol’s wife: I want a pony.
Gin & Tonic
@Tom Q:
Wimp.
SenyorDave
Does anybody know anything about this?
Lawsuit Charges Donald Trump with Raping a 13-Year-Old Girl
A civil suit against Donald Trump alleging he raped a 13-year-old girl was dismissed in California in May 2016 and refiled in New York in June 2016.
The suit names Trump and billionaire Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein has already settled with women who stated that he sexually abused them as minors.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
For me, always paper. Times, Telegraph, Guardian cryptics. Ink.
I buy GAMES Magazine only for the cryptics and one or two other puzzles.
Love cryptics.
Tom Q
@Gin & Tonic: Guilty.
Omnes Omnibus
@waysel: @Comrade Scrutinizer: Everyone draws his/her line in a different place. The gesture of canceling an NYT subscription is not a life or death matter. Get some perspective.
JPL
@efgoldman: Tomorrow I’m going to change to basic from Sunday delivery. This is why I can’t quit. The Science and Health section are informative for the average joe like me. The New York Times is the only paper that still provides decent World News coverage. Since I read a lot of non fiction their archives are valuable. Also I do daily crosswords. I’ll cut back but I’m still keeping some coverage.
btw Do you have cable?
SiubhanDuinne
@debbie:
Now I am watching the Obama rally, and have been brought to tears a couple of times with the realisation that he will be POTUS for only another four months.
SAD!
Ruckus
As I sit in the waiting room every day the TV is on Ellen. What I hear is a lot of screaming about anything anyone says. It’s not a talk show it’s how much noise can we make to show we are popular. Newspapers now play the same game. It’s not facts nor even just banter it’s how loud, how shinny, how exciting. Notice that I didn’t add the word truth in there anywhere, because the shows and the newspapers don’t either. They think we have the attention span of a gnat but the reason we change channels and don’t read newspapers is that they don’t tell us anything. The reason the olds still read them is they haven’t/won’t ever get the word. A lot of people have a problem when they reach 50-60 yrs old, they like the view in the rear view mirror better.
Major Major Major Major
@Tom Q: my parents print them out.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Omnes Omnibus: Didn’t I offer an alternative perspective? Get a grip.
RK
@SiubhanDuinne:
Do you do the NYT Puns And Anagrams puzzles? What about the the Saturday Newsday Stumper, probably the most challenging puzzle out there?
Gin & Tonic
@JPL:
Admittedly not a daily, but The Economist covers many corners of the world very well. And doesn’t pretend to be afraid of common Anglo-Saxon words when they are used by people in the news. For a bit over $100/yr, it is comparable to some of the other periodicals mentioned in this thread.
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
Really.
It’s not like their coverage of the Clintons has changed much over the last 25 yrs. This isn’t a whole new direction for them.
SiubhanDuinne
@RK:
No, tell me about the Newsday Stumper.
Botsplainer
@Mnemosyne:
How many younger Cubanos use landlines anymore?
SiubhanDuinne
@gogol’s wife:
They fired Allan Kozinn a while ago. Classical music/opera coverage has suffered ever since.
RaflW
@Brachiator:
How this feels to me is the period in the run-up to the Iraq war. A period of time that the NYT failed miserably in their journalistic mission. Sometimes very large events are under way that I think people reporting on the avalanche of daily crap just totally lose sight of.
And in that sense, the just complete failure of the public editor’s latest is so glaring. Isn’t her role to not be in that daily grind? To be watching the larger trends, and not fail to see the forest for the trees.
Of course us hurtling headlong into the Iraq war wasn’t just the fault of The Times, but they played a not-insignificant role, and it had to do with far more than Judith Miller. To be watching the paper do this again — and be among those really trying to alert them of the risks they are taking, both to their own credibility and the nation’s viability and be waived off so derpily — it’s just awful. And infuriating. And scary.
MomSense
@Mary G:
Maine’s CD 2 is a mini swing state every election. We are also one of the few states that splits our EV. CD1 will be solidly Clinton by a huge margin.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@debbie: How would they know, Trump ain’t talkin'(or disclosing his tax returns).
Shana
@hovercraft: I’m also grateful to Rosalind Helderman of the WaPo for almost single-handedly bringing to light Bob McDonnell’s malfeasance. Ultimately he got off, but his golden boy reputation is gone and it’s largely due to her doggedness in digging into his, and his wife’s, activities.
Major Major Major Major
@Gin & Tonic: the economist is pretty good. The byline thing is really stupid though.
And one of my progressive betters on this very blog informed me that the economist is a terrible horrible tool that the 1% uses to oppress the 99%, so there’s that.
gogol's wife
@Major Major Major Major:
Yes, and it turned out the person being berated for quoting it wasn’t talking about The Economist but about an economist.
JPL
@Gin & Tonic: Yes it is. 24/7 cable news, is far worse than the NYTimes though.
Maybe John and Doug will have blogs up about canceling cable.
There’s a lot a like about the NYTimes, just as there a lot of channels on cable. If folks really wanted to send a message to 24/7 news, they cancel it all. Right
Shana
@Tom Q: I’m with you on the puzzle, although I only do it on Sundays since I won’t pay $40 in order to get the daily one. We subscribe for Sunday’s paper only, which gets us access to the online version during the week, but you have to pay to get the daily puzzle.
Major Major Major Major
@gogol’s wife: yeah, it was really stupid! Good times!
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major:
I don’t think so. They try to present a single “voice” in the news articles, and I think they largely succeed. I used to make my kids read it when they were in high school, because you can learn a lot about writing clearly by reading it.
And there are times when the obituaries are just poetry.
Just One More Canuck
@debbie: opinions differ – who’ s to tell? But we’re out of time, so we’ll have to leave it there
Major Major Major Major
@Gin & Tonic: the obituaries are great.
Their authors aren’t just not listed in the articles though, they’re completely anonymous (except when they self-identify in outside media)
RK
@SiubhanDuinne:
It’s a very challenging Saturday puzzle. (It’s called “Saturday Stumper” for a reason.) It’s here. If you don’t have java you can view and print it up in PDF by clicking the “puzzle” tab. There’s a two week archive so navigate to “Sep 10, 2016” with the calendar interface to see last week’s offering.
And do try out a few Puns And Anagrams puzzles; they’re very clever and often quite funny.
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major:
Yeah, but they know that when they apply for the job. Nobody holds a gun to their head.
Shana
@Tom Q: Piker, I do the puzzles in pen.
Major Major Major Major
@Gin & Tonic: it’s still weird and dumb.
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major: Opinions differ. But we’re out of time, and in our next half-hour we’ll talk about new trends in gluten-free pasta.
Steeplejack (tablet)
@LABiker:
Krugman is adopting Twitter, at least partially. His explanation here.
Twitter link here.
Major Major Major Major
@Gin & Tonic: you can at least give me ‘weird’.
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major: “Unconventional” is my final offer.
Major Major Major Major
@Gin & Tonic: I’ll take it.
Bipartisanship lives! Also, both sides think there’s something unusual going on in what claims to be a normal, non-nefarious weekly magazine!
Chris
@gogol’s wife:
My God, is it ever! I used to really enjoy that blog and the comments section. Seems that every time I’ve looked this year, though, it’s been infested with douchebags. It’s like IMDb over there.
dww44
@dimmsdale: I absolutely agree that the Press has been browbeaten by the right, aided and abetted by the owners of the Press more interested in the bottom line than in clear eyed and focused journalism that serves the interests of those who are vastly underserved. Collectively, our press is purely and simply bought and paid for.
Aleta
@grandpa john: Oh I rarely forget that they use public airwaves but rural people can’t pick up more than one channel (sometimes none) without subscribing to cable. Even PBS is not available in many places since the switch to digital. Retired people with a cable bill –not right. I curse them (and won’t pay them a cent). Those cable news ghouls. Predicting all day long that bad things will happen is not news.
Aleta
@Regnad Kcin: “Homes You Can Buy for 3 Million”
different-church-lady
ZOT! Krugman asks the right question and suddenly it all makes sense:
You know why? Low-hanging fruit is why. “Clinton is shady” is a readymade — you don’t have to do a single damn bit of work, you just go RAISES QUESTIONS!!! and send it in. To get people to believe Colin Powell would do something wrong might involve some actual writing that went against the conventional wisdom and lord knows that would require more effort than it’s worth.
Villago Delenda Est
@different-church-lady: Lazy is one of the hallmarks of The Village. Both the email and foundation “scandals” surrounding Hillary are in part due to the laziness of Villagers.
j_doc
The NY Times demands complete access to Clinton’s EMR in a “news” article:
… And yet I’m guessing they’ll be just peachy with Dr. Oz’s “exam” of Trump? I mean, it’ll be more thorough than five minutes in a car transcribing Trump’s words, so fairandbalanced.
sukabi
@debbie: just not officially documented….yet. they still haven’t found out where all of his foundation donations actually went.
Hurling Dervish
I did it. I called and cancelled and told them why. It sounded like they’ve had a lot of these calls today. Thanks, John. Wouldn’t have done it without the jog.
J R in WV
@Tom Q:
Guys, you can print out the CW puzzle from the web page onto paper with a printer that costs less than a subscription to the paper costs. And then you have a printer, too.
There are more ways to kill a cat than drowning it in cream.
John D.
@j_doc:
Jesus Christ. HIPAA isn’t subject to FOIA. Fuck off, NYT.
Uncle Cosmo
@srv: Hey, shitstain, would you mind standing next to “blomi” so that one well-lobbed grenade can make ground longpork out of you both? No sense in wasting ordnance.