Possum Queen adheres to the revised and updated “NO COLLUSION” talking points in this brief clip, standing daintily on tippy-toes in the single square inch of unpainted flooring in the corner:
Sarah Huckabee Sanders: "Is CNN guilty of collusion?" pic.twitter.com/dssPRwCMk3
— TPM Livewire (@TPMLiveWire) January 25, 2019
The facts have whittled down the indignant broad denials of the early days to “Trump didn’t personally conspire with Russia.” That will eventually morph into “conspiring with Russia is not a crime.”
Would a man with a lifelong reputation as a greedy, lying cheat take the opportunity to lie and cheat for personal gain? Maybe even the dullest of our fellow citizens can puzzle out the end of this mystery.
But as we await the denouement, Huckabee Sanders’ malfunctioning centrifuge of a mouth whirls out a kernel of truth that will have to be reckoned with eventually: Beltway media complicity in this super-massive black hole of political scandals.
Kay put it succinctly this morning in the Stone thread:
This has been the most deliberately minimized presidential scandal of my lifetime.
I’m convinced it’s because they all dismissed it as a “nothingburger” during the campaign and they can’t admit it’s big now without having egg on their faces. There was some kind of editorial decision made and to admit it now means they made the wrong call. And they will fucking DIE before they admit that.
Truth. Here’s a montage of the NYT’s front-page treatment of the campaign’s closing days (source):
While The Times was fretting over HER EMAILS and banker-directed geniality, the US election was under attack by a hostile foreign power bent on sleazing a supremely sleazy New York City resident into the Oval Office, and it wasn’t some big secret. We didn’t understand the vastness of the conspiracy at that point and probably still don’t, but its outlines were there, and Trump’s hometown paper didn’t seriously follow the blinking neon CROOK signs until after the election.
As unforgivable as that was, the lack of introspection that followed and the deliberate downplaying of the scandal ever since have been even worse. The day after the most incompetent, unprepared and scandal-plagued president in modern history was sworn in, while the largest demonstrations on the planet were underway to protest that travesty, The Times editor was patting himself on the back for his paper’s awful Russia scandal coverage while members of his crack political team were barfing up prurient navel-gazing trash such as “Chasing Hillary.”
This is worse than incompetence. It’s active participation in the gas-lighting.
Because the principals involved in the Trump-Russia scandal are bumbling, buffoonish villains, I’m pretty sure it’ll all come out anyway. And I’m not suggesting the coverage of the Trump administration from The Times, The Post, CNN or other prominent media outlets has been completely worthless; all have broken really important stories.
But goddamn it, they have to do better, all of them. I don’t know what the answer is. Maybe burn down the DC bureaus and start from scratch with people who’ve honed their skills covering foreign capitals. Definitely start with NOT buying exclusive rights to garbage propaganda like “Clinton Cash” and using that framing to build your narrative (both The Times and The Post were guilty of this).
Or maybe, as Kay once suggested, we just accept the fact that these people will never change and urge Democrats to play the game. Maybe hang up a few tire swings and put on BBQs for the self-absorbed cockwaffles on the Beltway bus. After all, they blew the Iraq War story and refused to engage in self-examination in the aftermath of that catastrophe, despite untold loss of life and a trillion or so in national treasure down the rat hole.
Maybe Elizabeth Warren should host a clambake. Perhaps Kamala Harris could invite Chozick to a girls’ night out and validate her personal and professional choices over chardonnay.
Somehow, fellow citizens, we’ve got to crack this code.
Jeffro
Mainstream media: DO NOT FALL FOR THIS NONSENSE! “Who tipped off CNN?” is in no way important whatsoever. “Who ordered Roger Stone to further the 2016 trumpov campaign conspiracy with a hostile foreign power” – THAT is the question.
Seriously, these people are fucking idiots. They’re more distractible than a hound in a forest full of squirrels. SQUIRREL!
geg6
I am all for hanging them all in the Mall in Washington on national TV. With a few exceptions, of course. There is no other way to be rid of these vermin.
schrodingers_cat
The media is hand in glove with the Republicans. I have noticed it since Rs decided to impeach Bill Clinton. It has probably gone on since before that. And I don’t think inviting MAGA Habs for a lobster dinner is going to change anything.
VeniceRiley
” indignant broad” I took the meaning differently. Annnd stealing!
JPL
I’m seeing rumors that trump is going to call the southern border a national security issue and build his god dam wall. At least the shutdown will be temporarily halted.
Redshift
I’m eagerly awaiting Sanders getting to “The Trump campaign has nothing to do with the president!”
tobie
I’ve used up my monthly quota of free articles on FTFNYT so I can’t check to see if there’s a pattern regarding the authorship of these articles. I know Chozick was assigned to Clinton’s campaign and she spewed lots of garbage. Are there any other names that occur repeatedly in the bylines? Thrush maybe?
Elizabelle
Stone emerging. Giving a victory gesture.
Yarrow
People really booing Stone while he speaks. Chants of “Lock him up!” Heh.
Edit: Also, he looks like hell.
bemused senior
@Jeffro: CNN said they staked out Roger Stone. No need for a leak.
Mai Naem mobile
I wonder if Sulzberger has been compromised and/or propped up financially by the Russians. Isnt the non NYT Sulzberger money in NYC real estate? The NYT was having financial problems. Also if Hillarys and US Intel emails can be hacked is there some reason why Sulzbegers cannot? I know I sound like a conspiracy nut but that’s what Trumpov has done to me.
MattF
I’d settle for a recognition that Trump lies about everything all the time. Is that too much to ask for?
Also, wouldn’t it be nice if there was some acknowledgement that anonymous sources in the White House are mostly none other than Donald Trump.
Elizabelle
@Yarrow:
And his wife and his dogs got askeered.
Stone just said the FBI agents were extraordinarily courteous. They can afford to be.
Timurid
The MSM are not a bunch of babes in the woods or bungling idiots. They’re hired hands doing precisely what the C-level tells them to do.
schrodingers_cat
A fair number of media people are Republicans and pretty racist to boot. May be not the in your face MAGA types but of the Mitt Romney variety. The difference is in the manners not the substance.
ETA: Their reaction to the back to back presidencies of Obama and T is what tipped me off.
JPL
So nice to hear the chants of lock em up while Stone is attempting to speak. trump event in the rose garden today, and I doubt he’ll fire Mueller.
Elizabelle
@Mai Naem mobile: You don’t sound nuts at all. I think your suggestion is very plausible.
Rory
I think it was the CIA, but maybe it was the FBI, that was caught bragging about how they’d placed friendlies in top spots in all the media outlets that “mattered.” I believe this was sometime in the 70s…
Enhanced Voting Techniques
to “well EVERYONE conspires with the Russians. Did you seriously expect to the president to be left out?”
chris
Stone went on Alex Jones’ show to beg for money. Of course he did. (thread)
Raven
You watchin the blonde skank in the aviator shaded waiting for Stone. “It sooooo unfair. . . “!
Kent
I don’t think the media stupidity will be any different in 2020. It is just the new reality for campaigning in the modern world. I think the answer has to be a candidate who is charismatic and savvy enough to bypass the normal filters and gatekeepers and campaign directly to the American people.
Trump actually provides the blueprint with his twitter nonsense and the way his campaign bypassed the normal media. He just kept putting himself in the news again and again, drowning out the regular stories. And he had been practicing for a decade before 2016. I think AOC and Beto started to show how it can be done. I’m not sure who among the current crop are going to be best at this sort of thing. But it is something to watch for. Imagine what the Obamas could have done with twitter and instagram with their wit and wry humor.
Is that the world I’d like to live in? Not necessarily. But winning is too important to handicap the campaign by choosing a candidate who doesn’t know how to play the modern media game.
Elizabelle
@tobie: I will be in touch with you about that. Emailing now.
Scotian
I have as my first response but a single thing to say to this post…
Agree utterly and without qualification!!!!!
Yarrow
They’re working for their masters so they’re doing the job they’re told to do and paid to do. It’s no surprise that very wealthy people at the top want to protect their other wealthy friends. The way to get better media is to address that issue. For profit media with very highly compensated people at the top is never going to work for the people.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Elizabelle: It cost them nothing. So to speak.
Raoul
I’ve said it often enough, but it’s still true: The NY Times learned nothing from their horrible coverage of the run-up to the Iraq war.
I listened to a Fresh Air segment with Dean Baquet a couple years ago, and his arrogance came through with stunning clarity. They think they are the best (and in some areas, they are) but humility is still required, even from those that know their positional power.
Humility is the special sauce that transforms an organization from aimless power to true leadership.
mrmoshpotato
@geg6: That’d be too good for Chuck “Both sides are equally as bad” Todd.
Adam L Silverman
@Jeffro: No one tipped off CNN. Every news media outlet watches the FBI near high profile suspects in case the FBI makes a move.
Betty Cracker
My guess is Trump’s “announcement” will be an emergency declaration on the non-emergency at the border to end the shutdown (and disrupt the news cycle). Can’t afford to have Pelosi twisting his wizened little raisins on the daily while his cartoon super-villain friend gets perp-walked too!
scav
As a schadenaside, I am so schadenjoying the not so very good day the book of faces is havig as well. Nothing nothing nothing good passes by for so very long and then All the good news busses in a single morning.
laura
Where’s that Villago Delenda Est guy?
He’s probably got a good handle on what to do.
But seriously, there are some journalists who do a great job to our collective benefit as an informed citizenry. There are far to few owners of media outlets with far too much control on the public’s Right to Know. And how we fix that is going to take some doing. Its time to dust off the antitrust laws and start using them.
Elizabelle
@Betty Cracker: I really appreciate this post, Betty. You are not wrong, and I hope we can manage some informed pushback. Maybe even some citizen journalist investigating.
Adam L Silverman
@Redshift: Actually that’ll be “everyone knows the President had nothing to do with his campaign, his businesses, and his administration”.
opiejeanne
Dana Bash has declared that today’s arrest of Roger Stone is the last of them and every other journalist is scratching their heads and wondering how that conclusion was reached. Voices down the thread are shouting “Kushner!” and “Don jr.”
Nicole
After watching the incredibly weird reframing of the Covington Catholic story, especially how coordinated it was, there is no tinfoil hat theory too weird for me where the media is concerned.
Frankly, the massive layoffs of reporters and editors for Buzzfeed, HuffPo, etc., all seems really coordinated too. I am going to have a whole wardrobe of tinfoil hats by the time 2020 rolls around.
Adam L Silverman
@Yarrow: The cops didn’t give him time to put on his topical testosterone treatment, ascot, weskit, morning coat, and spats before departing for his arraignment.
SFAW
@JPL:
@Betty Cracker:
Declaring an National Emergency OMFGOMFGOMFG Brown PEEPUL!!!!!! does not necessarily mean the shutdown will end. The Traitor-in-Chief MAY be more inclined to sign whatever Traitor Turtle allows to be voted on, but there’s no guarantee.
Gravenstone
@Yarrow:
Didn’t have time this morning to put his face on before the FBI came knocking.
Tenar Arha
I wouldn’t want to be an NYT/CNN reporter or anyone passing on conventional wisdom 2+ years ago on Twitter today. But as a jackal in good standing, phuckem…they deserve it.
My special ire goes to the FTFNYT though. It’s been pretty clear that 24/7 cable has been dreck almost since the beginning, but newspapers were supposedly good for nuance & in depth reporting, & instead they’ve been played for marks for years. ?
Yarrow
@tobie:
There are people tracking this issue. I’ve run across threads about it on Twitter. If I find one of them I’ll post it.
chris
@Scotian: Dear me, Are you OK? I Don’t think I’ve ever seen you post a two sentence comment.
SFAW
Betty –
Thanks for posting that front page montage. It makes me realize that we really dodged a bullet by not electing that shrieking harpy a/k/a warmonger a/k/a herstory’s greatest monster
Elizabelle
@Nicole: Covington Catholic. I know. That is gonna be one for journalism classes. It was NOT a 180, and yet the MSM acted as if it was.
I still think there are a few chapters to come on that story. That won’t perhaps get the attention they should. The false narrative got the air.
chopper
no collusion. no collusion. you’re the collusion.
gene108
@Mai Naem mobile:
I think the same thing. We know Russian hacking went beyond the DNC and John Podesta. Lindsey Graham said his e-mails got hacked.We know the RNC got hacked. So why would Russia stop there?
The best case scenario, in my opinion, as Al Franken laid out, with regards to the coverage of Al Gore in the 2000 electin, in “Lies and the Lying Liars, Who Tell Them” is the media is lazy. They latch onto a narrative and just go with it.
I think there’s some truth to this, and the right-wing has taken advantage of it. They set-up their own serious seeming news outlets, like The Washington Times, American Spectator, etc., who would push right-wing scandal mongering and then some jerk-off at the NYT looks at these “serious” media outlets and thinks, “boy, how did I miss that” and decides to run those articles in the NYT.
That’s what gave birth to Whitewater, which I bet no one in the media can explain why it warranted wall-to-wall media coverage and required two Congressional Special Counsel’s to investigate, but they did give it wall-to-wall coverage, which helped Republicans retake the House in 1994.
Anyway, this is a best case scenario. I think things are actually worse, with regards to political reporting, as a generation of reporters have been raised parroting “news” from the right-wing media, and have decided this is how things ought to be.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman: I know that but that is the question that trumpov tweeted in his panic this morning, and it is what his mouth breathing supporters are echoing as well – the new “but her emails!”
Adam L Silverman
@Mai Naem mobile: Three words for you: David Pecker’s safe.
chopper
@SFAW:
as i pointed out in adam’s thread below, he’d have to deliberately veto a clean CR that lands on his desk. which would be monumentally stupid, but it’s trump we’re talking about so anything goes.
Yarrow
@Adam L Silverman: He was plenty orange enough, so I guess he was given time for that. His hair was weird, so I think he put on his fake hair in a hurried manner.
CNN said he answered the door in his pajamas and he’s dressed in regular clothes now so they obviously gave him time to get dressed. Wonder how that works. Does an FBI officer stay with you the whole time so you don’t escape out a window in your bathroom or something?
Adam L Silverman
@chris: It was meant to keep him from destroying evidence.
Elizabelle
@opiejeanne: Dana Bash. She’s a tool, isn’t she?
Had CNN on in background and John King (FWIW, Bash’s ex-husband) just joked that he is the son of a corrections officer or prison guard or whatever and being in handcuffs is something to be avoided.
That background goes a long way towards explaining John King.
WaterGirl
@tobie: I just got that message, too, from the NYT, and just for kicks I clicked on the icon in Safari that says the “show reader view”, and it came right up.
I don’t know where that would be in other browsers, but in Safari it’s in the box that shows the URL. The reader view icon is on the left and the refresh icon is on the right.
I am so happy to have discovered this, as it’s much simpler than copying the URL and opening it in private mode.
Scotian
@chris:
The brevity from me was meant as an underscore, since I am usually a bit more on the shall we say verbose side of things…lol.
chris
@gene108: Drudge rules their world. Remember that one? At the top of the MarketWatch news feed right now:
Redshift
@Adam L Silverman: Ah, yes, gotta cover all the bases.
chris
@Adam L Silverman: Or running.
gene108
@Kent:
Given how social media has been used to manipulate the hell out of certain segments of voters, I don’t think it is going to be totally effective in bypassing the MSM.
Trump had the advantage of almost all the people fucking around trying to use bullshit to influence voters were all on his side and posting things to his advantage.
I just think social media presents its own set of issues, with regards to trying to cut out bias.
Adam L Silverman
@SFAW: Actually it doesn’t mean that 1) McConnell will actually bring a clean CR to the floor, 2) It doesn’t mean the President then won’t take another hostage if McConnell were to do so, and 3) it doesn’t mean that McConnell won’t try to take another hostage.
WaterGirl
@Adam L Silverman: Then why do you suppose MSNBC wasn’t there?
Steve in the ATL
No threaded comments, no upvoting, and magical turns of phrase—I love this blog!
chris
@Scotian: Ok, good to know. After ~15 years it seemed… off.
chopper
@Steve in the ATL:
+1 emoji!
Adam L Silverman
@Yarrow: It isn’t fake hair. It is a combination of hair plugs/a hair transplant with the effects of human growth hormone on the adult skull.
Adam L Silverman
@WaterGirl: Decided they’d just use CNN’s feed?
Raoul
@JPL: I suspect the Trump announcement will be a declaration of emergency to build his widdle wall. Since the combo of Stone + Air Traffic + GOP senators harshing on McConnell is clearly a trifecta ’emergency.’
I hope (but maybe in vain) that this massive overreach will increase Donnie’s toxicity with more Repubs in Congress. It damn well should, if that’s what he does.
Scotian
@chris: I didn’t know anyone here had been aware of my writings from that long ago, that would have been what, PA with Drum back during the Jr years? I’ll admit I do have a lot of real world stuff on my plate this last couple of years which has severely reduced my writing time, and currently this is the only blog I comment at politically currently. and that is directly due to the excellence of this blog on the Russia intervention issue and the wider security and foreign policy observations from some of the front pagers as well as from the commentators within the threads created by said front pagers.
Raoul
@chopper: More brilliance from Sarah squat and fake:
catclub
@chopper: I wish the response had been: “Is collusion illegal now?”
Adam L Silverman
@Scotian:
Those guys and gals are making me look bad…
Chris Johnson
@schrodingers_cat:
The media is Pravda. They are run by Russians, and the reason is money: the key thought leaders here (not counting Fox News) are organizations like the New York Times, which is a paper newspaper. Paper newspapers have been going out of business for decades. They badly need money and Russia has it.
The NYT is owned. So is the Post but it’s owned by Bezos. I think you’ll find the Times is run out of Russia now.
Ask the Adam Silverman question: if they were in fact owned by Russia, how exactly would they be acting differently? If you draw a blank, then it’s time to entertain the idea and be open to evidence of it as it gradually comes out.
chris
@Scotian: Don’t think I ever commented on Saundrie but I read it along with CC, Galloping Beaver, etc.
chris
@Scotian:
Hear,hear!
MattF
WaPo sez there’s a deal to end the shutdown. For three weeks.
ShadeTail
But first, you have to tenderize them. Republicans spent a few decades blithering about “the liberal media” before the media got on board with giving them all the blow jobs. So we need to start negging them now, attacking them as “biased” and in the GOP’s pocket and whatnot, so they lose their self-esteem and become desperate for our approval. It’s going to take a while, obviously, but there really is no shortcut. And it has the advantage that we’d simply be pointing out the truth (at least for now).
BArry
@tobie: I’ve used up my monthly quota of free articles on FTFNYT”.
Use a private window in your browser.
The Pale Scot
@tobie: Use private browsing, works for FYNYT and WAPO. resort the browser when you hit the limit or turn off Javascript
Gelfling 545
@Redshift: She’s said as much already. Just a bunch of random strangers who showed up the get him elected. Nothing to do with him at all. He barely knew them.
Gelfling 545
@Yarrow: they interrupted his beauty sleep.
Gelfling 545
@Adam L Silverman: Because who in their right mind would let him? You know, that’s plausible.
Scotian
@chris:
WOW, that says something given I’ve left Saundrie essentially alone for the last decade now. Thanks for being one of the ones willing to wade through my not so succinct commentaries there.
Gex
What Liberal Media?
A FTFNYT piece in which they actually print top Republicans noting how the liberal media accusations are bullshit. In 2003, while the FTFNYT was helping them lie us into the Iraq War.
I don’t believe they represent refs that have been worked. I think they are fellow travelers with the right in many respects.
Scotian
@Adam L Silverman:
You sell yourself far too cheaply with this Adam. You really were the originating reasons I started here, stayed here, and came to respect as well as love this site. Your perspective is one hard to find in the white (as in open) world outside of specialized environs, and I cannot stress to you enough just how useful I found your work in 2016 on the Maskirova operation during that periods. Since then you have only furthered your credibility with me (and clearly many others here) and the addition of Cheryl has not hurt either. So stop fishing, you had me at maskirova…LOL
Dr. Ronnie James, D.O.
The NYT is a click based business, and I have given them Not One Click since Nov 2016. They had a good run in the past, but this was a conscious choice, and in their current configuration they are incompatible with a functioning democracy. In the immortal words of Ariana Grande, thank u next.
Kenneth Kohl
@Elizabelle: Stone emerging. Giving a victory gesture.
Yeah, with his stomach hanging out. Oops!