CBS becomes a quisling of journalism
The network folds to Trump, joining other outlets betraying the free press.
CBS News has become a quisling of journalism, a collaborator with Donald Trump’s assault on the free press.
The word “quisling” comes from Vidkun Quisling, a traitorous politician who led Norway’s puppet government during the Nazi occupation. At the end of World War II, he was executed by a firing squad.
CBS’ owners, on the other hand, are likely to walk away with a nice payday by knifing the U.S. Constitution’s 1st Amendment.
In a newly announced deal, CBS’ parent company, Paramount, agreed to pay $16 million to Trump’s future presidential library to settle his lawsuit against the media conglomerate.
The suit was a blatant act of extortion and abuse of power. Trump sued over CBS’s editing of an interview of Kamala Harris on “60 Minutes,” arguing that it represented “election and voter interference” because the program didn’t include her full answer to a question. That complaint was ridiculous, challenging the kind of editing that happens every day in the news business.
CBS would have won the case, but Trump had a huge advantage: His highly politicized Federal Communications Commission has been stalling on a merger of CBS parent Paramount with Skydance Media. It’s clear that Paramount’s controlling shareholder, Shari Redstone, decided to pay the ransom so Trump would stop holding the merger hostage.
It was a selfish, destructive act. Every surrender by the media encourages Trump to find new victims. It’s up to the public – which means you – to support news outlets that hold the line against Trump’s intimidation. Those outlets include the Associated Press, ProPublica, The New Republic, the Guardian US, The Atlantic, Wired, Meidas Touch, States Newsroom, Courier, and Rolling Stone, along with a variety of insightful newsletters.
Avoid news outlets that bend to Trump. In waving the white flag, CBS joins these other quislings of journalism:
ABC News
The network agreed to pay $15 million to Trump’s presidential library to settle a defamation lawsuit over anchor George Stephanopoulos declaring that Trump had been found guilty of rape in the E. Jean Carroll civil case. Jurors found that Trump had sexually abused Carroll, but neither of two trials involved a finding of rape as it’s narrowly defined under New York law.
Even so, experts said ABC could have won the case. Trump is a public figure, so he would have had to prove that ABC acted with reckless disregard for the truth. That would’ve been a high bar, considering that a judge in the case said jurors did consider it rape “as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’”
But ABC settled. It was a sign of weakness that has encouraged more intimidation. Trump threatened to sue ABC again over its coverage of Qatar’s “gift” of a jetliner to serve as Air Force One. And ABC fired correspondent Terry Moran after his social media post criticizing Trump and adviser Stephen Miller caused the Trump regime to complain.
Washington Post
Jeff Bezos, owner of the Washington Post, has sucked up to Trump in multiple ways, apparently fearful that the criminal president might sabotage his farflung businesses if he doesn’t play ball.
Bezos vetoed WaPo’s planned endorsement of Kamala Harris last year. He gave $1 million to Trump’s inauguration and sat in the row of oligarchs at the event. And Bezos’ Amazon is paying a $40 million licensing fee to produce a documentary on Melania Trump. Don't expect that film to be a hard-hitting investigation. In May, Trump and Bezos visited Saudi Arabia, where Bezos announced a $5 billion artificial intelligence project with the Saudis, who murdered and dismembered one of Bezos’ journalists, Jamal Khashoggi, seven years ago.
Bezos hired and is sticking with Will Lewis as WaPo’s publisher despite Lewis’ ties to Fox owner Rupert Murdoch’s phone hacking scandal in the United Kingdom.
Some WaPo news coverage seems independent and responsible. But Bezos’ actions eroding WaPo’s credibility have inspired an exodus of talent from the formerly respected newsroom.
Los Angeles Times
Patrick Soon-Shiong, a biotech entrepreneur who owns the Times, apparently wants to join the row of oligarchs with Bezos. He traveled to Saudi Arabia in May to chat with Trump and Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Like Bezos, Soon-Shiong vetoed his staff’s plan to endorse Harris for president. As he tacks to the right, he has slammed his own news organization as “an echo chamber, not a trusted source.” He has speculated about using artificial intelligence to create alternative versions of articles to provide “both sides of that exact same story.”
He has also asked his editorial board to “take a break” from writing about Trump. Which is like asking a newspaper to avoid writing about the Category 5 hurricane that just hit.
These ideas have chased away talented LA Times staffers, as you can well imagine.
What about CNN?
CNN is on my quisling watch list. It hasn’t written a check or killed an endorsement to help Trump, but it does seem to avoid confrontation. Management chased off tough-on-Trump anchor Jim Acosta by threatening to transfer him to the overnight shift.
The network is desperately looking for middle ground where there is none. Media writer Oliver Darcy reported that top CNN journalists were instructed on inauguration eve that they should not (in Darcy’s words) ”re-litigate the past” regarding Trump. Darcy’s review of closed captioning from inauguration day found that no one on CNN used the terms “twice-impeached” or “convicted felon.”
And what about Fox, Newsmax, OAN, etc.?
These right-wing operations only pose as news outlets. They’re propagandists conspiring with Republicans to exploit racism, sexism, and fear to establish a criminal dictatorship. They’re not turncoats – they started out as enemies of democracy.
There’s a real danger that they become the norm – that all media become state media.
Support independent voices now. Shun the quislings. The truth can win out, with your help.
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Yes quisling makes sense but we must dig deeper if we want to restore democracy. Did you notice how the nightly news uses Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill descriptor whenever they discuss this bill? Our nation is ignorant.
The Koreans got rid of their tyrant because they weren’t ignorant. Learn how we became ignorant at WhiteChalkCrime.com and EndTeacherAbuse.org due to fascists having covertly taken over our schools and help end this ignorance.
We no longer have journalists or news outlets on regular media accessible to the public masses. It’s no wonder that 77 million people voted for this malignant narcissist and another 10s of millions didn’t vote at all. There’s no one to speak truth to power. No one will stand up to this greedy tyrant. We are f*cked.