Today’s media: The ruthless, truthless, and toothless

Some journalists are attacking democracy while others fail to defend it

It’s a troubling time for journalism. A major-party candidate is running for dictator, and some people in the news media are helping him. Others keep playing the same old stupid games and unintentionally paving the way for his takeover. 

I divide these journalists into three categories: the ruthless, the truthless, and the toothless. Here are examples of the media types that fit into those categories.

THE RUTHLESS

If our democratic system dies, the autopsy report will list the primary cause of death as Rupert Murdoch. The Fox News owner is the most devious and damaging of a group of media moguls who have systematically made our society more divisive and helped dishonest demagogues achieve political power. 

Murdoch has played the long game. Back in 1976 when he bought the New York Post, he told the Village Voice he would avoid politics because “you prostitute your newspapers once you start joining political parties.” Then he became the Republicans’ favorite spreader of disinformation. Fox got caught red-handed pushing lies about the 2020 election and paid $787 million to Dominion Voting Systems to settle a lawsuit. But to Murdoch, that was just a speed bump and it’s full speed ahead with its lies in support of Republicans.

Murdoch and his son and successor, Lachlan, have negative influence beyond the New York Post and Fox. The Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal ran a hit piece last week in which it claimed Joe Biden was “slipping.” The Journal’s primary source was former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, a proven liar who is a political opponent of Biden.

There’s even a Murdoch link in the recent upheaval at the Washington Post. Its new publisher, Will Lewis, is a former Murdoch executive in the United Kingdom who is knee-deep in the scandal over the phone hacking of British politicians and celebrities by Murdoch’s tabloids. Lawyers for Prince Harry, actor Hugh Grant and others accuse Lewis of trying to cover up senior executives’ role in the hacking. Lewis showed his lack of ethics by attempting to kill stories in the Washington Post and on NPR that linked him to the scandal.

Then there’s Sinclair Broadcasting, which owns 185 local television stations and has been pushing right-wing disinformation for years. A Sinclair specialty is hyping urban crime. As journalist Anne Nelson told the Washington Post, “All of it is fear mongering and feeds into a racialized view of cities.” Sinclair is especially dangerous because consumers trust local news more than national news. During Donald Trump’s administration, Sinclair ordered its local stations to air commentaries by Boris Epshteyn, who was indicted in April for his role in the Arizona fake electors scheme. Sinclair’s executive chairman, David Smith, extended his influence recently by acquiring the Baltimore Sun newspaper.

Of course, there are others in the media who don’t care about the harm they cause. Elon Musk, for example. But we’ll save him for another day. Let’s move on to…

THE TRUTHLESS

I suspect a lot of the professional liars on Fox News are not ideologues. They’re careerists. The only fact they care about is the amount deposited in their bank accounts every payday.

Perhaps the worst of them is Jesse Watters. He lied that there was a plot to install “undercover liberal activists” as Trump jurors, and he and a guest said certain jurors were anti-Trump because ​​they’re teachers, watch CNN, or like to dance. Even though crime is down, Watters dwells on “vibes,” with comments like “Now, they say there’s no crime wave, but do you feel safe?” One of Watters’ worst segments was a tour of New York’s Chinatown in 2016 in which he asked people on the street if he should bow before speaking to them, suggested that a vendor’s watches might be stolen, and generally treated the residents as weird foreigners while “Kung Fu Fighting” played as background music. I’m beginning to think Watters’ obnoxious frat boy act isn’t an act.

Another Fox personality, Maria Bartiromo, may not be as cynical. She may just be a crackpot. Documents released in the Dominion lawsuit showed that some of the network’s higher-ups knew they were spreading lies about the 2020 election. But internal communications suggested that Bartiromo actually thought the election was stolen despite the lack of evidence. “The problem is she has [Republican] conspiracy theorists in her ear and they use her for their message sometimes,” a producer for Bartiromo texted a Fox boss. The producer warned that Bartiromo was posting “crazy shit” online. Yet Bartiromo is still on the air polluting American minds. And she’s still on the board of trustees of New York University, reminding us that the truth has a subordinate role at some colleges.

Then there’s Chris Cuomo, now an anchor at NewsNation. He was fired as a CNN anchor for violating journalism ethics by secretly helping his brother, then-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, battle sex harassment accusations. Cuomo said on the air, “I never made calls to the press about my brother’s situation,” but in fact he did. After being fired by CNN, Cuomo joined a news network with lower ethics, NewsNation. Now he’s giving a platform to disreputable people like former Fox News personality Bill O’Reilly, who was accused of sexual harassment, leading to $45 million in lawsuit settlements by Fox and O’Reilly.

Another category of truthlessness involves pundits who are simply wrong all the time, like Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker. She wrote a column in 2016 headlined, “Calm down. We’ll be fine no matter who wins.” Parker followed that up with a 2018 column headlined, “Calm down. Roe v. Wade isn’t going anywhere.” WaPo needs to calm down and fire Parker for being so spectacularly incorrect. 

Which brings us to …

THE TOOTHLESS

What do I mean by “toothless”? I’m talking about people who are so enamored by their own place in the news industry’s pecking order that they have lost a sense of the obligation that comes with that.

They certainly aren’t ruthless or truthless advocates for MAGA fascism. But they are toothless in confronting the threat. They are wasting their power.

The New York Times is a prime example. Some critics think the Times is boosting Trump, but I think its chief aim is to boost its own status to the exclusion of everything else. A recent Politico story quotes an anonymous source as saying Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger encouraged his staff to write negative stories about Biden’s age to punish the president because he wouldn’t give the Times an interview. Since the source was anonymous, I can’t weigh his or her credibility. But it’s clear that Sulzberger’s paper has a skewed sense of priorities. Times Executive editor Joe Kahn has downplayed concerns about Trump’s assault on democracy, claiming that immigration is the No. 1 issue – an assertion that’s not backed up by the polls but is what the right-wing wants people to think.

Many mainstream journalists are platforming known liars and traitors because they think it will boost their prominence or their ratings. For example, Ben Smith, co-founder of the Semafor news start-up, sent exactly the wrong signal by inviting the odious Tucker Carlson to Semafor’s launch event in 2022. Kristin Welker’s first show as host of NBC’s “Meet the Press” featured an interview with Donald Trump in which he lied constantly, including four separate references to “post-birth abortion,” which does not exist.

NBC even hired a participant in the fake electors scheme, former Republican National Chair Ronna McDaniel, to serve as a political analyst. NBC backed off only after a revolt by its on-air personalities. The network’s failure to understand the implications of the hiring was exemplified by the initial announcement that NBC exec Carrie Budoff Brown sent to staff, saying “it couldn’t be a more important moment to have a voice like Ronna’s on the team.” 

In fact, it couldn’t be a more important moment for the news media to have a voice like theirs on democracy’s team.

In a future newsletter, I’ll “go positive” and note the fine journalists who give me hope that we can find our way out of this mess.