After a little more than five months into a Trump administration some are comparing to “theater of the absurd,” we must not forget how far we’ve strayed off the reservation.
There is nothing normal about president Donald J. Trump.
For the first time in American history we have a leader who thinks a supermarket rag sheet, the National Enquirer, is “real news” and one of the most respected newspapers in the world, the New York Times, is “fake news.”
Let that sink in for a moment.
The most powerful man in the world believes what is written in a supermarket tabloid but not in a publication that has been awarded 122 Pulitzer Prizes, more than any other newspaper?
The man who even Ted Cruz called a “pathological liar” rails against legitimate news sources like the New York Times and the Washington Post for such transgressions as reporting accurately and fact checking his fabrications? Huh?
If you recall, the National Enquirer was Trump’s source for his bizarre accusation that Ted Cruz’s father was involved in JFK’s assassination! Yes, the very same scandal sheet that claimed Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was murdered by a $2,000 a night hooker recruited by the CIA who injected him with poison. (I’m not making this up.)
Trump’s love affair with the National Enquirer is nothing new. He has long been a friend of the rag’s CEO, David Pecker. Trump has defended the publication as “unimpeachable” and has even written articles for the tabloid.
And the admiration is mutual. Last August, the Wall Street Journal reported the Enquirer paid $150,000 to prevent a story about Trump’s affair with a former Playboy model from being released and they were one of the only publications to endorse him.
Of course Donald Trump’s favorite cable news outlet is Fox News. You know, the disinformation/propaganda arm of the Republican Party that up until recently went by the Orwellian slogan “fair and balanced.”
An American president’s reliance on junk reporting is truly unprecedented, dangerous and scary.
If stuff like this doesn’t keep you up at night, more power to you.
Photo | thinkprogress.org
Trump likes anyone who feeds his ego. The New York Times or any other legitimate news source will never be liked by El Capitan.
Funny, most legitimate news sources are only reporting what comes out of his mouth or from his stupid tweets.
Frightening. How this low informed morally bankrupt con mad huckster is the leader of the free world. I pity us for the next how many years he’s in power.
With what Trump is trying to do with voter suppression on a national level, Repugs could be in office for a very long time … oh, and they will have the Supreme Court to help them out!