television

MAGAnifying the News

Donald J. Trump to Anchor Nightly News Program MAGAnifying What Americans Need to Know

The White House Office of Publicity (WHOP) will soon announce the production and distribution of the Evening News with Donald J. Trump, (ENDJT), a 7-night-a-week strip show featuring America’s favorite President, Donald J. Trump, presenting the day’s news.

Mr. Trump will be both the Anchor and Managing Editor of the program that, like its closest model время (Vreyma), will run at varying lengths as determined by Mr. Trump in his personal assessment of the most important news of his administration.

Appearing as the most trusted man in America and the most successful media personality ever in his own right, Donald Trump delivering the news personally, and with his customary authenticity and empathy, is following in the footsteps of other iconic politicians whose distinctive voices penetrated deeply into the homes and lives of Americans at other times in our history. In eras past, the Little Flower and King Franklin informed, entertained, and delighted Americans with their radio programs providing humor, comfort, and reassurance during previous dark days in our history.

The Evening News with Donald J. Trump will MAGAnify the news of the day in a carefully curated program to explain and educate Americans about the important accomplishments of this administration. Even before its debut, it is already acclaimed as a WHOPping success and model for successive administrations.

There will be days when Mr. Trump will simultaneously appear as the nation’s cheerleader, advocate, blame assessor, and even the consoler-in-chief. When necessary, he will FIRE on-camera those who have failed their assignments (real or perceived) in his administration. When there is a gap in real news but still plenty of room for fake news, alternative facts, and speculation, audiences can count on the ENDJT to fill any silence with entertaining asides, especially whenever he goes off TelePrompTer, offering insights and opinions which are second to none.

Few personalities are more suited to presenting the complex News of The Day, much less giving commentary and perspective.

Few men have the clout of Mr. Trump, whose personal love for and friendship with world leaders, including Kim Jong Un, Bibi Netanyahu, Viktor Orbán, and ‘Uncle Vlad’ Putin, all of whom have repeatedly expressed such admiration for this American President. It’s expected that world leaders will clamor to take President Trump’s perfect phone calls live, responding jovially, and following his extemporaneous instructions for their domestic policies.

Domestically, the men and women of the Republican Party, from cabinet secretaries to congressmen (no longer woke-gender-corrected to include congresswomen) and even governors, who demonstrate over-the-top fealty to their President, will appear nightly to obsequiously offer eerie prayer and praise.

Nightly features on the faults and foibles of previous Democratic administrations, including Barack Hussein, Crooked Hillary, and Sleepy Joe, among so many others in state and local governments, will be highlighted.

Weather reports will be presented with Sharpie pens. Governor of Canada, and its former prime minister, Justin Trudeau, will report on lake-effect snowstorms and the Arctic Express.

Traffic will be reported by an avatar looking suspiciously like a Pete Buttigieg piñata.

Business news will feature real estate, hotel, and hospitality items.

Segments on cryptocurrency will feature reports from the President’s son, Barron.

A nightly special segment for hunting enthusiasts will tabulate the number of immigrant ICE roundups and deportations, presented using 3D colored graphics for both nationality and racial identification, and enabling audiences to see accomplishments of the administration’s #1 priority.

Also – in the wide world of sports and especially on multiple weekends each month, golf will delight duffers watching the President report from his links. Special offer coupons to selected courses owned by the Trump organization will be auctioned live to raise money for green maintenance.

Dr. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (who has received a medical doctorate from Trump University and was awarded by Presidential Order) will take viewer call-ins on vaccines as well as a wide range of medical topics several nights each week. His segment will be sponsored by major pharmaceutical companies.

Style, beauty, and entertainment, as determined solely by Mr. Trump on the attractiveness of featured individuals (as compared to himself) and the measure of their anatomies, will delight and rivet audiences with their comparisons.

Social media posts will include specially created segments using the subscription model of OnlyFans.

The Evening News with Donald J. Trump may be expected to debut soon on selected broadcast and streaming platforms.

Tiffany Network At Risk of Losing Its Luster

It is being reported that CBS News is entering negotiations with the F.C.C. because a settlement with the Trump administration is politically expedient.

Expedient for the parent organization, Paramount? Apparently.

As reported in the NY Times, “But in the wake of Mr. Trump’s election, CBS’s parent company, Paramount, has begun settlement discussions with representatives of Mr. Trump, according to several people with knowledge of the talks. Many executives at Paramount believe that settling the suit could help pave the way for the F.C.C. to approve Paramount’s planned multibillion-dollar merger with another company.”

Expedient also to avoiding any negative relations or a loss of access with the Trump White House? Perhaps true, but most likely a calculated decision based on fear of retribution from the press office.

The proposed settlement stems from a $10 billion lawsuit from President Trump over allegations of misleading editing in a CBS News 60 Minutes story from October 7, 2024.

Business settlements and political decisions based on real or imagined ramifications are one thing. But it is quite another for a major broadcaster to cave so willingly and early in the legal process. More alarming to veteran news people is the apparent surrender and kow tow to a personality.

If a story has been properly produced, vetted by experienced and senior editors, and scrubbed for accuracy, then the network should stand by the work. Stand by your reporters and editorial team. One presumes the experienced team at CBS 60 Minutes, the premier news magazine show on CBS, did their jobs properly and professionally. It would be a sad thing for risk-averse managers at the television network to scuttle the work and settle for the expedience of a new business deal.

Hinmatóowyalahtq̓it Was Right

Over the last 36 hours, much of the cable-verse has been unremarkably predictable. MSNBC grieves, Newsmax and Fox gloat, and CNN searches to strike a moderate tune, whatever that might be.

Each media entity is frantically and fanatically preaching to its choir. That’s what their audience wants and believes. That’s where their commercial success lies.

While I seriously doubt there has been any audience transference from its well-entrenched political ideology of choice, therein lies the problem.

They are squandering our future, and we are succumbing to their pabulum. Former New Mexico Governor and US Ambassador Bill Richardson promoted collaboration and compromise, “We cannot accomplish all that we need to do without working together.”

Instead, too many of us hear a story and mutter, “Geez, what a bitch!” Or dismiss some politician or businessman bemoaning, “What a rich bastard they are, what do they know about…?”
We pit one another against each other for short-term political gain. Congressperson Majorie Taylor Greene has announced her intention to hold hearings on the leftist-leaning PBS for insinuating that Elon Musk’s raised salute was an endorsement of either fascism or Nazism. Hearings? Really?

To quote one of America’s great orators, Bugs Bunny, “Heh. What a maroon!”

See, I did it there!

But I must also recognize that on the other side of the aisle, statements by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez routinely boil the blood of many conservatives.

We are seduced and reduced to embracing (liking?) a diet of bromides and broadsides from one side to the other and back again. We toss around words like liberty and freedom and define them solely and judgmentally in our terms… and if you disagree, you’re disloyal, un-American, and wrong.

Ronald Reagan reminded us to be more careful with what we say and what’s at stake. “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.”

We expect MSNBC to interview guests aligned with a left-of-center ideology, just as Newsmax or Fox celebrates the right. Name-calling predominates the headlines. Guests appear especially for their vitriol and the cleverness that predominate the airwaves.

Are media power brokers and gatekeepers so committed to being an echo chamber of their audience’s ideologies and so terrified of losing market share that they cannot present another idea?

Dare we suggest we deserve better?

Anchors and hosts giggle, make snarky editorial remarks, and castigate anyone who disagrees with their political line. Listen to the adjectives. Count the adverbs.

Admittedly, it’s so easy to sit in judgment. And the view ain’t bad either!

It is as unreasonable as it is unlikely that the media will change, and certainly not willingly, if ever. They will continue to pander to their perceptions of this divided and discordant mob of viewers.

Audiences respond to two distinct emotions. Anger and fear. Only. The more that fear is stoked, the angrier audiences become. The more that anger intensifies, the fear grows more profound.

What’s wrong with challenging audiences – not from opposite poles – but from a single theme articulated by Hinmatóowyalahtq̓it (Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce), “We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe.”

Would you listen and watch? Or is that theme too frightening for you? Is there any media company or talent with courage which is willing to try?

I, for one, would be proud to produce a show like that.

From CNN’s Reliable Sources – Media & Trump Day 1

AN insightful window in to how people see their news coverage

Is the media pimping the confirmation hearings for the Mar-a-lago casting couch?

It is not much of a stretch to consider the Senate confirmation hearings for President-elect Trump’s cabinet as much more than a show-and-tell, superficial and unsatisfying peek-a-boo into the nominees’ character.

While it’s not a new phenomenon, the same vomit of words is heard at so many confirmation hearings as, in this case, GOP Senators spread their lips and gush platitudes of praise. At the same time, their Democratic counterparts swallow hard as they choke back words of doubt with so much regret for their losses last November.

It’s equally tough to envision the nominees as anything more than pawns in this current, Republican drama featuring a live, on-camera ritualistic dance aimed at an audience of one. The Senators are prostituting themselves in, what seems to me to be, a dance of fielty to the high prince of Palm Beach.

To quote the American comedian and satirist Will Rogers, “Senators are a never-ending source of amusement, amazement, and discouragement.”

Are the networks live broadcasts anything more than pimping for the President? One could and should argue, “No. The public should see for itself and note the character and tenor of the nominees.” But the fact that so many hours are offered free of charge and without obligation or an equal amount of time without balance is a concern.

Whether you support the nominations or have doubts is a private matter.

But what is public is this Senatorial progression of posturing themselves with obsequious, scripted mission statements and softball questions, aimed more at impressing or currying favor with Mr. Trump than eliciting real knowledge or a response from the witness.

Is it a question of what’s best for the American people? (The Senator’s job). Or is it a question of what can they say to be quoted on Fox to be noticed, appreciated, thanked, and soon rewarded?

Have we learned much of anything that wasn’t already prepared, shared, and promoted before the gavel fell opening the first session?

Aren’t we being treated to a regurgitation of message points crafted by speech writers? What a pitiful diet they are asking us to ingest.
And can’t you imagine these sycophants congratulating their bosses as they come off the dais — “What a good job you did.” And, “You sure looked great performing on camera at the microphone.” And, “We’ll be sure to send the clips from C-Span to the local stations in your state for rebroadcast on tonight’s evening news. The folks at home will love seeing you.”

I’ve noticed several Senators who have promoted their pleasure that the new secretary of defense will restore the military to its bygone glory. Forgive me, but is the military in tatters? There seem to be plenty of ships, and soldiers, and tanks, and even a new Space Force — isn’t that enough? This message may play well with old geezers down at the VFW hall, but what about the rest of us? Do these same Senators think any future war will really be fought primarily with boots on the ground? 
The hearings are not offering much more than an echo chamber.

The hearings are a reminder of P.T. Barnum’s assessment of the public, “You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.”

One would hope.

There is not much to see and learn here… there was an opportunity for better, but it seems that in the current politicized and fragmented world, any such hope has been dashed on the jagged shoals of reality.

The Senate hearings remind me of another Will Roger’s recommendation.
“After eating an entire bull, a mountain lion felt so good he started roaring.
He kept it up until a hunter came along and shot him.
The moral: When you’re full of bull, keep your mouth shut.”

PASTEURIZING MEDIA

Countering “media fallout”

{{This was written by my friend, teacher, and colleague Marty Perlmutter and first appeared on his substack today.It is thought provoking, and I felt worth sharing

Marshall McLuhan had a central idea he termed “media fallout.” He knew the only way to avoid the mind-manipulation of media was awareness of how these modes of consciousness envelopment work on our brains. In the absence of awareness, you have media fallout. He explained this to advertising and broadcast executives of the time — half a century ago. He said that he felt a lot like Louis Pasteur in 1860. He was aware of pervasive and invisible forces that caused disease and spread infection. But all around were individuals, doctors along with patients, oblivious to imperceptible but all-too-real microbes that were killing them.

To become conscious of how balkanized, corrupted, disinforming and ever-more-pathetic media are shaping our minds and behaviors requires a quantum leap in awareness of invisible forces. Sinclair Broadcasting and Fox News are the easiest of the “cavorting beasties” (as the inventor of the microscope termed single-cell organisms) to detect, and begin to disinfect. Social media, fragmented attention, cell phone dopamine addiction — these will take more time to elucidate and defang.

Our plight seems more fraught than simply entertaining ourselves to death. As McLuhan taught, what we’re not aware of will have its way with our delicate cerebra. A lot of what we’re dealing with now barely makes it to the cortex. This is the age of the medulla oblongata, the brain stem where fear and rage abide. While we are distracted, addicted, disinformed and terrorized, what hope is there that we’ll grok how this enveloping miasma operates?

Another teaching gives me hope. A peerless penetrator of the loom of passions and persuasions, Friedrich Nietzsche, taught, “Understanding stops action.” When you comprehend how something triggers you, when you grasp the roots of your convictions, there’s no heat, no drive to act. There is only a tranquility that passeth manipulation.

So spread the word: Cavorting beasties are abroad in the land. We cannot see or sense this stuff til we surface the mechanisms by which they reach into us. By slowly becoming aware of how these forces massage our senses, impact our feeling and thinking, we can disabuse ourselves of thralldom and become, truly and at last, free.

Noteworthy in the media

To all of my students still interested in improving their skills of interviewing, two pieces on today’s (12.15.24) CBS Sunday Morning are a master’s class.

The first from David Martin in a profile of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and the second from Tracy Smith in an assessment of the talent of Nicole Kidman are well worth studying.

The reporter’s innate curiosity, authenticity, poise and focus are all to be emulated. The structure of their questions, their brevity and insight are noteworthy.

Even their on camera questions, bridges, and cutaways are executed so very well.

https://www.cbsnews.com/sunday-morning/

Three Little Pigs and a Big Bad Wolf

The Guardian (UK) has an interesting take on the fable of Three Little Pigs and how it might be covered in contemporary media. (Slow video window – wait for it to open!)

News – social media input – citizen journalism, blogs, commentators and critics all swarming – do they make for better coverage or a muddle?
In any case, it’s a short video worth more discussion.

Veteran Correspondent Richard Threlkeld – RIP

Dick Threlkeld was a masterful writer, story teller, correspondent and a good friend of both my father during the Vietnam war and me when Dick and I both worked at CBS and ABC on the US west coast.
He was a craftsman – a wordsmith – a gentleman – a friend.

From the Associate Press

By FRAZIER MOORE
AP Television Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — Richard Threlkeld, a far-ranging and award-winning correspondent who worked for both CBS and ABC News during a long career, has been killed in a car accident, CBS said.
The 74-year-old Threlkeld died Friday morning in Amagansett, N.Y., and was pronounced dead at Southampton Hospital. He lived in nearby East Hampton.
Threlkeld spent more than 25 years at CBS News, retiring in 1998. He was a reporter, anchor and bureau chief. He covered the Persian Gulf War and the Vietnam War, the Patty Hearst kidnapping and trial, and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.
He worked alongside Lesley Stahl as co-anchor of “The CBS Morning News” from 1977-79, and reported for “CBS Sunday Morning” from its inception in 1979, as well as for “The CBS Evening News With Dan Rather.”
In 1981, Threlkeld decided to go to up-and-coming ABC News without fanfare and without telling CBS.
“I don’t like to horse trade. I’m not a horse,” Threlkeld told The Associated Press at the time. “After I decided ABC was the best place for me to go, it would have been wrong to make a verbal agreement and take it back to CBS to see what they could do.”
At ABC News, he served as a national correspondent for “World News Tonight.”

Real news doesn’t include nipple slips

Once upon a time when news was not a commodity and what was editorially selected for print or broadcast was of the most pressing nature so that it deserved reporting, there were fewer stories about incidental nudity or wardrobe malfunctions.

But Nicki Minaj Nip Slip During “Good Morning America” today this has become news… It doesn’t matter which network – or how it happened – or if it was incidental or accidental. This is now grist for the content wheel. And it is, forgive me, awfully superficial stuff.

And here is a worthy-to-be-remembered apologetic quote using the term “regrettably.” From TV Newser, “ABC News spokesman Jeffrey Schneider, “Although we had a five-second delay in place, the live East Coast feed of the concert regrettably included certain fleeting images of the performer that were taken out of later feeds in other time zones. We are sorry that this occurred.”

And then – adding this, again from TV Newser, “TMZ spoke with the Parents Television Council: “For the umpteenth time in recent memory a morning news show has included inappropriate content for children and families.” It prompts me to ask — the “umpteenth time”? Did I miss so many of the others? How can they be so carried away with hyperbole – “the umpteenth time”? I guess we should ask for their list (Hah!) – or maybe just watch morning news more carefully.

Maybe this is just a Saturday story… but here’s the point. Until you can put a smoking gun in the hands of the ABC producers and prove they intended this to happen, which I don’t think is even remotely reasonable, can’t we just move on? Is this a worthy-to-be-reported story?

It would seem that there are are more editorially worthwhile things to discuss. My argument here is: this isn’t news. It isn’t fashion. It seems at best to be an isolated and fleeting screw up.

Content matters – this even isn’t worthy. Even by ranting I have given it undue prominence. I guess I just wanted to make a clean breast of how I felt.