THURSDAY, AUGUST 22, 2024
Journalistic fecklessness doesn't help: Dear reader, no—it never happened!
Yesterday, the candidate let the claim loose on an unsuspecting North Carolina crowd—but also, on the whole world. Below, we show you again what the candidate said—but no, this never happened:
TRUMP (8/21/24): Remember when Biden sent Kamala to Europe to stop the war in Ukraine? She met with Putin, and then three days later, he attacked.
How did she do? Do you think she did a good job? She met with Putin to tell him, "Don’t do it." And three days later, he attacked. That’s when the attack started.
Did you know that, General [Kellogg]? He should have sent you.
[Retired Army Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg was present at the event.]
Stating the obvious, General Kellogg didn't "know that," for a fairly obvious reason. But so Trump told the Tarheel crowd—though no, that meeting never occurred.
That meeting never occurred! Along with many others, CNN's Daniel Dale had to go through another laborious fact-check. You can review his fact-check here.
That said, the crackpot claims never stop. This includes crackpot claims about "Comrade Kamala," including the lunatic claim about the 15,000 rally-goers the candidate said weren't there.
Some of the crackpot claims involve the other candidate. On the other hand, some of the crackpot claims are restricted to major policy matters. Last Saturday, when he spoke in Wilkes-Barre, the candidate bizarrely said this to an unsuspecting crowd:
TRUMP (8/17/24): Here's the truth. Kamala wants to put massive taxes on American jobs and American industry. I want to cut taxes while putting tariffs on China and foreign countries to bring our jobs back home to Pennsylvania and take in billions and billions of dollars.
I'm the only one that ever took in any money from China...We took in hundreds of billions of dollars from China.
[...]
A tariff is a tax on a foreign country. That's the way it is, whether you like it or not.
A lot of people like to say [adopting pompous tone], "Oh, it’s a tax on us." No, no, no. It's a tax on a foreign country. It's a tax on a country that's ripping us off and stealing our jobs.
[AUDIENCE APPLAUSE]
And it’s a tax that doesn’t affect our country.
The candidate seems to think that a tariff is like a penalty or a fine. It sounds like he thinks a tariff is like a fine which is paid to us by some foreign government, in this case by China.
Obviously, that isn't the way a tariff works; that isn't how tariffs work at all! For Kevin Drum's annoyed explainer, you can just click here.
Kamala Harris met with Putin! Also: A tariff is a tax on a foreign country!
Also: No one was present at Harris's rally in the airport hangar! And on and on and on.
Journalistically, there's no perfect way to cover any major candidate. In fairness to the mainstream press, this candidate is especially difficult to cover because his endless peculiar behavior takes us so far beyond any recognizable norm.
There is no established way to cover this kind of behavior. That said, journalistic avoidance isn't the answer—and journalistic fecklessness only makes matters worse.
Journalistic fecklessness? For today, as an aside, we're going to leave you with this:
On the front page of today's New York Times, Jim Tankersley offers a detailed "news analysis" piece about Candidate Harris's alleged proposal to institute "price controls."
In print editions, it's the featured report on the paper's front page! As the report appears online, its dual headline says this:
NEWS ANALYSIS
On Harris’s Price-Gouging Ban, Allies and Foes May Have the Wrong Idea
The plan does not appear to amount to government price controls. It also might not bring down grocery bills anytime soon.
Say what? The plan does not appear to involve "price controls?" It's much as we told you at the start of the week:
The snark got all the way around the world before the journalism was able to get its boots on.
It isn't the fault of journalists like Tankersley that Harris's broad proposal was savaged—and was most likely mischaracterized—right out of the gate.
Still, we wanted to share an irony with you. You'll find it here, in this part of Tankersley's detailed report:
[Harris's] proposal was more specific than the extremely detail-light economic plans that Mr. Trump has floated, such as tariffs on all imports. But it left many blanks unfilled—an omission that some veterans of campaign policymaking say could eventually work to Ms. Harris’s advantage.
The initial public reaction has included sharp criticism, from Republicans and other commentators. “Kamala Harris is a Trojan horse for nation-destroying spending, communist price controls and open borders,” the Trump campaign said in a release this week.
“It’s hard to exaggerate how bad this policy is,” the Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell wrote last week, referring to the price-gouging ban. “It is, in all but name, a sweeping set of government-enforced price controls across every industry, not only food.”
But it has also put big retailers on the defensive in a way that delights progressive groups.
Sure enough, there it is! As part of his detailed analysis piece, Tankersley quotes Catherine Rampell's original, snarky put-down of Harris's proposal. He doesn't mention a related fact—he doesn't mention the fact that Rampell reversed her assessment one day later, after listening to Harris's initial economic address.
Why would Tankersley report it that way? Why would he quote the instant loudmouth snark, then fail to cite the subsequent walk-back?
We'll guess the answer is simple:
Rampell blared her instant takedown all over town—first in a snarky column for the Washington Post, then on CNN. One day later, she quietly announced her walk-back is a tiny little tweet which no one saw.
The snark got all the way around the world! Fecklessly, Rampell and the Washington Post quietly whispered the walk-back.
The crazy claims by Candidate Trump make matters bad enough. This kind of behavior from Princeton grads only makes matters worse.
"You can review his fact-check here." Unfortunately, Somerby forgot to activate the link to the fact-check by Dale.
ReplyDeleteFixed now, thank you.
DeleteSomerby keeps referring to "the Candidate" but there are two presidential nominees. It would be clearer if he referred to Trump when he means Trump and not to some ambiguous candidate who might be either Harris or Trump. Why? Because Harris isn't the one saying crazy things that need to be constantly fact-checked because they are lies.
ReplyDelete"Why would Tankersley report it that way?"
ReplyDeleteBecause the NY Times is no friend to the Democrats and may not want Harris to beat Trump.
"The crazy claims by Candidate Trump make matters bad enough. This kind of behavior from Princeton grads only makes matters worse."
ReplyDeleteThe gratuitous swipe at Princeton is unwarranted. Princeton did not teach Tankersley to have no integrity or to fail to search everything Rampell said (to make sure there were no reversals or retractions) before quoting that single instance of so-called snark. Blaming Princeton is unfair, but probably blaming Tankersley is also unfair. Does every journalistic have to become thoroughly familiar with everything anyone they've quoted has ever said? Somerby seems to think so. But is that feasible? Is it realistic given the schedules and resources and deadlines writers work under? And how did Princeton cause this error? There are unconnected dots in Somerby's world, but as long as he gets to slime his favorite targets, who cares?
Why is controversial to say that Democrats cheat and they are really good at it? If you have an open mind, you can clearly see it. Exhibit 1: Vicious lawfare to keep RFK off ballot as an independent. Exhibit 2: Lying about Biden’s senility, saying "he is sharp as tack" in unison and suppressing other candidates in the own primaries.
ReplyDeleteIs it ok for Trump’s supporters to fund and help RFK Jr because he may pull votes from Harris?
DeleteBecause we became atheists and having nowhere to go, our spiritual needs redirected themselves into a political party and made it a religion. And all the drawbacks came with it - dogma, conformity, squashing of dissent, loss of critical thinking. It's been really bad. They will write books about it one day.
DeleteAre either of your examples supposed to describe "cheating"? If so, you fail.
DeleteYou could refer to "undemocratic practices" such as dark money in primaries, lack of transparency in party governance, manipulation of party rules (including the primary calendar and the elimination of debates), superdelegate influence, gerrymandering, voter suppression, the Russiagate investigations and FISA abuse, the use of the Espionage Act against whistleblowers, drone strikes, the expansion of executive power, the DNC's handling of the 2016 primary, Super Tuesday and Michael Bloomberg's influence, foreign policy decisions made without congressional approval, the impeachment process and partisan politics, the handling of the 2020 Iowa caucus, the Obama administration's surveillance of journalists, and the Democratic leadership's support for the Iraq War, to name a few.
DeleteQuaker in a Basement: How about Exhibit 3: Be against voter id and oppose any effort to maintain integrity of voter rolls, using racist excuses like black people can’t get IDs . Exhibit 4: Pay 3rd party organizations to harvest promiscuously sent ballots, and pay them on a per harvested ballot basis.
Delete#4 isn’t a thing
DeleteVoter ID is a great idea, but how will you fund each state's program to find and provide a free VOTER ID to every eligible voter.
Deleteit shouldn't be too hard to raise taxes to fund these programs on the backs of citizens, who believe a VOTER ID is the best way to maintain the integrity of elections.
What rich person will complain about a return to the 90% top income tax rate, used to fund programs where the government finds each and every eligible voter and gives them a free VOTER ID?
DeleteAfter all, election integrity is very important to everyone, not just the rich.
No examples of so-called "cheating" cited still.
DeleteAll this talk about election integrity is just that:talk. After Trump lost the popular vote to Clinton, he assembled a Republican panel to root out the voter fraud in that election. They disbanded after roughly one year to no fanfare, empty handed, as did multiple Republican state election committees after 2020. It’s all b.s. generated by partisans who can’t stand to lose, despite the massive amount of gerrymandering that Republicans engage in, in the red states they control. This activity has been litigated against successfully because unlike massive voter fraud, it exists.
Delete4:42 Nice laundry list. Make one up for the Republican Party when you have time. Whose “democratic process” has resulted in the candidacy of an old codger who couldn’t tell the truth if his life depended on it, and a congress so beholding to him that they rejected a bipartisan immigration bill at his request? Whatever misshapen version of democracy you would characterize the Democratic Party as embodying is far preferable to the broken, rudderless assemblage of so called lawmakers on the other side. Trump lost the election last night, to a candidate with integrity who is not demented. The independents, energized youth, women, and people of color are not buying his party’s best effort.
DeleteHere is something that is worth quoting on the topic:
ReplyDeletehttps://robertreich.substack.com/p/how-kamala-intends-to-bring-prices?utm_source=post-banner&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true
Tariffs are a good tool in your toolkit to use against your country’s economic adversaries, pretty charts from Dem shill Kevin Drum not withstanding. Tariffs have been used by Presidents multiple times in our history, and other countries openly or tacitly use it all the time. So what if all the useless throw away shit we buy from China costs double at the store? I am with Trump on this.
ReplyDeleteTariffs raise prices on imports, thereby allowing domestic producers to better compete, thereby creating jobs in the US.
ReplyDeleteFine. Their benefit is most decidedly not to "take in billions and billions of dollars" from China, as Uncle Crazy says.
“ The crazy claims by Candidate Trump”
ReplyDeletePutting thumb on scales for his belief that Trump “might” be crazy.
Has Somerby ever considered that Trump makes this stuff up deliberately as a political tactic? DiC calls it “effective.”
A weak dollar is also a benefit to the USA, since it reduces our trade deficit.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't a "weak" dollar indicate that it has a lower value against foreign currencies? That would mean more dollars are required to purchase imports. Wouldn't that increase our deficit?
DeleteYes, we would be less inclined to purchase imports with a weak dollar. Hence more inclined to purchase US-made goods. So, good for jobs.
DeleteThat's as far as my economic knowledge takes me.
"Yes, we would be less inclined to purchase imports with a weak dollar."
DeleteAha. That really depends on what commodity we're talking about. If its light sweet crude oil from the middle east, the effect of the dollar's strength or weakness is going to be small. If we're talking about, say, French wine, that might be different.
Countries that use those foreign currencies will purchase more from U.S. companies, because they can buy more U.S. goods with those currencies.
DeleteTrump claims Democrats cheat but Trump cheats every time he tells a lie. His followers may not care about his constant lying but I do. Anyone who thinks Trump’s accusations of cheating have merit needs to explain why Trump is not a worse cheater than anyone he accuses.
ReplyDeleteHe is not as bad as the lies of the Democrats because Democrat's policies have been more effective at dismantling democracy in the United States, carried out on behalf of corporations and the wealthy. It has been a bipartisan effort but Democrats have led the way most recently in handing over courts, legislative bodies, executive branch, and media to corporate power. Democrat's record on issues such as war, criminal justice, immigration, and trade have caused immense suffering and death. They have created to opportunity for
Deletedemagogues who express their hatred for the corrupt system to excite voters who feel betrayed. Unlike the lies of the Democrats, Trump's lies haven't turned our democracy into a system where corporations exert subtle but substantial power over a system that only superficially seems democratic.
7:37 nonsensical verbiage with absolutely no substance, but thanks for your opinion
DeleteTrump didn't lie when he gave that HUGE tax break to the rich and corporations.
DeleteRepublican voters lied, when they said they were concerned about an economy rigged to help the rich and corporations over the citizens.
I can't claim to be an expert on economics in any sense. Someone once characterized economics as the "dismal science." I quite agree - except for the part about it being a "science." That said, my understanding is how tariffs work, or are supposed to work, is that the imposition of tariffs do cause imported goods to be more expensive; and that makes American manufactured goods more competitive and helps American manufacturers or farmers. One argument against tariffs is that it hurts consumers - they have to pay more for goods. They may also raise money for the government. (A real economist surely could explain this better). I don't think the main purpose of tariffs, though, is to generate revenue for the government. My impression is that there is another significant downside to tariffs. Other countries will retaliate by imposing tariffs on American products, hurting American exporters. I'm confident that someone more schooled than I could explain this better.
ReplyDeleteI think you understand it just fine.
DeleteEconomists rightly claim that tariffs are a tax on consumers, but there has to be a place for carefully chosen ones, in my opinion, since competition is imbalanced by the labor practices and government involvement in production of goods in other countries that do not allow a level playing field.
DeleteWhen does the drunk ass hoe take the stage?
ReplyDeleteMelania isn't supporting her so-called husband this time around.
DeleteKevin weighs in:
ReplyDeletehttps://jabberwocking.com/donald-trump-is-still-losing-his-mind/
My contention is that this is possibly just Trump bullshitting/lying to try to get the rubes to believe it and thereby damage Harris. I do believe it is a strategy he has continually used, so it may not mean he’s losing his mind. He could be though.
DeleteIs it too much to ask that he lose the part of his mind so in sync with bigotry?
Delete