Trump’s media feud enters new era, by Jonathan Easley.
President-elect Donald Trump and the news media are settling into an uneasy relationship.
Distrust and ill feelings are held on both sides, and no one is predicting the acrimony that characterized the final months of the presidential campaign will disappear. …
Nor should it. The media are Trump’s primary opposition, just as they are to any non-PC government — such as Abbott’s recent government in Australia. PC administrations can govern very differently, because the media is their ideological ally.
The president-elect’s frequent threats to the press have added to a sense that the rules for covering this White House might be different. …
Trump’s transition team says it is committed to having a press pool, which allows for a small group of reporters to remain stationed near the president to document his movements. The pool was on hand for the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, and when George W. Bush was on the move on 9/11. …
But there are no laws requiring that an administration maintain a press pool or even that news outlets have access to administration officials, the briefing room or White House grounds.
Trump pushes back against press bias, unlike most supine “right wing” leaders:
During his primary campaign, Trump blackballed some news outlets from covering his rallies, which were open to the public, because he was unhappy with their coverage of him.
He also singled-out individual reporters for ridicule and would whip up a frenzy against the media at his rallies, where Trump supporters would jeer at the press pen.
Just as the printing press undid the Church, with previously had a monopoly on news via the pulpit, the Internet is unraveling the power of the media:
But Trump has little incentive to go through traditional media channels, some experts say.
Facebook and Twitter combine to give him one of the most powerful social media presences in the world.
He has former Breitbart executive Stephen Bannon at his side in the White House, giving him a powerful ally in the massively influential world of right-wing news.
And when Trump releases a straight-to-camera video to announce his 100-day agenda — as he did this week, in lieu of a press conference — it elicits the same volume of coverage as a press conference would.
Heads are exploding because the real battleground is media bias:
Of course, the media will get little sympathy from the public, with a favorable rating sitting at an all-time low in the latest Gallup survey. Only 32 percent of Americans say they have a great deal or fair amount of trust in the press.
And Trump’s allies believe all of their moves to beat back at what they view as a hopelessly biased liberal media are justified.
They’re fuming over what they see as a press corps that has dropped any pretense of objectivity in covering Trump, and they’re sick of what they view as breathless coverage of frivolous stories, like the “Hamilton” actor who chided Vice President-elect Mike Pence after a performance.
Trump allies are apoplectic over the media’s obsession with the alt-right and the neo-Nazis that gathered in Washington, D.C., over the weekend to pledge fealty to Trump, arguing that Trump has condemned racism repeatedly and has no ties to either group.
By several accounts, there were as many reporters and protesters at the event as there were white nationalists, raising questions about why the event has attracted so much attention.
