Stick to reporting, not distorting
Opinions expressed within this article are solely the author’s and do not represent the opinions and beliefs of The Weber Shandwick Collective.
At the beginning of my career, I was a reporter — briefly, and an undistinguished one. My wife has been a journalist for quite some time, and a distinguished one. Most of my friends have been or are journalists.
I mention this to establish a deeply held bias in favor of a craft that includes some of the smartest, public-spirited and fun-to-be-around people anywhere on the planet.
And it is for precisely that reason I’m hoping this scolding will be seen as constructive criticism rather than totally unsubstantiated nonsense about fake news or the Bolshevik tendencies of the mainstream media.
Journalists today face a Sisyphean challenge in covering the lies and distortions endemic to the effusions of Donald Trump. It’s hard work but their focus should be on the words Mr. Trump actually says, and not the ones he doesn’t. (I’m pretty sure the concept was taught at the Columbia Journalism School in my day and I would imagine it still is.)
At a campaign rally in Dayton, Ohio recently, Mr. Trump was complaining about China’s trade policies and declaring that, if elected, he wouldn’t stand for their behavior if he became president again. Here’s how The Hill recorded his remarks:
“No, we’re going to put a 100% tariff on every single car that comes across the line, and you’re not going to be able to sell those cars if I get elected,” he said. “Now, if I don’t get elected, it’s going to be a bloodbath for the country. That’ll be the least of it.”
Mr. Trump is challenged in uttering complete and understandable sentences. But in this case, it was pretty clear that he was not talking about a bloodbath on America’s streets if he didn’t win in November. Not that you would know that from the hysterical (crazed, not humorous) headlines that followed. Here are a few from some well-known and highly regarded media outlets:
“Trump says some migrants are ‘not people’ and predicts a ‘blood bath’ if he loses”
“Trump says if Biden is elected ‘it’s going to be a ‘bloodbath’”
“Trump says there will be a ‘bloodbath’ if he loses the election”
As befits our rational civic discourse these days, a Biden campaign spokesman poured gasoline on this pyre of truth, adding an accelerant to the incendiary language that Trump didn’t use: “This is who Donald Trump is: a loser who gets beat by over seven million votes and then instead of appealing to a wider mainstream audience doubles down on his threats of political violence.”
Lying has been part of our national politics since before there was a nation. Stephen F. Knott, emeritus professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College, has written that even “George Washington [he of the cherry tree incident] knew how to lie. In fact, he told a lot of them. Moreover, talent for deception was shared by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson.”
To be fair and balanced, in recent times President Biden has been known to tell a whopper or two; President Clinton wagged his finger at us; and Hillary Clinton was called a “congenital liar” by then-New York Times columnist William Safire. But to be accurate, in both quantity and quality, Mr. Trump has elevated playing fast and loose with the truth to a wholly unprecedented level.
At a time when disinformation, misinformation and deception unceasingly contaminate the media environment, reporters face a complex challenge in trying to separate fact from fiction and doing so in a way that avoids the appearance of taking sides in the election.
But it is for precisely that reason that the members of the Fourth Estate must take special care not to give ammunition to the critics who despise them (unlike those of us who don’t) by engaging in the deception they so eagerly rebuke when politicians are the deceivers.
A recent Gallup poll found that 32% of Americans had a “great deal” of trust in the media and 39% had no trust at all — the lowest and highest figures, respectively, in the 50 years Gallup has asked the trust question. Mr. Trump gives his critics a daily barrage of unseemly and tendentious remarks to comment upon. The media should focus on those alone. In questioning Mr. Trump’s credibility, the press shouldn’t damage its own.
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Powell Tate is the Public Affairs Unit of the Weber Shandwick Collective. For more information, visit: www.powelltate.com
