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When people ask what happened to the last remaining inklings of journalist integrity in America over the past 10 years, perhaps the most popular answer is that Donald Trump broke the legacy media, pure and simple.

Another common thought is that if the media portrayed Donald Trump honestly, America would elect him to office in a historic landslide. But the undeniable bias is there, even though the industry tries to feign otherwise.

All of which brings us to New York Times columnist Maggie Haberman, who is also a political analyst on CNN. In a guest appearance on NPR’s Fresh Air, Haberman was asked about the “level of bitterness” in politics following TWO failed assassination attempts targeting Trump, who faults the rhetoric on the left. Host Dave Davies framed the discussion by claiming the media “have given Trump credibility by treating things he says as if they should be taken seriously when they don’t deserve that treatment.”

“I think that the media does a very good job covering Trump. There are always going to be specific stories that could have been better, should have been better, that are written on deadline, and people are not being as precise as they should be,” Haberman responded. “I think there is an industry, bluntly, that is dedicated toward attacking the media, especially as it relates to covering Donald Trump and all coverage of Trump.”

“And I think that Trump is a really difficult figure to cover because he challenges news media process every day, has for years,” she continued. “The systems are just fundamentally — they were not built to deal with somebody who says things that are not true as often as he does or speaks as incoherently as he often does. I think the media has actually done a very good job showing people who he is, what he says, what he does.”

Haberman unwittingly said out loud what is known to be true, not bothering to hide her own bias — keep in mind that prior to the rigged debate between Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, it was reported that moderator David Muir’s ABC newscast was 100% positive about Harris and 93% negative about Trump.

“I think most of the information that the public has about Trump is because of reporting by the media,” she said. “And I guess I don’t really understand how this industry that literally exists to attack the press broadly – and the media is not a monolith. It’s not a league. But this industry that exists to do that — I don’t see how they think they are a solution by undermining faith in what we do. That’s been very confusing to me.”

Talk about living in a bubble. Davies tried to frame the attacks as a partisan endeavor, but Haberman was more focused on criticism on the left when the media let up on its anti-Trump fever, painting the media as the victim here.

“I’m talking about criticism on the left. I’m talking about a lot of that Trump has used the language of despots to undermine the press is very well established, and it’s very dangerous,” she said. “And I’ve talked about that. The publisher of The New York Times has been incredibly clear about that. He published an op-ed recently in The Washington Post actually talking about that. So I don’t think that anybody is in — at The New York Times is trying to sanitize Trump’s language.”

“Do I think that there are occasional pieces at my paper, at other papers that probably should have been done differently? That’s absolutely true,” Haberman continued. “That’s what happens with this industry on the left that attacks the press is that it gets described as a grand conspiracy to try to help Trump somehow, as opposed to people doing their job on daily deadlines and not always hitting the mark because we are humans. And we are doing our best under a very challenging set of circumstances. But I actually think the media has done a very good job of covering Trump.”

The NY Times columnist said critics on the left are frustrated “that there is not the result they want to see, which is Trump melts or Trump no longer has, you know popularity.”

“I mean, you were saying — I think your question was treat him with credibility. He’s the Republican nominee. So there’s a substantial voting bloc in this country — almost half — that take seriously what he’s saying,” Haberman concluded. “And it’s not because The New York Times wrote a certain story. And so to not understand that, I think, is problematic for folks leveling the charge.”

Tom Tillison
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