Transcript for Post Elitist Drivel
On October 25, 2024 The Washington Post announced that it would not endorse a Presidential candidate for the pending election. So what? You say. You don’t vote based on what a newspaper says. The Washington Post thinks people do, and it has endorsed presidential candidates, explicitly or implicitly, since 1932 when it endorsed Franklin Roosevelt.
The reaction to the Post’s announcement was apoplectic. One editor-at-large quit. Several staffers have resigned. The editorial board has imploded. As many as 200,000 subscriptions have been cancelled. All because a newspaper declined to take a political position – presumably a noble action, but that remains to be seen.
On October 28, the owner of the Washington Post and multi-gazillionaire Jeff Bezos published an opinion piece explaining his reason for interfering in the editorial process, an action reminiscent of William Randolph Hearst, Joseph Pulitzer and the heady days of yellow journalism.
The 917-word article makes one realize just how far removed from common society the plutocracy is. The article is written with the confidence of a person who believes everything he says, believes it to be the truth, and moreover believes it to be the truth of every person who reads it. Too bad the power of belief is not magnified by wealth.
Mr. Bezos – may I call you Jeff? Jeff begins by lamenting the record low faith in journalism – something lower than the public’s trust in Congress and then asserts two platitudes. One: newspapers must be accurate. And two, people must believe that newspapers are accurate. He proceeds to say that newspaper endorsements of candidates do not influence election results, but they do influence people’s opinion of the newspaper – that the newspaper is biased. There’s nothing to debate in that sentiment.
Jeff insists that there is no personal motivation for refusing to endorse a candidate and that his sole purpose is to restore faith in journalism. Then the other shoe drops – whatever that means. Jeff laments that quote people are turning to off-the-cuff podcasts, inaccurate social media posts and other unverified news sources unquote, the unspoken assertion being that traditional news outlets are verified news sources – an assertion that conflicts with the current record-low confidence in journalism.
Jeff’s message is that people do not trust the press, alternative information sources are unreliable, and that by not endorsing a presidential candidate, faith in journalism will be restored. He tries to gain our trust by acknowledging the one fact to which we can all attest quote increasingly we talk only to a certain elite. More and more, we talk to ourselves. Unquote
At first glance, this appears to be a genuine observation of fault, but a more accurate phrasing of the underlying sentiment might sound like this “We, the beautiful people, must make more efforts to include the little people in our discourse.” This sole attempt to explain why trust in journalism has declined is, in fact, a veiled lament that the Washington Post must deign to speak to the huddled masses who lack the sophistication of the landed gentry if it wishes to increase its circulation.
Ultimately, Jeff does not proffer why faith in journalism is at an all-time low – and whether he believes the Post is a guilty party. No, he simply ‘reaches settlement without an admission of guilt’ so to speak.
Yes, Jeff, people are turning to off-the-cuff podcasts and social media posts and potentially receiving faulty information – and you drove them to it! You and others like you who insist upon taking a side, advancing that side as the ultimate incontrovertible truth, coinciding that messaging with other establishment outlets, and then mocking and persecuting anyone who disagrees with the approved messaging. Perhaps these are reasons that the public trust in journalism is at a record low.
Yes, podcasts and independent news sites do spread questionable facts, misinformation, propaganda, and exploit confirmation bias – but that is not remarkably different from establishment news outlets – they simply lack the coordination, budgets, and market penetration to overwhelm the populace with their blather.
Social media platforms do amplify said questionable facts, misinformation, and propaganda. Establishment news outlets are fine with that – because it goes both ways; their objective is to drown competing viewpoints with the incessant proliferation of their own narratives and vilifying opposing perspectives.
The naked reality that the Post cannot escape is that journalism, the federal government, and corporate America are the founders and exclusive members of a cult of lies that harkens to Joseph Pulitzer and the transmogrification of news from rational reporting on events to tension-filled stories of drama and intrigue.
As Peter Vanderwicken wrote thirty years ago: “The news media and the government are entwined in a vicious circle of mutual manipulation, mythmaking, and self-interest. Journalists need crises to dramatize news, and government officials need to appear to be responding to crises. Too often, the crises are not really crises but joint fabrications. The two institutions have become so ensnared in a symbiotic web of lies that the news media are unable to tell the public what is true and the government is unable to govern effectively.” End quote.
Examples of the culture of lying include Ronald Reagan’s treason in the Iran Contra affair and the Bush administration’s misleading justifications and outright lies for invading Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003.
A more recent example would be the so-called Russia-gate narrative that claimed the Trump campaign colluded with Russia in 2016. Three years and thirty million dollars or so later, no evidence of a crime committed by Trump or his campaign was provided.
The stories that claimed the files on Hunter Biden’s laptop originated in Russia, as asserted by fifty-one former intelligence officials and presidential candidate Joe Biden, when in fact they were provided by computer repairman John Paul Mac Isaac from Delaware and the proceeding suppression of the story by Facebook and endless repudiation by establishment news media.
And let us not forget the “safe and effective” experimental gene therapy from Pfizer. How many millions of people were forced to receive unproven medication at the point of a virtual gun? How many tens of thousands died from unacknowledged risks? How many millions still suffer today from unacknowledged side effects? The propaganda campaign against the American and global population about the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 pathogen and the safety and effectiveness of the patented and profitable “treatments” represents the pinnacle of a culture of coordinated lying between government, journalism, and corporations.
Jeff reserves his most presumptuous and offensive statement for last. Referring to, in his opinion, the finest journalists anywhere working at the Washington Post, he said quote they deserve to be believed. Jeff is either oblivious to the unabashed political bent of the Washington Post or is a zealot who believes the absolute superiority of his positions justifies any amount of propaganda. Power-mad psychopaths are firm supporters of the end justifying the means.
The Washington Post is unashamedly agenda-driven and politically-oriented publication that appeals – at best – to thirty percent of the population, a number not dissimilar to the proportion of people who still profess faith in journalism. And yet, Jeff insists they quote work painstakingly every day to get to the truth unquote. But whose truth? A noted philosopher once said, “many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.”
When the Washington Post presents more than one viewpoint, acknowledges and respects viewpoints that are different and even oppositional to its own, then perhaps the journalists at the Post will have earned the respect of belief.
Like so many aristocrats throughout history, Jeff believes that his ability to influence public opinion is proportional to his wealth and power, but the reality is always the inverse. The more power and wealth the individual possesses, the more likely his opinions will be summarily dismissed, for how can the wealthy and powerful have any motivations other than gaining more wealth and power?