I totally get your frustration at her seeming unwillingness to engage with the press. But the mainstream media has changed so much over the past 50-ish years. Now, every time there is a misstatement or a bent truth on the Democratic side, Kamala is grilled by the press. And when the Former Guy lies blatantly EVERY single day, it’s mostly glossed over and becoming normalized! I understand her unwillingness to engage with that circus.
Thank you for your column and i wonder why you have not addressed the elephant in the room that mainstream media has been compromised. Trumps ‘press conferences “ are rambling incoherent nonsense pushing his lies. The nytimes finally addressed the issue this week. I understand the frustration you voice that VP Harris has not spent a lot of time with mainstream media but you of all people realize that THIS IS NOT HOW WE GET OUR NEWS. We cannot cede this election to the pandering of 2016. The public is exhausted with the cycle of lies and ignoring the incompetence of the now Republican Party. I salute Liz Cheney for choosing country of party and hope that she and others of character will remake their party without the lies.
The high information voters are the ones that pay attention to sources like Meet the Press and the NYT. We already know who we’re voting for and why should Harris answer tough questions from folks who want to play gotcha because it adds to their prestige as journalists when those same folks aren’t asking those same kinds of questions of her opponent? Really why would she be so damned stupid? The traditional press still wants to make this a horse race and have only barely started to talk about her opponent’s declining mental abilities and age. This is not a horse race this is a fight for democracy against autocracy and hate and racism and misogyny, homophobia, and christian nationalism etc. When the traditional media does their journalistic job of consistently telling the truth instead of trying to “balance” the story with a false bothsideism, then they deserve to be recognized and granted the right to ask both candidates tough questions. Until then Harris gets to go with audiences where she might convince folks that their votes count and therefore they need to get off their butts and get out the vote and to go vote. PS you did notice that she did prime time interview on 60 Minutes didn’t you?
The BIG DIFFERENCE between 1960 and now is that the majority of MSM has been bought and compromised by billionaires and organizations that expect profits for investors and return on investments. When the reporters and their bosses, the editors, are told what and how to report then quality and trust goes down and lies and mistrust go up.
Who has the audience? Who has our trust? I'm subscribed to you because your articles and info are simply better than what I can get at WaPo, NYT, etc. You're right that Kennedy was right. But I would prefer you to interview Kamala to ask these questions. I don't trust the established media to give either candidate the space to fulfill the obligation in full. I do trust you to do that.
To me the story here isn't that candidates are dodging hard-hitting questions from journalists; it's more that editors at these legacy papers are not what they were in Kennedy's day, and they've lost our trust over time. It is more of a political risk to sit down with these legacy papers than it is to sit down with independent journalists or podcasters. The distrust may be contagious.
Today I saw an article in WaPo about whether Kamala's communications strategy was effective or not. What she said wasn't covered. If WaPo interviewed Kamala, I don't think they'd tell us what she said. Instead they would tell us whether she said it correctly or not.
I found the interview with Alex Cooper to be quite a serious one and not fairly compared to late night comedy shows. I suspect that it has been dismissed as ‘entertainment’ or ‘pop culture-y’ because it focused unrelenting threats to the autonomy and basic rights of women in the country.
I stopped watching the "news" when I realized all the big news organizations were lying about Ferguson. I literally had family from overseas message me because they thought the entirety of stl was on fire.
full stop.
Yes, Ferguson was a damn good, and necessary, movement. But it should never have been blown out of proportion like it was. It turned me off of mainstream media.
Now I'm relying on substack, tiktok, and Reuters for factual info. Both cnn and fox are Just out of gotcha sound bites.
Nope.
She's tapping into an audience much younger than me. And hats off for this ingenuity.
Besides, all the big news organizations ever want to talk about is the latest shitshow that has come from the party of trump. They rarely, if ever, ask her about what she is planning on doing. Case in point, what does she think about trump thinking she's not black.
The thing I wonder is whether, given the overwhelming availability of both hard and soft news, those who want to hear about policy don’t have the opportunity. Given what a person hears (from many sources) and what intelligence and experience suggest, it shouldn’t be very hard to figure the effect each candidate wants to have if elected. And, given events playing out right now, it shouldn’t be hard to see that American “checks and balances” have been weakened at best, destroyed at worst. I would love to read your thoughts about that, Gabe.
If I were running for any position, I would not rely on the print media. They have proven they are complicit in disseminating disinformation. Same is true of other media. Every day I yell at NPR, when they refer to the Israel/Hamas war. Israel is defending itself from the attackers. Hamas initiated war is correct. The same is true for Russia invasion of Ukraine.
I agree with many of these comments, and want to pile on with an additional point, which even our wonderful Gabe neglected to call out - both Harris and Walz have been interviewed by local TV and radio stations in swing states, which serves the dual strategy of getting in front of the voters that matter most and using a medium that voters trust more than the national news. Americans, regardless of party, both believe in the importance of local press and are more favorable of their reporting, according to a recent Pew survey. I have to conclude that national news outlets evidently don't believe that local reporters are capable of asking tough questions on policy or, even, are worthy of a mention in their self-interested reporting of Harris's media strategy (but hardly ever Trump's, of course, to the point made again and again about "bothsideism").
The Occam’s Razor answer to why Kamala isn’t engaging traditional MSM is that she doesn’t believe it will gain her any votes. It used to be that engaging traditional MSM was necessary to gain votes, but both her and Trump seem to believe it’s not necessary anymore.
The one sort-of traditional MSM source that I think Kamala would benefit from doing an interview with? Fox News. Every now and then, Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders have engaged Fox News with good results. Going into enemy territory could win a few converts for Kamala.
I'm with the majority here, in that intelligent thinking people no longer follow nor believe the information pushed out by msm over the past few decades. In fact I would say that especially in the past decade alone, it has become obvious that msm has their own agenda (from the top down no doubt) and whatever doesn't fit that narrative is disregarded. The most blatant example has been regarding the constant lying, the thousands of lies during and since 45's first term that the msm wouldn't even call out as *lies* but instead rephrased with a wide variety of euphemisms. It's only been recently that he is finally being held accountable by some of the msm for all the topics he has lied about, and he continues to spew new lies.
Now I get my news from Semafor, The Guardian, various Substack authors, and occasionally I will watch Rachel Maddow or Lawrence O'Donnell during their time slots on MSNBC.
I really enjoyed this article, and I can kind of agree with some of the comments down below. For campaigns, they typically understand that mainstream media has become perceived as polarized, therefore, readers and viewers are likely to be decided voters.
If I were a campaign strategist, I might increasingly rely on apolitical outlets to account for voter apathy—people who are tired of feeling lied to, watching an embarrassing spectacle, or reading something seemingly life ending every few hours. This is where you might reach Americans in the middle.
As for policy answers, many voters vote based on ego. Most people don’t actually care where Kamala is getting the money to pay for her proposals or anything Trump says that’s “policy-related.” Our norm is being pandered to, and I think as voters were not used to hearing the truth from politicians, so we don’t expect it and in a lot of cases we don’t even ask for it. (I myself am curious, I should note, about in-depth policy proposals)
Enjoyed your two track dissertation, it was memorable. Especially the video of Kennedy and Jack Paar. Can remember well both the run for the White House and his time there. The level of discourse he gave to the American People has dropped precipitously. Only Michelle Obama still address’s the American People using at least a 10th grade vocabulary, most others, in both parties, do not exceed 6th, based on the recent Conventions. The average American may not be the brightest bulb around, but they are not dumb, it would help if politicians remembered that.
I totally get your frustration at her seeming unwillingness to engage with the press. But the mainstream media has changed so much over the past 50-ish years. Now, every time there is a misstatement or a bent truth on the Democratic side, Kamala is grilled by the press. And when the Former Guy lies blatantly EVERY single day, it’s mostly glossed over and becoming normalized! I understand her unwillingness to engage with that circus.
Thank you for your column and i wonder why you have not addressed the elephant in the room that mainstream media has been compromised. Trumps ‘press conferences “ are rambling incoherent nonsense pushing his lies. The nytimes finally addressed the issue this week. I understand the frustration you voice that VP Harris has not spent a lot of time with mainstream media but you of all people realize that THIS IS NOT HOW WE GET OUR NEWS. We cannot cede this election to the pandering of 2016. The public is exhausted with the cycle of lies and ignoring the incompetence of the now Republican Party. I salute Liz Cheney for choosing country of party and hope that she and others of character will remake their party without the lies.
The high information voters are the ones that pay attention to sources like Meet the Press and the NYT. We already know who we’re voting for and why should Harris answer tough questions from folks who want to play gotcha because it adds to their prestige as journalists when those same folks aren’t asking those same kinds of questions of her opponent? Really why would she be so damned stupid? The traditional press still wants to make this a horse race and have only barely started to talk about her opponent’s declining mental abilities and age. This is not a horse race this is a fight for democracy against autocracy and hate and racism and misogyny, homophobia, and christian nationalism etc. When the traditional media does their journalistic job of consistently telling the truth instead of trying to “balance” the story with a false bothsideism, then they deserve to be recognized and granted the right to ask both candidates tough questions. Until then Harris gets to go with audiences where she might convince folks that their votes count and therefore they need to get off their butts and get out the vote and to go vote. PS you did notice that she did prime time interview on 60 Minutes didn’t you?
The BIG DIFFERENCE between 1960 and now is that the majority of MSM has been bought and compromised by billionaires and organizations that expect profits for investors and return on investments. When the reporters and their bosses, the editors, are told what and how to report then quality and trust goes down and lies and mistrust go up.
Who has the audience? Who has our trust? I'm subscribed to you because your articles and info are simply better than what I can get at WaPo, NYT, etc. You're right that Kennedy was right. But I would prefer you to interview Kamala to ask these questions. I don't trust the established media to give either candidate the space to fulfill the obligation in full. I do trust you to do that.
To me the story here isn't that candidates are dodging hard-hitting questions from journalists; it's more that editors at these legacy papers are not what they were in Kennedy's day, and they've lost our trust over time. It is more of a political risk to sit down with these legacy papers than it is to sit down with independent journalists or podcasters. The distrust may be contagious.
Today I saw an article in WaPo about whether Kamala's communications strategy was effective or not. What she said wasn't covered. If WaPo interviewed Kamala, I don't think they'd tell us what she said. Instead they would tell us whether she said it correctly or not.
I found the interview with Alex Cooper to be quite a serious one and not fairly compared to late night comedy shows. I suspect that it has been dismissed as ‘entertainment’ or ‘pop culture-y’ because it focused unrelenting threats to the autonomy and basic rights of women in the country.
Go Kamala 💯👍🇺🇸💙🌊🌊🌊!
I stopped watching the "news" when I realized all the big news organizations were lying about Ferguson. I literally had family from overseas message me because they thought the entirety of stl was on fire.
full stop.
Yes, Ferguson was a damn good, and necessary, movement. But it should never have been blown out of proportion like it was. It turned me off of mainstream media.
Now I'm relying on substack, tiktok, and Reuters for factual info. Both cnn and fox are Just out of gotcha sound bites.
Nope.
She's tapping into an audience much younger than me. And hats off for this ingenuity.
Besides, all the big news organizations ever want to talk about is the latest shitshow that has come from the party of trump. They rarely, if ever, ask her about what she is planning on doing. Case in point, what does she think about trump thinking she's not black.
Screw that.
The thing I wonder is whether, given the overwhelming availability of both hard and soft news, those who want to hear about policy don’t have the opportunity. Given what a person hears (from many sources) and what intelligence and experience suggest, it shouldn’t be very hard to figure the effect each candidate wants to have if elected. And, given events playing out right now, it shouldn’t be hard to see that American “checks and balances” have been weakened at best, destroyed at worst. I would love to read your thoughts about that, Gabe.
If I were running for any position, I would not rely on the print media. They have proven they are complicit in disseminating disinformation. Same is true of other media. Every day I yell at NPR, when they refer to the Israel/Hamas war. Israel is defending itself from the attackers. Hamas initiated war is correct. The same is true for Russia invasion of Ukraine.
I agree with many of these comments, and want to pile on with an additional point, which even our wonderful Gabe neglected to call out - both Harris and Walz have been interviewed by local TV and radio stations in swing states, which serves the dual strategy of getting in front of the voters that matter most and using a medium that voters trust more than the national news. Americans, regardless of party, both believe in the importance of local press and are more favorable of their reporting, according to a recent Pew survey. I have to conclude that national news outlets evidently don't believe that local reporters are capable of asking tough questions on policy or, even, are worthy of a mention in their self-interested reporting of Harris's media strategy (but hardly ever Trump's, of course, to the point made again and again about "bothsideism").
The Occam’s Razor answer to why Kamala isn’t engaging traditional MSM is that she doesn’t believe it will gain her any votes. It used to be that engaging traditional MSM was necessary to gain votes, but both her and Trump seem to believe it’s not necessary anymore.
The one sort-of traditional MSM source that I think Kamala would benefit from doing an interview with? Fox News. Every now and then, Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders have engaged Fox News with good results. Going into enemy territory could win a few converts for Kamala.
I'm with the majority here, in that intelligent thinking people no longer follow nor believe the information pushed out by msm over the past few decades. In fact I would say that especially in the past decade alone, it has become obvious that msm has their own agenda (from the top down no doubt) and whatever doesn't fit that narrative is disregarded. The most blatant example has been regarding the constant lying, the thousands of lies during and since 45's first term that the msm wouldn't even call out as *lies* but instead rephrased with a wide variety of euphemisms. It's only been recently that he is finally being held accountable by some of the msm for all the topics he has lied about, and he continues to spew new lies.
Now I get my news from Semafor, The Guardian, various Substack authors, and occasionally I will watch Rachel Maddow or Lawrence O'Donnell during their time slots on MSNBC.
I really enjoyed this article, and I can kind of agree with some of the comments down below. For campaigns, they typically understand that mainstream media has become perceived as polarized, therefore, readers and viewers are likely to be decided voters.
If I were a campaign strategist, I might increasingly rely on apolitical outlets to account for voter apathy—people who are tired of feeling lied to, watching an embarrassing spectacle, or reading something seemingly life ending every few hours. This is where you might reach Americans in the middle.
As for policy answers, many voters vote based on ego. Most people don’t actually care where Kamala is getting the money to pay for her proposals or anything Trump says that’s “policy-related.” Our norm is being pandered to, and I think as voters were not used to hearing the truth from politicians, so we don’t expect it and in a lot of cases we don’t even ask for it. (I myself am curious, I should note, about in-depth policy proposals)
The closest Trump has gotten to Gaza, is the Gauze, wrapped around his brain.
Enjoyed your two track dissertation, it was memorable. Especially the video of Kennedy and Jack Paar. Can remember well both the run for the White House and his time there. The level of discourse he gave to the American People has dropped precipitously. Only Michelle Obama still address’s the American People using at least a 10th grade vocabulary, most others, in both parties, do not exceed 6th, based on the recent Conventions. The average American may not be the brightest bulb around, but they are not dumb, it would help if politicians remembered that.