Yesterday, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow endlessly hyped the fact that veteran investigative reporter David Cay Johnston had obtained President Trump’s 2005 federal tax return. When it was revealed, the scoop didn’t justify the hype. Trump paid 38 million in taxes that year, 24% of his income—not the top rate, but not “nothing,” which was the rumor Democrats were selling during the campaign.
Ethics points:
1. Whoever leaked the return broke the law, and doing so was unethical. No, it’s not illegal for the news media to take material stolen by others and sanctify it via their First Amendment protections. It should be though. When they do this, they aide and abet a crime, and Freedom of the Press wasn’t supposed to allow THAT. At very least, journalists should be required to reveal the names of the criminals who steal and release our proprietary documents. The publication of these makes such thefts worse, not better.
2. I don’t see why the President’s tax returns from 12 years ago has any genuine relevance to anything now. The returns were relevant to the decision of whether or not people wanted to vote for him. Now, the tax documents have no purpose, except for the insatiable Trump-bashers to have something new to bash him with. Anything will do.
3. David Cay Johnston was dishing about his “scoop” with GMA’s George Stephanopoulos, and decided to start a new rumor. He speculated that Trump leaked the return himself. No evidence, not a drop, and yet that’s what this veteran reporter felt was justifiable to say on national TV. Gee, can we call THAT fake news?
4. Then, as he did with Maddow, the reporter went on about all the conflicts of interest that Trump’s financial dealings have created. Again, this is re-litigating the election. At this point, there is no practical way to eliminate Trump’s conflicts and the appearance of impropriety that they create, and he’s not going to bother trying. Johnston, and others, including me, never made a clear case to the public why the President’s unprecedented financial entanglements should have been disqualifying; nor did Hillary, in part because her own financial entanglements were disqualifying. Well, the train left the station, y’all. You had your chance, and botched it. Johnston, like so many of the other bitter-enders who want to turn back time, ultimately get back to, “But…but…but…we never should have elected this guy! Surely there is something we can do to undo it!”
No, there isn’t. Cut it out.
5. Over at the Washington Post, a clearly disappointed Paul Waldman, one of the paper’s more openly partisan flacks, again started beating the drums for Trump to release all his returns now. Trump should have released his returns during the campaign, but he’d be insane to release them now. There is literally no up-side for him or the nation for him to do that: it will just give his most virulent enemies, whose goal is to bring down his government, more opportunity to insist that he be impeached, or shot, or burned alive. Waldman writes:
“We have never had a president for whom it was more important that we see their returns, because Trump has an extraordinarily complex web of financial interests all over the world, has refused to divest himself of those interests, and has, with his family, obviously seen the presidency as a golden opportunity to cash in. Which is why we all have to keep demanding them, until Trump releases them. It’ll almost certainly require a court order or a congressional subpoena to pry them from his hands, but if that’s what it takes, so be it.”
This is so slimy. How has the President “obviously” treated his office as a “golden opportunity to cash in”? This is a disgusting slur, and there is no reason to say it, or assume it, except to denigrate the President of the United States. Go ahead, keep demanding the returns. Knock yourself out. They are private documents and proprietary information. Moreover, there will be no court orders or Congressional subpoenas absent a specific and subsantive justification beyond “we really hate this guy, and we’ll keep fishing until we get the good on him.”
6. I have protested more than once here that I resent being made to defend Donald Trump. I will resent even more being made to admire Donald Trump, but if he can manage a half-successful administration and get any productive work on behalf of the country done at all in the face of this relentless, hateful, mad and nationally-destructive onslaught, I will admire him.
Ethics Alarms 
If nothing else, this incident now proves that the Left will not blink at breaking laws to get what it wants. Between these tax returns and the assault on right-wing talk show host Michael Savage, we are seeing what the Left does when it is out of power.
Now, let’s take four to eight years of growing rage over Trump. Add that to Lois Lerner’s actions at the IRS against the Tea Party, which certainly didn’t bother Obama. Add to that the riots in San Jose and Berkeley and what happened at Middlebury College when Charles Murray spoke.
What can we expect from the Left when they regain any measure of political power? What will they do to avenge their 2016 loss? Who will they blame?
I’m pretty sure I’ll be blamed, if for no other reason than I’m white and male. We’re seeing the Left become willing to embrace an apartheid-type system, and those who aren’t “woke” will be the have nots.
So now, voting for Trump in 2020 and for a Republican in 2024 is as much an act of self-defense as it was in 2016, if not more so.
“I’ll be blamed, if for no other reason than I’m white and male. ”
Since it is unlikely that Trump will ban guns, and MOST guns in the country belong to white males (simple demographics and rural population assumption), I doubt any such move will get far. You have to disarm a population before you start genocide, and apartheid will be looked at as genocide.
How many times have the Left said I deserve to die, just for being born white and male?
33,865,146. Or there-abouts.
33,865,146. Well, that’s a weird number. I think I am nervous now.
jvb
You are aware I made that up, yes?
Well, not really, as those numbers are very similar to my driver’s license number, social security number, passport number, and the identity chip implanted in the back of my neck. Oh dear . . . . .
jvb
BWAHAHAHA (rubbing hands together) You weren’t supposed to notice all that. That’s what is called the Universal Number…it allows me to control the chip, which is actually in the back of your head, your medulla oblongata and from there, YOU’RE MINE.
I missed my calling. I shoudda been a bad Science Fiction writer.
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
jvb
dragin_dragon wrote, “…medulla oblongata…”
Speaking of parts of the brain…
“MOST guns in the country belong to white males (simple demographics and rural population assumption)”
Not sure that’s a safe assumption, considering inner cities. Now, most registered, legal guns, I’ll totally give you.
Emily,
Want to bet? Just kidding, how would we know? But here is my reasoning:
Inner city thugs do not collect guns because they like guns, but as a tool. Otherwise, given the gun phobic nature of the press in urban areas, we would hear of busts with dozens of illegal (or legal) guns found, and that does not seem to be the case.
Now, go bust Billy Bob on a bad check warrant, and you WILL find dozens of guns, ammo, and accessories at his house. They will likely be legal, too.
Collecting guns is a rural pass time, and the more rural you get the more guns are likely. They are tools for a farm or ranch, but are also a form of entertainment (something not used for in inner cities). Going plinking (shooting for the sake of shooting, at improvised targets) is still a great American activity, in low population density areas.
We rural ‘bumkins’ learn to shoot from our grandpa’s knee (sometimes literally) and have a working knowledge of all types of arms. We also know how to cause mayhem with what is now referred to as ‘improvised explosive devices.’ I was raised figuring ways to blow stuff up, usually without adult supervision. It would never occur to us to hurt someone with this knowledge, but come round us up and find out how expensive that would be! There is a reason the military recruits fly over country so heavily…
(One of the new favorites is called ‘Tannerite,’ a binary explosive that take a high speed impact -think ‘rifle’- to explode. Look it up: this substance might give sex a run for thrills 😉 No permit needed, and this stuff would give liberal talking heads an anxiety attack if they knew it existed!)
Think about this: rag tag rebels in Iraq outfought the best army on Earth with far fewer resources than white males have at their disposal.
A question, slick…Did you really mean Iraq, thus saying the Iraqi insurgents defeated us, or did you mean the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan fighting the Soviet Army?
Actually, both are apt, and the Mujahadeen has pulled this stunt TWICE on the premier armies of the world.
I posit that the Iraqi insurgents DID defeat us. (Or we lost the political cajones to continue, which is the same thing)
Either way, the unequal force thing has not gone well until the more powerful foe decides to go scorched earth… and even then the Soviets left Afghanistan with their tails between their legs. I don’t think even the hardcore progressives have the stomach for mass murder in the USA on a scale necessary to subjugate white males…
My opinion is open to discussion and derision, as you see fit 🙂
I totally agree there’s no way of really knowing, and that rural white males are certainly armed enough to fight back against an oppressor. But I wouldn’t underestimate the amount of firepower in cities. Individuals might not have collections, but you do hear of major collections when they manage to bust gang hangouts and drug rings.
But it’s also important to note that I seriously doubt those types of people are hardcore liberals, as opposed to opportunists. If the shit hits the fan they’re not the ones protesting, they’re the ones stealing TVs.
Good point about the TVs!
I agree with your analysis, and add that most homes in urban areas do not routinely have firearms, as is the case in much a rural America.
I pray we never find out
slickwilly wrote, “Think about this: rag tag rebels in Iraq outfought the best army on Earth with far fewer resources than white males have at their disposal.”
I can only assume this “best army on Earth” you are referring to is the United States Military (BTW, it was not just the Army) and if that is what you’re talking about, you just don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.
I do get what you’re trying to say but you should have picked an example that at least accurate, maybe the Revolutionary War.
Zoltar, I respect your input. You are entitled to your opinion. May I offer facts in evidence?
Where did ISIS come from?
Who controls much of Iraq?
Who controls Afghanistan?
I am a proud veteran of the US Army (and your point about the other services is well taken; it was not intended to be a slight) but winning a conflict means you impose your will on the loser. The asymmetric warfare waged by insurgents held on long enough to force us out (granted, by sapping political will) and thus won, long term.
Now you have a point about the Revolutionary war, but I did not use it for two reasons:
First, it is so long ago that most do not understand the tactics and results, short of “We won with French help.” (Now I have to spit, admitting the French DID help at the end)
Second, the tactics used are a far cry from what we use today, on either side. We have innovations that make much of the maneuvering of that period obsolete.
All IMHO
slickwilly asked, “Where did ISIS come from?”
The devil. Other than that, it was born out of violent extremism that took hold in areas that had a vacuum of power after the United Stated pulled out of Iraq and handed over the reigns to the government of Iraq.
slickwilly asked, “Who controls much of Iraq?”
The government of Iraq still does.
slickwilly asked, “Who controls Afghanistan?”
The government of Afghanistan essentially still does, although that’ll probably change before too long and that is not because the United States military lost the war because we didn’t loose.
What was your point?
slickwilly asked, “winning a conflict means you impose your will on the loser”
We did; for all intensive purposes the war was “won” before Bush left office. The government of Iraq simply did not have the means or the will to inflict the same method of imposition after the United States left.
slickwilly asked, “The asymmetric warfare waged by insurgents held on long enough to force us out”
Actually that’s false. The government of Iraq is what forced us out, not the insurgents.
Point of fact: the Insurgents in Iraq did not “outfight” the United States military, they simply survived long enough to fight a new war after the United States left.
Need I go further?
How many times have the Left said I deserve to die, just for being born white and male?
Show me one.
Can’t run google?
http://www.truthandaction.org/mass-college-professor-white-males-are-a-cancer-and-must-die-urges-students-to-kill-themselves/
http://www.dailywire.com/news/4180/debater-harvard-says-white-people-should-kill-chase-stephens
http://govtslaves.info/liberal-professor-calls-genocide-says-white-males-consider-suicide-sent-death-camp/
Actually, slickwilly, I am better at Google than you are, which is why I was able to quickly determine that both the “govt slaves” and “truthandfiction” stories are completely false, and based on a “satirical” interview that Professor Ignatiev never gave.
https://chroniclevitae.com/news/1014-a-professor-tries-to-beat-back-a-news-spoof-that-won-t-go-away
Also using the tremendous powers of Google, I found that the story in your second link was already debunked…here, on Ethics Alarms, by Jack. Strike 2.
https://ethicsalarms.com/2016/03/21/more-fake-news-how-untrustworthy-are-hard-right-websites-this-untrustworthy/
So you haven’t provided any actual examples of “the Left” telling people they should kill themselves because they are white and male.
Chris, you got me. Since I hear this all the time, I was flip in my reply, and picked the first three results. Below are better examples of the many times I found.
You cannot be this obtuse. This is in the press all the time, but you implied that it never happens.
Here you go, progressives saying white people should die:
http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2016/11/04/lena-dunham-faces-criticism-after-posting-video-extolling-extinction-of-white-men/
http://archive.is/rpWK8
Since my point was I was being told I should die by progressives, I’ll stop at three. There are many more, but you knew that.
I violated my policy of not responding to you, Chris, because you are not interested in rational discussion. My mistake.
Ok, let’s look at those examples.
Lena Dunham is incoherent. I’m not going to defend her or that video, which is definitely bigoted. I also think it’s pretty obvious that she is not saying white men should die. I Googled “The extinction of white men” and found articles from both the left and right using the phrase to mean the reduction of white male power, not an actual genocide. Everything said in that video indicates that’s how Dunham meant it, though as usual, she phrases things in the most inflammatory way possible.
Do you really believe Dunham was saying that white men should die? Do you believe that’s what her father, who is a white man, was saying?
Your next link goes to a professor’s tweet where he says “All I want for Christmas is white genocide.” I have to ask: do you know where the phrase “white genocide” comes from and what it means? It’s a white supremacist phrase. White supremacists don’t use it to describe institutional murder of white people, because even they know that’s not going to happen. They use it to describe miscegenation, immigration, integration, women’s rights, and racial diversity in movies. Here are some things off the top of my head that they’ve called “white genocide” in the past year:
–The new Star Wars
–Cereal commercials with mixed-race parents
–Beyonce
–The new Ghostbusters
–Taking in Syrian refugees
That’s what “white genocide” means.
The professor who tweeted this was using this phrase in the way white supremacists use it, in order to mock them. White supremacists insist that racial diversity = white genocide. That’s what the professor was playing off of.
He was not saying white people should die.
The Black Liberation poster is inflammatory and stupid, but calls for “armed self-defense.” How exactly is that different from the white conservatives here who keep implying that we may need to take up arms to defend ourselves? Explain the difference.
There is none; both are wrong. But the poster does not say that white men should die.
I think I have done enough here to show that I am, indeed, interested in rational discussion. You’re under no obligation to reply, but please don’t pretend it’s because I’m irrational.
My policy, as well. I can resist temptation better than you, I guess.
Last post. All I asserted is that I have been told that I should die by progressives. I have proven that. Your blather about who said it is irrelevant and a deflection.
Go ahead and get the last word if you wish: I met the burden of proof objectively and rationally. I am done with this, and with you.
Slick, this is dd. I’m guessing you meant your last to go to Chris, not to me.
Yes, it was directed at Chris. Sorry, dd, I did not see your reply.
ll I asserted is that I have been told that I should die by progressives. I have proven that. Your blather about who said it is irrelevant and a deflection.
No, you didn’t. I literally just explained that not a single one of your examples says you should die.
Feel free not to respond to me, but if you are going to, at least read what I write first.
I don’t find it to be a valid justification for releasing his tax returns, but I know people are now saying that he is hiding them so people don’t know he has ties to Russia. It just looks like fishing to me.
Also, I think its 25%. Johnston was quoting a lower number on twitter (36.5 million) which is where the 24% comes from. For “professional journalist” he seemed to be throwing quite the tantrum.
The temper-tantrum is showing no signs of abating, so we’re probably okay for the next 20 years or so.
At the risk of going to the point of reductio ad absurdum, I do have an argument that a law punishing any publishing of a return can be constitutional. Possession of child porn is a crime. There is no first amendment shield, and that is beyond settled law, even if it is a news item.
If we make possession of a unauthorized release of a return a crime in itself, it really isn’t a violation of a first amendment right.
> When they do this, they aide and abet a crime, and Freedom of the Press wasn’t supposed to allow THAT
Is this true? Is there historical evidence of this?
Well, since there were no crimes at the time that would be so abetted, I think it’s res ipsa loquitur.
United States of America v. Progressive, Inc. could be considered a pretty good precedent on “prior restraint” of publication, which a ban on release of tax returns the press obtains without illegal action on their part.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Progressive,_Inc.
I think that leaking unlawfully obtained tax returns is going to boomerang big time on the media. If Trump could be a target, why not some member of his Cabinet, a Senator or a member of the House. Doing this for partisan reasons is totally unethical and possibly prosecutable on some grounds.
Wonder when someone on the New Right starts seeing this as fair game? Think about Bernie, or Hillary, or Rachel Maddow having their tax return leaked?
Wanna bet there are shady tidbits hiding on many Democrat tax returns?
”Wanna bet there are shady tidbits hiding on many Democrat tax returns?”
Say it ain’t so!
C’mon, Timmy “Turbo Tax” Geithner (former SoT, which oversees the IRS) & Charlie Rangel (former Chair/House Ways-n-Means, tasked with writing tax law) came clean, didn’t they?
Granted after they got caught, but is that really the point?
It gets worse.
Funniest thing; Warren “SirTaxMeMore” Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway owes back taxes from 2002.
From the Bedrock Conservative HuffPo:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/29/warren-buffett-taxes-berkshire-hathaway_n_941099.html
Et tu, HuffPo?
Lefties (most, not all) don’t pay taxes, they just raise them.
What you think, Wayne, has no basis in fact. I don’t do anything for partisan reasons, never have. Clearly you have no idea what investigative reporters do or what I have done over the last 50 years. Implicit in your note are assumptions (partisan for example) that you would know to be false had you made even a modicum of effort to learn the facts.
I suspect, hating every instant of the thought, I’ll be forced to as well, under the conditions you’ve laid out.
It seems so unfair for the universe to force me to admire a man I think is a role model for how a person should not grow up to be. But I suspect even your relatively low bar is too high for him to even see without a telescope, much less clear. We’ll see.
The Leftmedia (sorry, but that’s what they are) never ceases to amaze me. They are now busting there butts to be just like Trump. In fact, they may be proving that it’s possible to be collectively worse than Trump. Why would anyone do that, individually or collectively? This is no less than mass insanity.
Is ethical, fair journalism extant anywhere in America? Serious question. I’m beginning to think the Yeti, Bigfoot, or Nessie might be more commonly sighted.
1. The unknown person who sent me the Form 1040 may — or may not — have broken the law. We don’t know the circumstances. But, as you note, it is entirely lawful for any news organization to print documents that come in anonymously. We know this document did not come from the IRS because it is stamped “client copy.”
2. The document is news because it is the first Trump federal tax return ever seen by the public. It is also rich with information that I analyzed and explained at DCReport.org, where the news broke first.
DCReport.org s a nonprofit, non-advertising news service I founded that covers on what the Trump Administration and Congress DO, not what they say. It is supported by hundreds of donors. I am an unpaid volunteer and a donor.
You can read my full analysis of the tax information at dcreport.org including a link to a sidebar about how we got the information and how we handled it. I trust here that you are aware of my decades long coverage of highly complex tax issues.
3. Your claim of fake news is nonsense. Donald Trump has a long history of leaking material about himself. He used fake identities to plant favorable stories about himself, including that Madonna, Kim Basinger, and Carla Bruni were his lovers when they were not. I called them “imaginary lovers” in my book The Making of Donald Trump, which is available in 11 languages.
Other serious journalists who cover Trump have documented his practice of leaking documents about himself. There is so much material available about Trump planting stories about himself that your comment are surprising.
4. You advance a bizarre understanding of what the Framers sought in writing our Constitution.
Taking office does not give the office holder a pass on examining his conduct, but rather demands more scrutiny while in office.
You are also wrong that there is “no practical way to eliminate Trump’s conflicts and all the appearance of impropriety that they create.”
Trump choose to run for office and his personal financial interests should be subordinate to our system of law, not supreme. He can end the national security and corruption concerns because of his massive debts to the communist government of China and the corrupt Deutsche Bank (fined more than $20 billion so far because of laundering Russian money and other serious offenses), his decades of business dealings with Russian oligarchs, and his lifelong entanglements with major criminals, violent felons and a major drug trafficker for whom he risked his lucrative casino license for reasons he has never explained.
The solution is putting his assets in a blind trust, having an independent and experienced broker sell the holdings and then disclosing the terms of those sales with the proceeds are invested in mutual funds and US Treasuries for so long as he is in office.
I lecture all over the world on journalism ethics. I have written press criticism for more than four decades. I am the only journalist whose reporting forced a broadcast chain off the air because its owner manipulated news reports.
I am well known in the big newsrooms where I worked for always taking the high road in ethical matters as journalists who have worked alongside me, and subjects of my work, can — and in many cases have — publicly attested.
You are invited to attend any future lecture I give on ethics. Just bring this email. If the college or other nonprofit sponsor charges a fee to cover costs (renting the lecture hall, etc.) I will have it waived for you or pay it myself.
It is also clear from some of he comments above that our readers have no idea the nature of my work.
My books and columns champion competitive markets and integrity in business. I am a longtime registered Republican. And I cover politicians in both parties — and everyone else — by the same standards.
Thanks for weighing in, David. It always helps to have the subjects in these posts give their perspective.
I’ll return the offer. I’ll comp you into any seminar I give on ethics. Heck, the way your profession is slipping, I’ll comp ANY journalist. You never know what might stick.
Seriously, I appreciate the comment. I’d love to hear from you again.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “I lecture all over the world on journalism ethics.”
Please show us the integrity of your character by performing the following task; go through the list of Unethical Rationalizations and Misconceptions that Jack developed, return to the comment you posted, count how many unethical rationalizations you used, post the count and identify which rationalizations you used.
Thanks.
Don’t hold your breath, Z. His response was a rebuke and was supposed to intimidate. Probably to get an apology for Jack’s original post.
Thank you, Zoltar who dares not reveal his name. I will read them shortly.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “Zoltar who dares not reveal his name.”
Immediately stooping to “attacking” the messenger for something as petty as choosing anonymity are you; and you dared to present yourself as a person of character and integrity, an ethical person?
I never hide behind a nom d’Internet, as you do. I identify myself in all forums. In doing so I take responsibility for everything I say, also known as accountability. I also make my contact information widely available so people can reach me whether it’s to send news tips or criticism or praise.
If you can show any factual error it will be corrected promptly and forthrightly.
I encourage and applaud web participants who do so under their own names. I know the real name and e-mail of everyone who comments here, and in some cases I agree with the reasons for the anonymity. There are posts and comments I’ve made here which would have caused serious problems for me in those environments: a major Democratic Party-allied association, and a large business lobby. The trick is not writing or revealing anything that harms or is disloyal to an employer, anonymously or not.
At least two commenters here who use screen names are journalists; one is an actor who fears retaliation in an oppressively left-wing culture.
Jack; have you ever posted about anonymous-v-real identity commenting?
I have, though the last time was a while ago. It has been argued out even more extensively in the comments, most recently when the late Ablativemeatshield, he of the performance art of obscene abuse, was called out on his hypocrisy of being insulting without having the guts to stand behind his words and be identified. He finally ditched the screen name and posted under his own.
As I noted, there are several commenters who have a good case for being unidentified to the world. I will not allow anyone to post as Anonymous. I know that’s a ditinction without a difference, but it is symbolic. Still, the hyperpartisanship rampant now and ideological bullying in many fields does make candor and full identity on the web dangerous, and it shouldn’t be. And one party is increasingly estranged from the First Amendment.
I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it, but one of the reasons that I don’t list my full name is that a pervert hacked my FB account and was apparently sharing pictures of my kids, and making comments that I can’t even bring myself to think about. I’ve gotten more OCD about privacy since experiencing this and other incidents.
There are plenty of good reasons, joed. That’s a good example of one of them.
Jack Marshall wrote, “There are plenty of good reasons, joed. That’s a good example of one of them.”
Making a promise to your family that you wouldn’t comment under your own name because of a past history of a cyber stalker turned into real world stalker is another good reason.
Yes!
It is unethical for any journalist to comment using a nom d’ Internet. You sign your work, you operate openly. Those journalists should be fired and escorted from the building. It doesn’t matter if they are reporters or opinion writers or news clerks or photographers. Fired. Period. Full stop.
David: would you say the same standard should apply to Joe Klein and “Primary Colors”?
I’d echo your statement regarding ethicists. How about lawyers? What is the ethical duty you are arguing for regarding journalists? Participating in an online debate is what, dishonesty? A false representation that one isn’t a journalist? You’re even more of a Hun on this issue than I am. What’s your guess: how many of your colleagues comment on blogs using fake names?
So what David; so what? You have absolutely no knowledge as to why I have chosen to use a pseudonym. I made one choice, you’ve made another, so what?
FYI: Jack Marshall and at least one other person that comments here knows my identity. My words represent me here, just as your words represent you.
Now about your little pseudonym deflection; if you’re pre-judging me just because I have chosen this path of anonymity then you’re just being petty; however, if you’re choosing to attack me about this petty point because I have raised questions about possible rationalizations you used in your comment, then you’re an pompous ass. Which is it David, choose.
Now Mr. Johnston, you need to drop this nonsense little deflection of yours.
Have you read Jack’s list of Rationalizations yet; if so, did you learn anything new?
By the way David; my statement “Which is it David, choose” was rhetorical, a challenge for you to look within; you have already shown me the answer, I just want you to see it too.
Let’s move on.
Mr. Johnston, I don’t agree with Zoltar that your defense includes rationalizations, but your attack on him for not using his real name is petty and irrelevant.
Chris wrote, “Mr. Johnston… your attack on him for not using his real name is petty and irrelevant.”
I acknowledge and appreciate this effort.
Chris wrote, “Mr. Johnston, I don’t agree with Zoltar that your defense includes rationalizations”
I obviously disagree with this part.
I think that Mr. Johnston is a reasonably intelligent person, he’ll figure it out regardless if others do or don’t. The whole point of my reply to him regarding rationalizations was for him to learn something new about rationalizations that I honestly don’t think he knew before; applying that knowledge is his choice.
I hate to pile on, but a journalist mocking someone for keeping anonymity on a discussion about illegally obtained documents where he is protecting his own anonymous source has my irony meter overloading.
Touche!
Alex,
Your post is utter nonsense. I am not protecting my source. I have no idea who it is.
I published the envelope, which has my home address on it. And I did so despite the dozens of comments I have read on the Internet calling for me to be tortured ad murdered for my accurate news article about a matter of great public interest and significance for our republic.
My book The Making of Donald Trump, our website DCReport.org and my columns use on the record sources.
I do not let government spokespeople comment without citing their name and title. In the last 50 plus years I rarely use unnamed sources. In every case the subsequent facts showed these sources were spot on accurate.
I have used unnamed sources only when life or limb was in danger, someone was exposing serious wrongdoing that would put them in jeopardy or when exposing foreign agents and spies. In such cases I required extensive independent verification, like memos and records, before publishing.
On the few occasions that I have I used unnamed sources I typically was able to report that I had 12 or 25 or in one case six dozen of them — and their information in each case was then verified by officials who knew I had the goods and there was no point in denying what had been hidden facts. These stories have saved taxpayers significant money and contributed to national security.
In such cases Imade note of how many people I had spent a lot of time and money finding all across the country so readers would understand how whatever tip I got was developed. Readers deserve to know the number of unnamed sources to understand how carefully and thoroughly the facts were gathered before publication and so readers could understand the basis of the hidden facts revealed.
Second, the document was NOT illegally obtained. I violated no law. The sender may have done something unethical or in violation of a court order, but the sender may also have been authorized. I have no way of knowing. The Supreme Court rulings on this make it clear as can be that I had every right to publish and I would argue I had a duty to do so under our Constitution.
1. You violated no law. Agreed.
2. I think the speculation that the mysterious leaker did not is a stretch. Would you feel better if it was legally leaked?
3. Would you publish leaked grand jury documents? How about Pentagon battle plans?
4. Do you regard an anonymous source as unethical to insist on anonymity?
5. I do.
>Your post is utter nonsense. I am not protecting my source. I have no idea who it is.
>I published the envelope, which has my home address on it.
I bet you’re a big fan of wikileaks then. I say this because I don’t see anything in your comment that you actually verified the authenticity of what was published.
I don’t think you’d release an unverified document like that, so I must conclude that either you had access to private Trump or IRS data or someone confirmed that for you. Since I don’t expect you to have broken the law, there must be some “background source” that confirmed the authenticity. You *are* protecting that one, or maybe you have other investigative techniques you might share with us not in the know.
Or maybe you could have bet your career on an unverified anonymous envelope that could have been a good photoshop work. May I suggest not taking these gambles in the future?
Read any of the news accounts, in addition to my article breaking the news at DCreport.org, and you will see that of course I authenticated the document. The White House confirmed. In fact they did something unethical and if you really care about ethics you can look up what they did.
Your post suggests that you are lazy and made no attempt to learn anything before posting.
I check and recheck and cross check and verify before i publish to make sure I normally have the right fax but I have them in the right context in the universe.
Just out of curiosity, did you verify your “sleazy porn” comment as well? And did you do so before or after Maddow hurried to silence you? You may, sir, qualify as an ‘investigative reporter’, possibly even as a Republican, but you are NOT a gentleman.
I only say things I can prove.
As do I.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “I only say things I can prove.”
I think that it’s interesting that a man of your notable accomplishments would say something like that.
Communicating is far more than just what you say, it’s also how you say it; but of course you already knew that, didn’t you David.
How about you prove all the innuendo that you’ve implied in your written “communications” about Trump. I’m quite certain that you’re not ignorant of the fact that you are communicating vast amounts of innuendo about Trump in the things you write; therefore, your statement above is an intentional lie presented to deceive those that don’t think logically.
I get it David, I really do; you want to market your writings to a large market and what better way to do that than to lace it full of innuendo that panders to a extreme base of ignorant people that believe the innuendo is fact because they are utterly partisan blind. Nice to infuse a marketing tactic within your writings to make them sell better but when you get right down to it, all the innuendo is blatantly unethical; but I guess for you, the ends (your bank deposits) justifies the means.
You know, it might not be anything to do with padding his bank account at all. There’s plenty of “true believers” out there who approach their work with all the zeal of a cult follower.
joed68 wrote, “There’s plenty of “true believers” out there who approach their work with all the zeal of a cult follower.”
Interesting way of looking at it; I’ll ask…
Hey David Cay Johnston,
Are you a “true believer” in all the hyped-up innuendo about Trump that you’ve been selling to the public?
He actually used the words “sleazy porn” in a write-up about Trump? He’s doing linguistic somersaults to try to convince us that this is all a fair, objective, unbiased presentation of facts. Kind of like Snopes and the other purveyors of the supposedly pure, unvarnished truth.
The “arguments” at dcreport.org are no more substantive than your comments here, so I see no need to respond to them when Jack and the commentariat have already addressed them. I am sorry that the one time a journalist has chance to prove the worthiness of their profession they resort to insults instead of educating us on the subtler points of sourcing, and authenticating information. You could have given us a timeline of what happened, you could have told us who you reached out for confirmation, you could have told us of forensic techniques you applied to the document to confirm it was real. Instead you decided to lower yourself to insults, which in reality just diminish our view of your person and your profession. I am sorry journalism has come to the point where you are forced to resort to these tactics in order to have a profitable career.
Alex,
At DCReport,org we in fact did exactly what you claim we did not. I am finding this common here — just take stuff up. I only write what I can prove from empirical sources that you can check easily.
I think from your other notes that you also confuse reporters with other journalists. I am not a reporter, I’m a columnist which means (I’m educating you now, Alex, as requested) that while I report to the same standards as before I put it in the context of my knowledge based on decades of published work and a demonstrated deep knowledge of subjects. Readers, knowing my track record, can judge the approach.
At DCReport we take the view that the USA is OUR government, not THE government, that we are the owners and we should act as owners. And we say that explicitly at our website.
We also show people how to exercise their right of petition to formally file comments — whatever those comments are — in the appropriate official forum so they become part of the official record. We do that in the belief that when citizens feel estranged from their government and say, as millions do, that they are powerless, we can help change that. We do the hard work of finding things that matter, translating legalese into plain English and showing people how to EASILY pout comments into the official record.
We also believe that if citizens participate, the people we temporarily imbue with power to act on our behalf will be aware that they are being watched and it will encourage virtuous behavior and discourage misconduct and favoritism.
Allbests.
dcj
Thank you for responding, Mr. Johnston. For what it’s worth, I think you defended yourself well.
Welcome, David. Come back and comment on any topic. It is nice to get a different perspective. I think you will find this blog interesting, enlightening, maddening, challenging, and educational. Jack Marshall does a great job letting the discussions flow without too much interference from the Central Scrutinizer*.
jvb
* Yes. That is a Frank Zappa reference, I am proud to admit.
Uncle Meat lives!
Let me second Jack’s welcome to you and thanks for your comment defending your work. It was lucid and informative, a worthy and appreciated contribution. But I object to some of it, to wit:
I don’t think this is right. It is doubtful the Founders intended the First Amendment to be used to publish documents that were illegally obtained. But it is true that the Supreme Court has found that the FA does in fact do so. Please don’t conflate the intent of the Founders with the ruling of the Court, they are not the same thing.
It is also time honored but ethically questionable for reporters to conspire with criminals to publish data that would be otherwise illegal to publish. I do use the word “conspire” advisedly.
One would have to go no further than Absence of Malice, one of my favorite all-time movies, to see how illegal leaks are… well, illegal, and when the press becomes a willing accomplice things can go badly. Everybody thought they were doing the right thing, but all of them were wrong, and it was bias and preconceptions driving the matter just as it likely is here, Trump’s suitability notwithstanding.
The big questions are, why should he explain them, and in what way is his personal financial interests not subordinate to our system of law? Even if I uncritically stipulate that all these financial and political entanglements are as you describe them, none of them are, as far as we know, illegal, and most of them aren’t all that troubling taken in their full context. It seems to me that you are are engaging in guilt by association so typical of journalist who claim to be fair, but really aren’t, by demanding an explanation of everyone Trump has ever associated with.
Don’t we ever get tired of this game? In business, people develop contacts of an unsavory nature, especially in big business. These facts were surely available during Trump’s run to the presidency, and if he were elected without sufficient analysis of this data, that’s a problem for the press, not Trump. It is not incumbent on him to allay any and all concerns raised about his suitability for the office. The American people make that decision via the Electoral College. There is also a remedy in the Constitution — impeachment — if it turns out he has broken laws.
Having said that, I agree that the opportunities for corruption and self-enrichment are rife and alarming, and that Trump’s behavior and apparent ethical amorality is anything but reassuring. But I don’t think that guilt by association is a worthy journalistic effort, and I strongly disagree with the notion that he must explain his business dealings — if he has committed crimes, they should be investigated, but no such credible allegations have emerged yet. It’s fine if the dealings are brought to the light of day, and demanding a defense of them is okay as well, but drawing conclusions from that defense or lack of it is not a journalist’s job. That’s the job of the reader.
What is surprising about them? YOU HAVEN’T PRODCUED ANY EVIDENCE, just like Jack said. That is a fact. You have engaged in speculation based on prior evidence of similar actions. That, sir, is not proof and should be noted as the pure speculation it is. Are there no opinion columnists left in the world that persons claiming to do journalism must editorialize their own work?
This would be a fine and ethical solution. Trump should take this advice, which Jack has repeatedly suggested here.
What is surprising about them? YOU HAVEN’T PRODCUED ANY EVIDENCE, just like Jack said. That is a fact. You have engaged in speculation based on prior evidence of similar actions. That, sir, is not proof and should be noted as the pure speculation it is.
But he did make it clear that it was pure speculation, and he did not ever say he had proof of it. He also made clear that his speculation was based on Trump’s previous pattern of behavior. That is perfectly fair, and not at all “fake news.”
Not his previous pattern of behavior as President. Why is that so hard a concept?
It is typically a hard concept for me, Jack, but I don’t see how applying it here is anything but silly. You’re saying that since we don’t know that Trump has ever leaked information on himself since becoming president, we shouldn’t wonder if he did so in this case, even though he did so many, many times before becoming president? That doesn’t make sense to me.
It makes even less sense when you look at the fact that nothing else about Trump’s character, rhetoric or behavior has changed since he became president.
The last sentence is complete speculation on your part.
People behave differently when they become lawyers, priests, accountants, police officers, soldiers, public figures, teachers, mothers, husbands, wives,father, ethicists and celebrities. This would obviously be true, especially be true, of Presidents. And you know this. As always, people don’t want to give concede that Trump is human.
What? No, it’s not speculation, it’s observation. Has Trump stopped sending tweets where he demonstrates both pettiness and complete ignorance of the law? No. Has he stopped baselessly accusing his political enemies of crimes? No. Has he stopped speaking like a third grader? No. Has he stopped surrounding himself with idiot loyalists who will say anything to protect him? No.
Give me one example of a behavior change you have seen since he has become president. I’m talking about public behavior here; of course he could have changed in private, but how on earth would anyone know?
It’s speculation. You have no idea how he’s weighing decisions, or how he would be conducting himself if her were not President.
What? He is conducting himself exactly as he conducted himself before he was president! This is nonsensical, Jack.
Again. that’s a supposition. You have no idea how he would be conducting himself right now if he were not President. For example, he is not running the Trump businesses, or seeking branding fr that purpose.
These posts make me wonder how much the people on this for him know about the actual conduct of Donald Trump as opposed to his carefully polished image.
Do you know about his very deep involvement with a major drug trafficker for whom he risked his casino license to reassure him hope his loyalty?
Or about the numerous cases in which Trump cheated workers, small businesses – many of whom had to lay off workers are one out of business – and swindled investors?
These are a few examples of thoroughly documented conduct from the public record and Trump’s own words. All of this is laid out with sources from the public record in The Making of Donald Trump. If you were on aware of these and all of his other criminal relationships I would not be surprised because of the utter failure of my peers and national journalism to Vet the candidate.
Carefully polished???
I caught that, too.
As my post said…I wonder how much people in this forum know the real DT…Your response suggests you have no idea what I am writing about.
On the other hand, everyone around the world who has read my book and read my columns, with all facts from open source public records, knows a very different DT and would get my post immediately. Do you know about the lying, the testimony found not credible, the financial cheating, the huge favors done for a major drug trafficker, the confessed tax cheating, the…. I could go on here for enough to fill a book. Oh, wait, I did that and showed how he polished his image to deflect from that record.
No, my response indicates that I see nothing polished or deceptive about Trump’s image whatsoever. Your allegations aside, he has never left any doubt that he has no scruples, and will use the laws to his advantage, limited by no ethical considerations whatsoever. Nothing you have suggested would surprise me if they were true, which doesn’t mean they are true.
I don’t see why you have to be both defensive and snotty here. Nobody is defending Trump. But I really don’t care, at this point, what he has done in the past. I knew enough about him years ago to pronounce his aspirations to office as outrageous, and his qualification as nil. What matters, since he is in the White House, is what he does. He didn’t fool anyone; that’s what the Anti-Trump furies like yourself can’t get your mind around. I’m sympathetic. I am.
“No, my response indicates that I see nothing polished or deceptive about Trump’s image whatsoever. ..”
I know you don’t because you have no idea what the established hard facts show and your own posts show that.
My words are NOT allegations. They are verified and verifiable facts. I cite his own words at length across time and space, his testimony under oath, contracts, court rulings, and other hard documents and show where you can read them if you have any doubts.
I don’t allege that he put his grand nephew’s life in jeopardy over money and made no apologies for it. I have the goods. Ditto everything else. When I do speculate I site up front that we don’t know the reason Trump did X or Y (which he did do), but state the obvious question(s) to ask.
What you are doing is making assertions without any effort by you to examine the record. If you did you would know that I solidly back up as settled fact what I report is settled fact.
You want to impact my work then do the work to impeach it — its all there and signed for you to examine. Its not like I haven’t had people try in formal Congressional, legislative, judicial and other proceedings. The record shows I got it right every time. When I said LAPD had officers undercover in Moscow and Havana, that the police chief assigned officers to sleep with women as part of a political spying operation lots if people wrote along the line that you are and then, low and behold, testimony incur by the police and the chiefs autobiography show I was absolutely 100% spot on accurate in details, nuance and context.
So unless you can show otherwise your continued use of “allegations” is unethical.
Do you even understand the definition of that word? It means “an assertion unsupported, and by implication regarded as unsupportable.” If you then checked the record you would see that what you wrote is itself an insupportable statement.
You are alleging crimes. In the United States, guilt of crimes is determined through a process, not because a brilliant, dedicated journalist who cannot possibly be wrong states them or “proves” them to his satisfaction. If these were sufficiently airtight as you ALLEGE, there is no shortage of Trump-hating prosecutors who would love to nail his scalp to a wall. I’ve been a prosecutor. The standard for ethical prosecution is high.
They are allegations until they are proven in a court of law. I know what the word means: I’m a lawyer. And your past record of accurate reporting on unrelated matters is irrelevant to Trump.
Wrong. You do not read with care. You use words loosely to justify what you write rather than being careful with the words you use and reading with care.
For example, I wrote that he put a severely sickly baby’s life in jeopardy. I never said or suggested that was a crime. I described exactly what he did. In that case a judge issued a ruling, Trump spoke publicly and there are medical and other records in the public record, all of which I cite accurately and in context.
What you do is upgrade. That is you say if I wrote B then it must mean D or M or T. Talk about unethical!
I didn’t allege he committed a crime in obtaining mercy for the major cocaine trafficker. I described what he did, including lying and denying to DGE investigators. I never wrote that the lying and denying was a crime. I didn’t even point out that it could be. I just stated the hard, solidly established facts.
Sigh. So what? No, there is no way at all to prove one reporter’s interpretation of an event that doesn’t rise to the level of a crime. (Putting a severely sick child’s life in jeopardy is a tort, also subject to proof in trial) Proving someone lied, especially Trump, is very difficult. You proved what he said wasn’t true. Saying he lied is an allegation.
And your defensiveness makes me sad. I don’t doubt your integrity and research. You have an agenda and a view of the world, but your work, as far as I can see, has had integrity and shows thorough professionalism. I assume you react like this because you work in fields like economics and law without formal credentials, so don’t always get the respect your work deserves. That must be infuriating; I’m sorry. Yet your recognition and credibility is high; you can let your work speak for itself. There’s no need to adopt such a pugnacious attitude.
As a Trump critic, you would have gained in stature by presenting the 2005 returns as evidence positive toward Trump, rather than stretching to find something sinister in it. Bias makes us stupid.
BTW, another of your upgrades:
“… journalist who cannot possibly be wrong …”
I have explicitly written here that I correct all mistakes promptly and forthrightly. I make mistakes just like everyone else. And given the incredibly complex and sophisticated issues I write about like arcane tax and accounting rules, electricity economics, etc., I am generous in letting people not familiar with being interviewed by reporters make sure the record reflects not just what they said, but what they intended. Even after reading people;’s words back to them many do not appreciate what they said or the impact and people sometimes make amazing mistakes, like misspelling their own name.
Unlike journalists who try to get people who complain of an error to not make a complaint (as I have heard some reporters do in the newsroom and who i have then privately chastised them in many cases and warned of the dire career consequences if it happens again) I actively solicit critiques, publish my personal email (including in my book with an invitation to report errors) and phone numbers and addresses.
I am perfectly aware that people reading this may think I am being pretty stiff when in fact I am one of the happiest, friendliest people you would ever meet and an exceptionally popular teacher because of the substance of my lectures and my style of delivery.
Here and in other forums where people make baseless comments about me or my work,I push back with good reason. Sloppy use of language, baseless charges, assumptions and lack of understanding of the law, journalism, economics all play into this. And then there is the anti-market, anti-capitalsm observation from Zoltar, one of whose posts shows he has no respect for market economics, at least for authors.
I could just ignore forums like this. But I also think it matters to engage people who criticize me. When they show error I act. When they hurl falsehoods while cowering behind noms d’ internet I hurl back with signed comments.
It is also why the nonprofit, non advertising news service I founded, DCReport, writes about OUR government, not THE government and shows people how to overcome the barriers that Washington has ut in place that keep most folks from ever telling their government what they think, whatever that may be. Zoltar takes exception to that, calls promotion of what we do unethical. Wow.
Let me be clear, no one here has shown any error of fact, whether details (like dates, statutes cited) or context or nuance. If someone does I will move quickly to correct the record.
What from my POV comes across is a lot of people here hold strong beliefs and demonstrate that they are not swayed by facts which they could easily verify (with you as a significantly partial exception). Me, I go wherever the facts go and I have 50 years of signed work to prove that.
Since I have nothing with which to support myself but my dedication to fact, integrity, fearlessness and reputation for conducting myself honorably at all times I do, to be sure, take offense at people who flippantly attack my work with no basis in fact and while making no effort to establish facts that are often as close as a Google search pointing to an official document.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “All of this is laid out with sources from the public record in The Making of Donald Trump”
I’m getting the distinct impression that you are only participating in this blog for the following reasons;
1. To rationalize your anti-Trump behavior.
2. To promote yourself.
3. To promote your book.
4. To promote dcreport.org
Personally, I think each of those things is unethical.
Your bias has clouded your professional judgement, and you’re to self absorbed to see it. There is a clear difference between you and the average Joe anti-Trump idiot hack that’s spouting continuous anti-Trump innuendo as if it’s all settled fact, you have the luxury of being a professional journalist with credentials to back it up yourself and you are using those credentials to rationalize unethical anti-Trump behavior.
I have one question for people like you that are spewing all this propaganda, what do you want; and don’t give me any of your journalistic trash that you’re just trying to inform the public because what you and others are doing has gone far, far beyond informing.
Mr. Johnston,
You have become are part of the political lefts anti-Trump propaganda machine whether you want to openly admit it or not, your bias is blinding you and clouding your ethics. What is the end goal of all the innuendo, outright unethical accusations, and lying propaganda? I know you can’t answer for others so I’ll pointedly ask you; what do you want to happen regarding President Trump?
Without reading my work, which is all sourced, you are in no position to judge. Not one of my readers around th world has shown a single error. And many of the people praising the book are people who know Trump well.
There is nothing unethical about promoting your own book or the nonprofit public service website that covers what politicians DO rather than SAY. I am not paid. My peers get modest honoraria.
When I wrote about crooked cops was I being anti-cop or in support of integrity in law enforcement?
When I exposed many tax shelters, prompting the government to finally act against them, was I being anti the people who bought those shelters or was I telling people about tax cheating?
If Trump were a man of integrity and deeply informed I would report that. I report facts. And I only report what I can prove empirically, which is why all of my work for 50 years has stood up to intense scrutiny by people with a deep interests in kicking my work down.
If you can show any error in my work it will be forthrightly and promptly corrected.
“Personally, I think each of those things is unethical.”
I think I need to clarify this…
Personally, I think each of those things is unethical to do here, especially #2, #3, and #4. I think it’s unethical to rationalize anti-Trump behavior anywhere.
Wow, you don’t think anyone should report critically on the resident? Really? I’ve written critically of every president starting with Nixon. I was the first to write major critical pieces on GWBush and Obama when they took office (10 days and 9 days, respectively).
And I’m not writing “anti-trump” anymore than I was anti-Obama or -Carter, etc.
I am reporting important matters if public significance about the temporary leaders of our government.
Must tell you, every dictator in the world would love you for that you wrote.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “Without reading my work, which is all sourced, you are in no position to judge.”
Two things about that to start with: you don’t have a clue what I do and don’t read and I have every right to judge you based on nothing but your words right here in this thread. If you don’t like that Mr. Johnston, that’s tough shit.
Now Mr. Johnston aka I-Look-Foolish-Making-Ignorant-Assumptions,
Contrary to your false assertion above I’m a real quick study and I have have read some of your work and everything I’ve read so far related to Trump is laced full of unprovable propaganda innuendo. Now don’t get your bikini in a bundle, I didn’t say unprovable facts, I said unprovable propaganda innuendo. You don’t have to be a genius to pull this kind of innuendo out of your writings, so don’t be obtuse and claim that you don’t know what I’m talking about.
How about this tasty little propaganda morsel, “Trump made use of an abusive tax shelter that Congress soon closed to newcomers”; tell me Mr. Better-Than-Thou, why would an upstanding person like yourself, full of ethics and all, choose to write that instead of just presenting the facts like this, “Trump saved bundles on taxes by using a legal tax shelter that Congress later chose to close”? What can readers take away from your little morsel of “I report facts” innuendo, they can take away that Trump is a tax cheat and as as such he should be prosecuted. It’s not the what, it’s the how; thus unprovable propaganda innuendo is born.
Now Mr. Johnston about your statement that “I report facts. And I only report what I can prove empirically”; sure Mr. Johnston you report facts; however, how you report facts that are related to Trump puts you directly into the camp of being an anti-Trump propaganda “the ends justifies the means” extremist.
Tell me Mr. Johnston which of these sentences is nothing but reporting the facts and which is full of innuendo;
1. Joe threw a fast ball, it hit Jim in the helmet, Jim got a walk to first base.
2. Joe recklessly threw the ball as hard as he possibly could directly at Jim’s head, it sounded like the helmet had been struck by a violently swung baseball bat, and Jim got to walk to first base as a result of Joe’s intentional violent actions.
3. Jim intentionally put his fat helmeted head in the path of Joe’s fast ball so he could get a walk to first base and make Joe look like a violent bully.
Sure Mr. Johnston you report facts; however, it’s transparently clear that that’s not all you are communicating to the readers.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “If you can show any error in my work it will be forthrightly and promptly corrected.”
So when I show that you are unethical in how you present your facts will you “promptly correct” every instance of that too? I bet not and I also bet that all you’ll do is attack the messenger as you already proven you are willing to do.
By the way, Mr. Johnston, I too only “report” what I can prove empirically.
I haven’t once stated that there is an error in facts that you’ve presented, I’ve said and implied that there is an error in the way you choose to unethically present your facts; which appears to completely allude you or you rationalize it all away because you are such a good person with such good intentions. So by means of observation and experience rather than theory or pure logic; I have determined that you’re a political hack, an accomplished one, but still a political hack. Also since you claim to be a registered Republican, I’ve determined (by means of observation and experience) that you are also the epitome of a RINO, and quite likely now a fully consumed partisan Liberal.
Other than I’ve noted above, I’m choosing not to address the pile of baseless allegations you’ve slung at me, it’s all just a bull shit smoke screen to divert attention away from your unethical behavior.
You can continue your trolling for emotional reactions elsewhere.
““Trump made use of an abusive tax shelter that Congress soon closed to newcomers”; tell me Mr. Better-Than-Thou, why would an upstanding person like yourself, full of ethics and all, choose to write that instead of just presenting the facts like this, “Trump saved bundles on taxes by using a legal tax shelter that Congress later chose to close”?”
Or even just “Trump made use of a tax shelter that congress soon closed to newcomers”.
David Cay Johnston wrote, “Wow, you don’t think anyone should report critically on the resident? Really?”
Read for comprehension you idiot.
Now you’ve earned yourself a very polite pat on the back, a friendly fuck off, and one of these dandy participation trophies.
You’re welcome.
I’m done with you.
You have no idea how he would be conducting himself right now if he were not President.
Irrelevant. My statement was that his behavior has not changed since becoming president. That is a fact. I do not need a window into the alternate world where Hillary Clinton won in order to state that fact. I literally just need to compare his past behavior to his present behavior.
For example, he is not running the Trump businesses, or seeking branding fr that purpose.
This is also irrelevant. It does not in any way make speculation that he will continue to leak information about himself unfair.
***You advance a bizarre understanding of what the Framers sought in writing our Constitution.
I don’t think this is right. It is doubtful the Founders intended the First Amendment to be used to publish documents that were illegally obtained.***
I have no facts showing whether the document was obtained legally or not. If Trump had it sent it obviously it was lawful. The sender may have only violated professional ethics, but no law. So your statement is overly broad. In 50 years at this I have studied deeply issues about documents and understand the law about how to handle them in many situations.
***But it is true that the Supreme Court has found that the FA does in fact do so. Please don’t conflate the intent of the Founders with the ruling of the Court, they are not the same thing.***
The Framers (only about a fifth of whom were Founders of our Second American Republic) lived in a time when newspapers just made up most of their stuff. Yet they put one job, journalist, in the Constitution. For all their raucous disputes, they agreed that they wanted the press to be unfettered.
I have read more than 100 books on the era from Jamestown to 1789 (and many original historical documents) for a book and possible movie project because a leading scholar of the Colonial Era, in a footnote, wrote that no one had done serious scholarly research on a specific issue that he thought merited inquiry. Years later no one had taken up his suggestion. I could without notes deliver an hour long speech tomorrow that would hold an audience in rapt attention on the issues of how we got our Constitution, a subject I hope to soon start teaching. Now don’t go all this is an authority argument. You stated an opinion, to which you are entitled, I based what I wrote on deep study and reflection.
My point here is I do serious work. I know my stuff. I can prove what I write. I sometimes stick with stories for years from initial idea to the last published report and from one outlet to a another (like my exposes of unregistered foreign agent John McGoff).
I sign my name to all my work. Many millions of people have had the opportunity to challenge it. All of it stood up. Integrity, reliability and accuracy are all I have to sell in the world. I nurture my assets, not ruin them.
***It is also time honored but ethically questionable for reporters to conspire with criminals to publish data that would be otherwise illegal to publish. I do use the word “conspire” advisedly.***
I did not conspire with anyone. This document came out of the blue. Or, as others have noted, I was chosen because of my decades of hard work on behalf of taxpayers ad my sophisticated understanding of tax law, tax administration, accounting, economics and Trump. I don’t know what motivated the sender. I know I got lucky.
I have never committed a crime. Do you think I would be so foolish as to risk my freedom and career over a shortcut?
Ethics are debated, often hotly, in the best newsrooms every day. The ultimate decisions are not always optimal, but they ae not arrived at lightly. And uniquely, journalists self-report their mistakes and correct them.
There is a saying that I am sure I did not originate, although a researcher I hired couldn’t find any written example older than one under my byline of this:
Doctors bury their mistakes.
Lawyers see theirs off to jail.
Only reporters sign theirs for all to read.
***One would have to go no further than Absence of Malice, one of my favorite all-time movies, to see how illegal leaks are… well, illegal, and when the press becomes a willing accomplice things can go badly. Everybody thought they were doing the right thing, but all of them were wrong, and it was bias and preconceptions driving the matter just as it likely is here, Trump’s suitability notwithstanding.***
I lived through the actual incidents on which that movie is based. The reporters (including me in a minor role) acted ethically. We scoured public records, interviewed people and acted in the highest standards and traditions of fearless journalism. We did not sneak peaks at files that were left with a wink-and-nod to be looked at. It was the editor who screwed up. He wrote the screenplay. Not surprisingly, then, that the reporter is made to look naive and unethical while in the end the editor appears as the wise and ethical one. Pure BS.
When I wrote a piece about this for the American Journalism Review the screenwriter threatened to sue the lightly funded public service magazine out of existence, killing the story.
Do you know why you don’t know about the real character of Trump unless you have read my books or those of the other biographers I mentioned here? Because everyone around him, even campaign volunteers in many places, signs lifetime nondisclosure agreements. I have interviewed many people who have described illegal acts that I cannot write about because they won’t go on the record. They fear that those agreements will be used to sue them and, like that journalism review, even if they win the lawsuit they will be broke.
Those agreements might be broken as contrary to public policy, but so far no one wants to endure the awful rigors of litigation with an uncertain outcome. Many people who worked for him are afraid of Trump. I’m not.
***Trump choose to run for office and his personal financial interests should be subordinate to our system of law, not supreme. He can end the national security and corruption concerns because of his massive debts to the communist government of China and the corrupt Deutsche Bank (fined more than $20 billion so far because of laundering Russian money and other serious offenses), his decades of business dealings with Russian oligarchs, and his lifelong entanglements with major criminals, violent felons and a major drug trafficker for whom he risked his lucrative casino license for reasons he has never explained.
The big questions are, why should he explain them, and in what way is his personal financial interests not subordinate to our system of law? Even if I uncritically stipulate that all these financial and political entanglements are as you describe them, none of them are, as far as we know, illegal, and most of them aren’t all that troubling taken in their full context. It seems to me that you are are engaging in guilt by association so typical of journalist who claim to be fair, but really aren’t, by demanding an explanation of everyone Trump has ever associated with.
Don’t we ever get tired of this game? In business, people develop contacts of an unsavory nature, especially in big business. These facts were surely available during Trump’s run to the presidency, and if he were elected without sufficient analysis of this data, that’s a problem for the press, not Trump. It is not incumbent on him to allay any and all concerns raised about his suitability for the office. The American people make that decision via the Electoral College. There is also a remedy in the Constitution — impeachment — if it turns out he has broken laws.
Having said that, I agree that the opportunities for corruption and self-enrichment are rife and alarming, and that Trump’s behavior and apparent ethical amorality is anything but reassuring. But I don’t think that guilt by association is a worthy journalistic effort, and I strongly disagree with the notion that he must explain his business dealings — if he has committed crimes, they should be investigated, but no such credible allegations have emerged yet. It’s fine if the dealings are brought to the light of day, and demanding a defense of them is okay as well, but drawing conclusions from that defense or lack of it is not a journalist’s job. That’s the job of the reader.***
There is so much misunderstanding above of our Constitution, our laws, and by implication of issues of national security, integrity, conflict of interest, etc., it would take me all night to unpack it. I suggest you read The Making of Donald Trump, especially about his lifelong deep involvement with violent felons, including a major drug trafficker for whom he risked his lucrative casino license to signal his absolute loyalty. Ask yourself why he would do that. I don’t know the answer, but in my book I do ask the obvious question.
The Trump you know is an image he has sold. He is a master salesman. He is a con artist and swindler. My book is 100% from the public record, including his own writings and speeches and testimony under oath.
***Other serious journalists who cover Trump have documented his practice of leaking documents about himself. There is so much material available about Trump planting stories about himself that your comment are surprising.
What is surprising about them? YOU HAVEN’T PRODCUED ANY EVIDENCE, just like Jack said. That is a fact. You have engaged in speculation based on prior evidence of similar actions. That, sir, is not proof and should be noted as the pure speculation it is. Are there no opinion columnists left in the world that persons claiming to do journalism must editorialize their own work?***
Wrong.
Read The Making of Donald Trump, where several chapters recount this with sources you can check in the Source Notes, Then there is the Wayne Barrett book, the Harry Hurt III book, the Tim O’Brien book. All are respected journalists. Not one fact in any of these books has been shown to be wrong.
This story is well known in Manhattan newsrooms, so much so that when I mentioned it two nights ago to the overnight reporter at the NYDaily News she said no need to explain everyone knows the stories. He has even testified under oath about this, as you can earn from my book. This story has bee in national magazines, TV news shows. Of course if you rely on fake news sources like Fox, Breitbart, InfoWars you would not know about this, but you would be informed about the “interdimensional beings” who secretly control us….
I deal in verifiable facts, There are 40 pages of sources in my book. I included my personal email so people could contact e to challenge the facts. Many people who know Trump have called or written me to praise the work. Not one error has been shown.
So what you do above are make statements for which you have no basis in fact because you did not research the facts first. You just imagined and then wrote. And then you say I am engaged in speculation when you are the one speculating.
Do you really think that I would have survived 50 years of exposing the most powerful forces in this country, getting laws passed, presidents to change their policies, people set ti prison, etc., unless I had my facts bolted down solid? Fo you think a major newspaper would have recruited a teenager to be a front page reporter if he didn’t do remarkable work?
Reporters who get it wrong get fired early on. Investigative reporting is littered with reporters whose careers were ended after one flawed story. I know these reporters and I know they made honest mistakes, but it still was the end of being allowed to put their employers assets at risk.
My work has been the subject of decades of independent inquiry by competing news organizations hoping to knock it down. It has also been investigated by Congressional committees, legislative and other bodies, grand juries, civil and criminal trials, blue ribbon citizen panels and all of it has held up. Much if my work was hard for people to believe when it appeared because hardly anyone knew the facts I dug out and made understandable. That’s news. what you would not know but for the reporters work
For example, Jack Welch did not walk away from what I estimate to e $70 million of retirement perks because I “speculated.” My brief article revealing the economics of those perks and how they violated this own stated policies caused him to immediately renounce them. (He has shouted at other journalists at the mere mention of my name, but never challenged my facts because they were perfectly documented He is entitled to be angry, BTW, but at himself because he arrogantly thought he could hide the terms in opaque legalese and never imagined a lowly journalist would decode a single obfuscating sentence and run the numbers.)
Ditto my expose of the pay of a former Coca-Cola CEO, which even company directors did not understand until I wrote it up, causing fight among them. My reporting which changed the way all news organizations report executive compensation. (I know that because I paid a researcher to photocopy every single article on executive pay from 1970 through 2002 and a clear demarcation occurs after my Oct 13, 1996 article with a colleague starting with coverage of the SEC 14-A reports the following spring. (I spent a lot of money on that research and al to of time reading because I am always thorough and in the rare cases where I speculate — never in news reports, but in columns and my books, I state so directly.)
Then there’s the 501(c)(15) story. I exposed how a billionaire, Peter Kellogg, used a nonprofit device to earn $315 million of profit tax-free hundreds of millions of dollars tax-free from a nonprofit insurer that by law could take in no more than $350,000 of insurance premiums annually. I hope you see that the economics of that are orders of magnitude larger than the premiums could generate. (Kellogg put in massive excess reserves which grew tax free.)
The next year I could not find the required report and called Kellogg. His aide said because of my story Kellogg converted to for-profit, but added that Kellogg wanted me to know that he was impressed that I figured out the scheme, how clearly I explained it to people not familiar with subtleties of finance, accounting snd tax law.
The IRS then audited the deal and demanded $168 million in back taxes and penalties.
One of my NYTimes editors asked me why I didn’t quit journalism to fashion tax shelters and make a fortune. I could have. Instead I chose to do good in a field that required serious research, commanding arcane and complex details and turning them into plain English.
But you, who have not read my work, write that I do not provide proof. No, you did not do any research, which thanks to search engines would have taken you only a few moments to find, though much longer to read.
***The solution is putting his assets in a blind trust, having an independent and experienced broker sell the holdings and then disclosing the terms of those sales with the proceeds are invested in mutual funds and US Treasuries for so long as he is in office.
This would be a fine and ethical solution. Trump should take this advice, which Jack has repeatedly suggested here.***
Thank you. And thank you for getting me to put down some thoughts for the memoir that I am asked often to write, but have not gotten around to yet.
Continued (Part Two)
Then there’s the 501(c)(15) story. I exposed how a billionaire, Peter Kellogg, used a nonprofit device to earn $315 million of profit tax-free hundreds of millions of dollars tax-free from a nonprofit insurer that by law could take in no more than $350,000 of insurance premiums annually. I hope you see that the economics of that are orders of magnitude larger than the premiums could generate. (Kellogg put in massive excess reserves which grew tax free.)
The next year I could not find the required report and called Kellogg. His aide said because of my story Kellogg converted to for-profit, but added that Kellogg wanted me to know that he was impressed that I figured out the scheme, how clearly I explained it to people not familiar with subtleties of finance, accounting snd tax law.
The IRS then audited the deal and demanded $168 million in back taxes and penalties.
One of my NYTimes editors asked me why I didn’t quit journalism to fashion tax shelters and make a fortune. I could have. Instead I chose to do good in a field that required serious research, commanding arcane and complex details and turning them into plain English.
But you, who have not read my work, write that I do not provide proof. No, you did not do any research, which thanks to search engines would have taken you only a few moments to find, though much longer to read.
***The solution is putting his assets in a blind trust, having an independent and experienced broker sell the holdings and then disclosing the terms of those sales with the proceeds are invested in mutual funds and US Treasuries for so long as he is in office.
This would be a fine and ethical solution. Trump should take this advice, which Jack has repeatedly suggested here.***
Thank you. And thank you for getting me to put down some thoughts for the memoir that I am asked often to write, but have not gotten around to yet.
He was a pretty good sport about losing $168 million, I’d have to say.
This is delightful stuff, and I love your passion. Some random points:
1. Now that Trump is President, the financial conflicts will be a constant irritant and impediment to his credibility, but he’s not going to sell off his businesses, no one can make him, and that’s that. It’s also dubious that he could deal with all of them.
2. Nobody, including you and I, made this the central issue it should have been during the campaign, especially during the GOP debates. In my case, it was because I was concentrating on character and qualifications, but this should have been a silver bullet.
3. The options should have been eliminate the conflicts, or don’t run. The public should have been educated on why this was crucial. It wasn’t.
“The public should have been educated on why this was crucial. It wasn’t.”
Why wasn’t the public educated on civic virtue?
Well, fortunately I stopped reading once you really got the “beat your own drum and toot your own horn” rhythm up to a fever pitch.
No doubt we all believe we are each individually the most consummate professionals in our fields. I doubt not that you put forth the greatest effort…so you should consider worrying less about touting your own credentials here and do more towards resting on the merits of your own arguments.
Otherwise it smacks of appealing to your own authority. Which, around here, combined with $.50 will get you…ooops inflation…which, around here, combined with $1.50 will get you a cup of coffee.
If you don’t want to bother rehashing arguments and merely want us to assume you’ve done your homework, we’ll probably stop listening with a quickness that will put the speed of light to shame.
That being said, it was great your first bit of composition here. Thanks for that.
Now, something substantive from the first section of your essay that wasn’t just a big self-paean:
You said; “Yet they put one job, journalist, in the Constitution.”
No, they didn’t. No more so than they put “gun-seller” into the constitution, or “preacher” into the constitution, or “lawyer” into the constitution as jobs.
The 1st Amendment protects every individual citizen’s freedom to publish their beliefs and narratives. The Market developed journalists. Not the 1st Amendment.
Well, he did win the Pulitzer Prize. I’ve been waiting for mine for years now…
No doubt the man’s accomplishments are worthy of respect and adulation as they surpass most of what we’ve accomplished. However, if he were to assert that the moon was made of a fine French cheese, saying “I have a lot of accomplishments” wouldn’t make him less wrong.
Only the French would be so arrogant as to make that claim.
And as a self-professed ‘historian’, he should know this. There have not been a first and second American Republics. What he is referring to as the first, I think, was actually a Confederation, as defined by the Articles Of Confederation. So, right off the top, I am suspicious of his self-professed ‘credentials’.
David,
I commend you for being a very talented and passionate writer, but this needs to be stated very bluntly because subtly doesn’t appear to work with you.
In my opinion, you need to learn the following short list:
4. Marion Barry’s Misdirection, or “If it isn’t illegal, it’s ethical.”
The late D.C. Mayor and lovable rogue Marion Barry earned himself a place in the Ethics Distortion Hall of Fame with his defense of his giving his blatantly unqualified girlfriend a high-paying job with the DC government. Barry declared that since there was no law against using the public payroll as his own private gift service, there was nothing unethical about it. Once the law was passed (because of him), he then agreed that what he did would be wrong the next time he did it.
Ethics is far broader than law, which is a system of behavior enforced by the state with penalties for violations. Ethics is good conduct as determined by the values and customs of society. Professions promulgate codes of ethics precisely because the law cannot proscribe all inappropriate or harmful behavior. Much that is unethical is not illegal. Lying. Betrayal. Nepotism. Many other kinds of behavior as well, but that is just the factual error in the this rationalization.
The greater problem with it is that it omits the concept of ethics at all. Ethical conduct is self-motivated, based on the individual’s values and the internalized desire to do the right thing. Barry’s construct assumes that people only behave ethically if there is a tangible, state-enforced penalty for not doing so, and that not incurring a penalty (that is, not breaking the law) is, by definition, ethical.
Nonsense, of course. It is wrong to intentionally muddle the ethical consciousness of the public, and Barry’s statement simply reinforces a misunderstanding of right and wrong.
Closely related to the Barry Misdirection is……
5. The Compliance Dodge.
Simply put, compliance with rules, including laws, isn’t the same as ethics. Compliance depends on an individual’s desire to avoid punishment. Ethical conduct arises from an individual’s genuine desire to do the right thing. The most unethical person in the world will comply if the punishment is stiff enough. But if he can do something unethical without breaking the rules, watch out!
No set of rules will apply in all situations, and one who is determined to look for loopholes in a set of laws, or rules, or in an ethics code, so that he or she can do something self-serving, dishonest, or dastardly, is likely to find a way. This is one reason why the ubiquitous corporate ethics programs that emphasize “compliance” are largely ineffective. By emphasizing compliance over ethics, such programs encourage the quest for loopholes. Remember that when Enron’s board realized that one of its financial maneuvers violated its Code of Ethics, it made compliance possible by changing the Code.
When an organization or society makes compliance…doing the right thing to avoid unpleasant consequences… the focus of its attempt to promote ethical conduct, it undermines the effort by promoting confusion in the not-infrequent circumstances when doing the right thing hurts. The better approach, and the one promoted by Ethics Alarms, is to teach and encourage good behavior and ethical virtues for their own sake. When the inevitable loophole opens up in the rules, when the opportunity to gain at someone else’s expense is there and nobody will ever know, it is the ethical, not the compliant, who will do the right thing.
14. Self-validating Virtue
A corollary of the Saint’s Excuse [See Below] is “Self-validating Virtue,” in which the act is judged by the perceived goodness the person doing it, rather than the other way around. This is applied by the doer, who reasons, “I am a good and ethical person. I have decided to do this; therefore this must be an ethical thing to do, since I would never do anything unethical.” Effective, seductive, and dangerous, this rationalization short-circuits ethical decision-making, and is among the reasons good people do bad things, and keep doing them, even when the critics point out their obvious unethical nature. Good people sometimes do bad things because they are good people, and because of complacency and self-esteem they begin with a conviction, often well supported by their experience, that they are incapable of doing something terribly wrong. But all of us are capable of that, if our ethics alarms freeze due to our environment, emotions, peer pressure, and corrupting leadership, among many possible causes. At the end of the movie “Falling Down,” the rampaging vigilante played by Michael Douglas, once a submissive, law-abiding citizen, suddenly realizes what he has done. “I’m the bad guy?” he asks incredulously. Indeed he is. Any of us, no matter how virtuous, are capable of becoming “the bad guy”…especially when we are convinced that we are not.
13. The Saint’s Excuse: “It’s for a good cause”
This rationalization has probably caused more death and human suffering than any other. The words “it’s for a good cause” have been used to justify all sorts of lies, scams and mayhem. It is the downfall of the zealot, the true believer, and the passionate advocate that almost any action that supports “the Cause,’ whether it be liberty, religion, charity, or curing a plague, is seen as being justified by the inherent rightness of the ultimate goal. Thus Catholic Bishops protected child-molesting priests to protect the Church, and the American Red Cross used deceptive promotions to swell its blood supplies after the September 11, 2001 attacks. The Saint’s Excuse allows charities to strong-arm contributors, and advocacy groups to use lies and innuendo to savage ideological opponents. The Saint’s Excuse is that the ends justify the means, because the “saint” has decided that the ends are worth any price—especially when that price will have to be paid by someone else.
Learn from this or don’t, it’s your choice.
P.S. I hope your arms recover from all your patting yourself on the back.
David,
Just in case this blew over your head, because you didn’t care to actually learn from what I linked to before, that short list was created from items in the Unethical Rationalizations and Misconceptions list that Jack developed.
I understand your #1, but disagree with you that the sources should have to be revealed.
I often use similar logic in defending arrests of perpetrators of civil disobedience, even in cases where the cause is obviously just. Because such acts should be costly to perform, otherwise we wouldn’t be a nation of laws.
Source protection, on the other hand, serves a similar purpose to whistle blower protections. Yet, unlike whistle blower protection, which require the cooperation of the very institution it is attacking, source protection creates a truly independent institution, capable of protecting democracy: news reporting institution.
Now, I here your objection: news outlets are not independent institution, anymore, by any objective measure. But this only re-enforces my point: if non-governmental agencies cannot be entrusted with their independence from the previous administration (or the ‘should have been administration’, in their views), how can we call them independent? Let me ask you this: do you think that then, a true whistle blower would trust an official government agency, now that even newspapers cannot be trusted? At least now, you can go see some obscure non-mainstream newspaper and still be anonymous.
Philosophically, free speech isn’t what allows the protection of journalistic sources, IMO. But extending it to encompass source protection serves as a means to protect democracy as a whole. It is a key element of the free press, if not free speech.
This being said, publishing and commenting on that income tax served no societal purpose and shows the debasement of the mainstream media, and its utter lack of judgement and professional ethics.
This is the part of the argument I would like to see more fully developed….
I shouldn’t have included that part, it was tangential to the point I was making, and not properly reflected.
In fact, now that I try to defend it, I can. So I must conclude that this was a store if the moment thing, an impression, not an actual conclusion.
In fact, I do think it is of political and social interest to know the financial background and assets of the president. However, the law does not require it, such that while it is good practice, forcing it is of questionable ethics, even though Trump’s refusal to release such records is even more questionable (one has no bearing on the other).
Arguably, releasing it at best suggested a bias, but certainly didn’t demonstrate it.
I’d like to recant that part of my comment.
Erratum:
I can’t defend them.
Spur of the moment.
You heard it here first!
“The Art Of The Deal,” “The Art Of The Comeback,” & “Think BIG and Kick Ass in Business and Life” were ghost-authored by Bill Ayers…
I kinda wonder if Rachel Maddow or anyone at MSNBC actually read the tax returns before getting all hot and bothered about releasing them. I mean… She tweets the announcement, a bunch of her co-workers do too, and then they put a little countdown box in the corner of the feed, and then the bomb is dropped:
Donald Trump. Paid. All the tax… He was legally….Supposed… To pay? What? What is this? I thought we had a bomb. So he paid…. 25%? 24%? I’ve heard both numbers, one is probably a rounding error. I’ll check the source documents later. Fun facts: Obama paid 19% on his last released tax return. Bernie “tax-the-rich-people-but-not-me-apparently” paid 13% and MSNBC’s parent company, COMCAST paid 23%.
This reminds me of when Geraldo Rivera opened Al Capone’s vault. It’s just painful.
I see you too listened to Ben Shapiro’s extremely amusing takedown of this fiasco.
Honestly. I feel like all the pre-hype for this great “bombshell” revelation was in anticipation that most of the unthinking masses weren’t actually going to watch Rachel Maddow anyway- but the hype alone is enough to sway just enough to further obfuscate the waters.
I mean let’s face it honestly… does MSNBC really think it does anything other than muddying the waters of rational discourse anyway?
WOW…. No, I actually saw the coverage and got the percentages and Riviera comparison from PJW at Info Wars, but Ben and Paul gave almost word for word the same talking point…. I’m not sure who copied who, but that’s blatant.
No, I actually saw the coverage and got the percentages and Riviera comparison from PJW at Info Wars
Why?
I find them funny. Once you put yourself into the mindset that Alex Jones is satire, you can sit back and chuckle at him.
“THEY’RE TURNING THE FROGS GAY!”
Pure gold.
I want to be clear: I talk Info Wars with a HUGE grain of salt, so I took a second after to double check the effective tax rates, and as far as I can tell they check out,
Why would you (or anyone else) give any credence to Alex Jones, who spends time discussing such lunacies as the “interdimensional beings” that he claims have taken over, but the elites have hidden that….but its starting to come out…
Then there are his more mundane claims — Scalia was murdered, the Orlando nightclub attack was part of an Obama conspiracy and the Sandy Hook murders of 20 first graders and six adults was ““synthetic, completely fake, with actors.”
Humble Talent wrote, “Once you put yourself into the mindset that Alex Jones is satire, you can sit back and chuckle at him.”
David, With all due respect, there is a concept that used to be taught in K-12 schools that’s commonly referred to as reading for comprehension, you might want to take an objective journalistic look at that concept. Humble Talent clearly talked about Alex Jones as satire, did that point blow over your head or did you conveniently ignore that point?
By the way David, your immediate reply to Humble Talent remarks about Alex Jones was to start attacking the credibility of Alex Jones. You wrote, “Why would you (or anyone else) give any credence to Alex Jones…”. You’ve really latched on to this attack the messenger tactic, that tactic must be in the top drawer of your debating tool box. Nice.
Above you wrote, ” I am a longtime registered Republican”
You could claim to be a long time registered member of Star Fleet Academy and I wouldn’t care one bit, it’s your words that give insight to your motives and your character; in that regard, it appears to me that you are using the same tactics as pompous intellectual Liberals and you “appear” to be suffering from the same form of Trump Derangement Syndrome that puts you squarely in the “ends justifies the means” crowd. Now before your head explodes and you strain more of your arm tendons trying to pat yourself on the back like you did above, you might want to really think about that, perception is part of the equation and your tactics as a professional journalist and as a common citizen commenting here (or are you the professional journalist commenting here) put you square in the lap of an anti-Trump Liberal/Progressive.
Okay David; take all that and run with it.
For the record, Breitbart, Media Matters, Roliing Stone, Infowars, Gateway Pundit and Snopes, among many others, will never be cited as sources here.
“Then there are his more mundane claims — Scalia was murdered, the Orlando nightclub attack was part of an Obama conspiracy and the Sandy Hook murders of 20 first graders and six adults was ““synthetic, completely fake, with actors.””
Don’t forget that the government is turning frogs gay.
People on either side who feel the show was overhyped by Maddow strike me as people who have never watched her show. She overhypes pretty much everything, and most of the time I don’t even think it’s intentional; it’s just how she speaks. People were also annoyed that she spent the first fifteen minutes explaining why it was important to see Trump’s taxes before explaining what was in the document she found, but again, that’s how she does every show. I don’t think it occurred to her that people expected some kind of bombshell; I saw nothing different about how she promoted this episode than the way she promotes every episode.
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God I hope that works, otherwise that’s a godawful mess of text.
This hits me as what happens every time strangers wade into new territory, if you aren’t used to the culture, the memes, of the group you’re walking into, you invariably ruffle feathers. I remember a new commentor about a year ago that took huge offence with my use of “the ick factor” in an abortion debate. So you’re probably even right, this might be par for the coarse Maddow, and not nearly as big a deal for her normal audience.
The one defence I have is that Maddow KNEW that people outside her normal audience were going to pay attention to this, I think she should have stepped a little bit away from her business as usual song and dance, because I think it’s reasonable for people to see that tweet outside the context of normal Maddowism as to be taken as excitement over a bombshell.
Just curious; are you by any chance from Canada?
Sarcasm?
Not at all. I’ve been reading a book, “Shake Hands With the Devil”, by retired Canadian General Romeo Dallaire. He also spells “defense” as you do, “defence”, so I was wondering if this might be a French-Canadian regional dialect thing.
I thought I wore my Canadianism on my sleeve. It’s also colour, valour, touque and zed,
”I thought I wore my Canadianism on my sleeve.”
I have a Sister & BIL in Cape Breton: they’re tantamount to “Newfies” (but won’t admit it), have ‘Great White North’ hosers Bob & Doug McKenzie on speed dial, LUV beer-n-donuts, end every sentence with “eh?” (pronounced “ā”) & never leave the house without their Stormy Kromers, flaps down.
If she reads this, she’d be feeling owly. Me? I’ll be mawga after weatherin’ that kerfuffle.
“People on either side who feel the show was overhyped by Maddow strike me as people who have never watched her show.”
At something like a whole whopping .2-.7% of the Nation watching her show (less if you assume even some foreigners watch), it’s safe to assume most people seeing an overhyping assume it’s atypical. And this particular overhyping was publicized by more than just her…
So I don’t see this as a valid consideration in evaluating the foolishness of how much this episode was over-hyped…as it wasn’t just her over-pushing this.
It was Maddow’s own Al Capone’s vault fiasco, but worse: at least Geraldo really hadn’t opened the vault. She gouged her own credibility. If she read the document, she knew it was a footnote, not a scoop, and yes, she should have read it, and yes, what she did was essentially a bait and switch.
It’s defending clear ethics breaches like this, Chris, that should provoke bias self-exams.
It’s time to pick on Chris again.
Chris wrote, “People on either side who feel the show was overhyped by Maddow strike me as people who have never watched her show. She overhypes pretty much everything, and most of the time I don’t even think it’s intentional; it’s just how she speaks. People were also annoyed that she spent the first fifteen minutes explaining why it was important to see Trump’s taxes before explaining what was in the document she found, but again, that’s how she does every show. I don’t think it occurred to her that people expected some kind of bombshell; I saw nothing different about how she promoted this episode than the way she promotes every episode.”
“She overhypes pretty much everything”, “It’s just how she speaks”, “that’s how she does every show”; okay now we know how you feel about that kind of behavior.
But wait!
Below Chris wrote, “As a sidenote, I am concerned and disturbed over the turn this thread has taken into conspiracy theorism, racial grievance, and paranoia. The comments I’m seeing from certain right-wing commenters here are more hysterical and unhinged than anything I’ve heard from the liberals I know.”
It’s a lot more than just “interesting” that Chris gives Maddow’s the “she overhypes pretty much everything” and the “it’s just how she speaks”, ” that’s how she does every show” consideration but people right of the political divide get the “conspiracy theorism, racial grievance, and paranoia” and that’s not even talking about the President who clearly does not get the same “she overhypes pretty much everything” and the “it’s just how she speaks” consideration.
Does anyone else have a problem with this seemingly double standard method of rendering what seems to be character judgments and basing those judgments on which side of the partisan political divide the deliverer resides?
P.S. Jack, does “it’s just how she speaks” fall into one of the rationalization categories?
It’s interesting to hear that from someone who decries the Julie Principle when applied to others.
But the Principle doesn’t apply to journalists, who cannot be loose with facts, since facts is their job. This was conduct, not words.
Jack Marshall wrote, “It’s interesting to hear that from someone who decries the Julie Principle when applied to others.”, “But the Principle doesn’t apply to journalists, who cannot be loose with facts, since facts is their job.”
I’ll admit that I had no idea what the “Julie Principle” was, I had to look it up your original post on it to get a grasp. Now I’m trying to wrap my head around the whole concept and how it applies, or doesn’t apply, in the ways you said it does; that’s alright, I’ll muddle through it myself until the light bulb goes on and then it’ll stick.
Jack wrote, “This was conduct, not words.”
Didn’t the word’s bring conduct to the forefront?
I’m going to be wrapping my head around this reply to my comment for a while, time for some inward looking critical thinking.
The conduct was hyping something and misleading viewers. Words were used in the conduct, but as with any fraud, it’s more than words.
I just thought of a question that “might” help me to wrap my head around this; does your reply only apply to the question I asked you a the end?
Yes.
Okay, Thanks.
Jack,
I think I’ve finally wrapped my head around this Julie Principle.
I’m struggling with this concept with someone I know right now related to drug addiction. I know that might sound a little callous, but I’m not sure I need this in my life again, I had an actively drinking alcoholic wife a long time ago. During that time, almost 40 years ago, I went through a crash course over two full weeks (120 hours education barrage) learning about addiction and how it affects everyone in contact, it was taught presented psychologists, medical professionals, trained addiction counselors, an even some members of the clergy; it was enlightening. I’ve been reaffirming that that education actually sunk in and stuck with me over the past month or so.
I do have a question: earlier you wrote, “It’s interesting to hear that from someone who decries the Julie Principle when applied to others.” My reading of that is that I might be unaware that I’m being hypocritical about this, is that reasonably accurate? Don’t hold punches on this, I really don’t want to be perceived as being selectively hypocritical. If I have a litle soul searching to do on this then I need to know it.
I wasn’t referring to you. I’m sorry if that was unclear.
I’d wondered about that myself, but it did send me running (typing, actually) to become better acquainted with the “Julie Principle.”
It applies to me & The 77 Square Miles Surrounded By A Sea Of Reality. Drive Reduction Theory would suggest I skeedaddle from a place whose approach to municipal logic (from where I’m sittin’ leastways) is questionable at best, non-existent at worst, and has me asking “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” more often than not.
Who knows, maybe I will move on, after they remove that monitoring device of course, but that’s not the point.
I’m attached to Madison the same way James Garner’s Jimmy Rockford was attached to the weaselly “Angel” (Stuart Margolin): always expecting him to come around, always maddeningly disappointed but never surprised when he didn’t, but never able (or never willing) to cut the cord because of the deep lifelong ties.
“Angel”—the Rockford buddy, not the vampire— is a GREAT example of “The Julie Principle.” Well done.
It’s a lot more than just “interesting” that Chris gives Maddow’s the “she overhypes pretty much everything” and the “it’s just how she speaks”, ” that’s how she does every show” consideration but people right of the political divide get the “conspiracy theorism, racial grievance, and paranoia” and that’s not even talking about the President who clearly does not get the same “she overhypes pretty much everything” and the “it’s just how she speaks” consideration.
I find this a ridiculous comparison, Zoltar.
The comments I’m referring to suggest that a civil war is coming, that white people might be rounded up and killed, and that white people need to make sure they hoard guns in order to avoid being killed by leftists and minorities.
I am sure you can see why that is much more irresponsible than someone speaking in an outside voice about tax returns.
Chris,
Don’t try to morph what I was talking about into judging whether one piece of over-hyped rhetoric is “more irresponsible” than another piece of over-hyped rhetoric; it’s over-hyped rhetoric, period.
I talked about what I perceived as double standard from you when you judge over-hyped rhetoric and it appears that the political partisan divide is where you draw the line. Liberal Critical Thinking.
I find your double standards ridiculous, Chris.
No, I draw the line at racism and statements that may incite violence.
Chris wrote, “No, I draw the line at racism and statements that may incite violence.”
Here we go again. 🙂
Please quote the statements you are referring to that are racists and the statements that may incite violence, you might as well explain how these statements are what you say they are because you know I’m going to ask anyway.
Chris,
You wonder why I’m hard on you sometimes, well one of the reasons is exactly what you did in this little conversation. You seem to think it just fine for you to spout these kind of things and not back them up. Heck Chris, you’re no better than the people that you are claiming are being irresponsible when they write things that are over-hyped rhetoric; but somehow they are ones that are wrong and you are not.
I was wrong to state that any of the comments “incited violence;” that is legal terminology and was obviously wrong. I’m sorry.
I do think many of the comments about some kind of oncoming race war, and the dogwhistles about stolen TVs, were racist. Any implication that whites are some kind of oppressed class, or that we will be soon, is racist paranoia. So I stand by that comment.
I also think speculating about an oncoming race war, absent evidence, is irresponsible and shows a disconnect from reality. While it goes too far to say that such speculation “incites violence,” there are violent people out there who do believe such things, and any reinforcement of such beliefs is unethical and irresponsible.
I also stand by my assertion that such speculation is far more irresponsible than anything Rachel Maddow said about Trump’s tax returns. From what I understand she may have overhyped their importance, but did not exaggerate any of the details about what was actually in them.
I also apologize for taking so long to reply, Zoltar. It took me a few days to gather my thoughts about why I felt the way I did about this conversation. It also took me a while to fully articulate a response to your fair critiques. Please know that in the future if I take a while to respond that it isn’t because I’m trying to deflect or ignore you. You often raise very good arguments that I honestly find difficult to rebut. Thank you for keeping me on my toes.
Chris wrote, “I was wrong to state that any of the comments “incited violence;” that is legal terminology and was obviously wrong.”
Acknowledged; moving forward.
Chris wrote, “I do think many of the comments about some kind of oncoming race war, and the dogwhistles about stolen TVs, were racist.”
I just copied this entire comment thread and pasted it into a MS Word document, did a half hour of targeted searches to try and find justification for what you just wrote and what I found is you are only one talking about a race war is you Chris; I can find no other relevant comments regarding or implying a race war, as far as I can tell your statement that “comments about some kind of oncoming race war” is completely bogus. If you’ve got something I missed, I’ll read it.
Also, your statement about that the “dogwhistles about stolen TVs, were racist” is completely bogus! I think you need to go reread those comments, they have nothing, and I do mean absolutely nothing to do with race, they have to do with criminals. You are reading something that is simply not there. Your race baiting is unethical bull shit.
Here is a point that you and others need to understand; when people use the word “dogwhistles” as it’s related to racism, there better damn well be some solid evidence to support that race baiting or I’ll come down hard on whoever uses the term; my experience shows that 9 out of 10 times it’s nothing but blatant unethical propaganda bull shit and it deserves to be sternly rebuked!
Here is a personal suggestion, take it or leave it; you need to reread this thread and find out whatever it is you’re talking about regarding this “race war” thing, share it if you like, I’ll read it. Personally I think this race war talk is over-hyped rhetoric from you. In addition you need to publicly retract your statement that the comment about the stolen TV’s was racist (that needs to be done up by the TV comment) and apologize directly to Emily and slickwilly for your false claim.
Chris wrote, “Any implication that whites are some kind of oppressed class, or that we will be soon, is racist paranoia.”
Please actually quote where you are getting this impression from; I simply cannot find it in this thread.
Chris wrote, “I also think speculating about an oncoming race war, absent evidence, is irresponsible and shows a disconnect from reality. While it goes too far to say that such speculation “incites violence,” there are violent people out there who do believe such things, and any reinforcement of such beliefs is unethical and irresponsible.”, “I also stand by my assertion that such speculation [regarding race war] is far more irresponsible than anything Rachel Maddow said about Trump’s tax returns.”
Chris, you haven’t been able to quote anything that has supported your claim that people in this thread are “speculating about an oncoming race war” and yet you think that which you cannot prove (race war speculation) is more unethical than that which was televised on national TV (Rachel Maddow comment about Trumps taxes)?
Chris wrote, “I also apologize for taking so long to reply, Zoltar. It took me a few days to gather my thoughts about why I felt the way I did about this conversation. It also took me a while to fully articulate a response to your fair critiques. Please know that in the future if I take a while to respond that it isn’t because I’m trying to deflect or ignore you.”
Okay, I understand; however, three days with nothing and yet you’re actively commenting elsewhere on this website gives an appearance of intentional silence (which this was) and we all know that sometimes silence can be deafening. Maybe a simple comment stating that you’re thinking about it, or gathering your thoughts, no time right now, the sky is falling ;), whatever you like. I think even I’ve stated that I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around some things and I’ll be back later to comment on something.
Zoltar, I am referring to the first comment by Inquiring Mind, who wrote:
What can we expect from the Left when they regain any measure of political power? What will they do to avenge their 2016 loss? Who will they blame?
I’m pretty sure I’ll be blamed, if for no other reason than I’m white and male. We’re seeing the Left become willing to embrace an apartheid-type system, and those who aren’t “woke” will be the have nots.
So now, voting for Trump in 2020 and for a Republican in 2024 is as much an act of self-defense as it was in 2016, if not more so.
I’m also referring to slickwilly’s reply, in which he wrote:
“I’ll be blamed, if for no other reason than I’m white and male. ”
Since it is unlikely that Trump will ban guns, and MOST guns in the country belong to white males (simple demographics and rural population assumption), I doubt any such move will get far. You have to disarm a population before you start genocide, and apartheid will be looked at as genocide.
Both comments posit the idea that the Left wants to oppress white males. This is bullshit, and racist paranoia.
I also easily disproved this paranoid statement of slickwilly’s:
How many times have the Left said I deserve to die, just for being born white and male?
He defended this with two examples that were hoaxes (one of which was disproved on this very site, by Jack), then tried to give me three more, none of which said what he claimed they said.
Emily’s and slickwilly’s exchange about TVs came after they both made several references to white males owning the most guns–though Emily said that’s only true of legal guns, apparently implying that blacks own the most illegal guns, a statement I am not sure she can back up. Given that stealing TVs is a common stereotype of blacks, and the many references to race made before that comment, I do think this statement was racist in nature:
I totally agree there’s no way of really knowing, and that rural white males are certainly armed enough to fight back against an oppressor. But I wouldn’t underestimate the amount of firepower in cities. Individuals might not have collections, but you do hear of major collections when they manage to bust gang hangouts and drug rings.
But it’s also important to note that I seriously doubt those types of people are hardcore liberals, as opposed to opportunists. If the shit hits the fan they’re not the ones protesting, they’re the ones stealing TVs.
I honestly am not sure how you didn’t notice this. It wasn’t subtle.
Chris wrote, “I honestly am not sure how you didn’t notice this. It wasn’t subtle.”
I didn’t notice it because your over-hyped claims did not match what was written, it’s just that simple.
Knowing you, as represented by things you have twisted here in the past based on assumptions, I understand how y o u would twist those things into racism and a race war; however, what was written simply does not extrapolate the way you’ve claimed to logically thinking individuals, only to those making assumptions and reacting emotionally to those assumptions. You are engaging in over-hyped rhetoric and I mean way over-hyped rhetoric.
I think we’re done here.
It makes me wonder why Trump would want to be President. Certainly he doesn’t need it to produce cash. He’s probably actually taking a financial hit.
Maybe he was bored?
Probably a dare that occurred while playing darts. I imagine him turning to a drinking buddy and saying “Here, hold my beer; watch this…”
You owe me a keyboard… not because this is so outlandish, but because it is so plausible
“Oh yeah? I’ll prove to you I can run for President!”
Later…
“They LIKED my comments about illegal aliens? That was supposed to sink me…”
Then…
“The press is giving me millions of exposure? Any press is good for business, I have to continue…”
Finally, Nov 9th 2016…
“I won?!? Dammit, cancel the Bahamas vacation, I have to get a team together!”
My son asked me that same question, especially after he learned that Trump is not going to receive payment as president. My only thought was that people of his monumental ego (and I don’t mean that as a pejorative) truly believe that they possess gifts that others do not and they believe that they alone can do the best job. I have no doubt in my mind that Trump wants to be the best President in the history of presidents. It seems, though, that his mouth gets in the way.
jvb
I have no doubt that Trump wanted to be President due to his ego also. I wonder how he is feeling now? I’ve read that Trump enjoys a fight. Is he enjoying this particular fight? I would doubt it. I don’t think he knew what he was getting into. I still don’t think he knows what he is into. I would like to know if anyone around him ever told him…family members etc…”hey, are you sure about this…it’s kind of a hard job…nothing like you have ever done before”. I’m sure we will never know.
The way I look at it: it’s been done a few dozen times before.
Ah, but the theory is that it IS to get cash! Because no billionaire actually cares about anything but profit.
“I will admire him.”
I bet that hurt
I’ll say it, since no one else has yet: On behalf of us other taxpayers who pay less or nothing at all, thank you Donald Trump for for giving $38 million dollars to the United States Treasury.
When you have flushed all ethical behavior and the ends justifies the means is the only thing left driving your actions…
1. What’s wrong with illegally obtaining the personal tax returns of the President of the United States for the purpose of illegally releasing them to the news media?
2. What’s wrong with the news media publicly justifying the illegal activity by promoting it when they release the illegally obtained, illegal to release to the public, private tax returns of the President of the United States touting it as a justifiable public service to inform the public and therefore implying that it is heroic acts of personal integrity?
3. What could a news media publicly justifying this kind of deliberate illegal activity lead to?
Any professional psychologist care to react to these questions?
Once you have a private business (the media) that has been touted for over two centuries as a valuable “public service” and that “public service” chooses to become full engulfed in transparently unethical partisan behavior (basically a PAC) and that “public service” literally begins to promote unethical and illegal behaviors by publicly touting the behaviors as heroic acts of personal integrity, that “public service” actually becomes a threat to the stability of our civil society, they become a literal danger to the people that they are supposed to be serving, yes they are in fact an enemy of the people!
The news media outlet that released these tax returns needs to be hauled on the carpet for this breach of public trust in a very public way; if that means Trump sues them for billions, then let it be done; if that means that they are prosecuted for their activity, then let it be done; if that means both, let it be done. Make an example of this news outlet! I’m no lawyer; but, I think this kind of breach of public trust cannot go unanswered by our legal system.
Now to extrapolate and go slightly off the tax return release topic but remain on the same media theme that I talked about above…
The vast majority of the media is actively spreading subversive and seditious propaganda; there can only be one end goal of this kind of activity and that is to bring down the current government of the United States of America, trashing the Constitution, and installing a totalitarian government. The question becomes, if they were to bring down the current government, who would they actively promote to replace it? Maybe Daniel Greenfield: Obama’s Third Term is Here is not so far off base.
Here’s a extended extrapolation…
We are no longer approaching, we have reached the edge of a terminal social precipice, a critical turning point for the United States of America is upon us. We are a very divided people and public forces are promoting civil unrest. Very shortly you will have one of three choices; support the government of the United States of America based on the foundations by which it was built – the Constitution, support the destruction of the Constitution and therefore the destruction of government of the United States of America, or be completely apathetic to the social precipice and live with, or die with, the consequences.
The choices are yours.
You might want to begin making any arrangements you need to support your choices, you may not have time to plan ahead once the seemingly inevitable civil unrest begins. It’s better to be prepared and not need it, than to be unprepared and need it.
I know that was a lot, but if it inspires some genuine critical thinking then it was worth it.
I’m no longer a professional psychologist (retired for the past 10 years) but if I may, I’d like to answer the first three points:
1) IT’S ILLEGAL>/B>
2) Ain’t illegal yet, but it should be.
3) This is where the rubber meets the road. What, indeed?
Right now, we’ve got both red and blue states wanting to secede. Should any state manage to make a case at SCOTUS, and SCOTUS gives them the go-ahead, I believe we’re looking at the US splitting into 5 separate nations. The deep South, the North-East, the Midwest, Texas and Friends, and the Far West. There may even be a few states that will try to go it alone, but the Nation, United States of America will be finished. Sadly, I also think that that is EXACTLY what the media and the Power-Thinkers of the left have in mind. Strangely enough, I do NOT believe that the liberals who comment on this blog believe or desire that, but they are not molding Far Left policies, either. And, they do not see where these policies are taking us.
Oops! Didn’t take the ‘caps lock’ off. My bad.
I’d break the far west into The Pacific Coast and The Great Basin and Surroudings. I think California, Oregon and Washington State, or their coastal counties and cities are Granola country, but inside the coastal ranges, it’s not lefty land.
Plus, there are two midwests. Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis and St. Paul and the university towns are Lefty. The rest of the midwest is not. I’ve long thought the US is really an amalgamation of different regions different enough from each other to be separate countries, all of which, so far, share a common language and currency.
Now try to logically answer those same questions in context with this statement, “When you have flushed all ethical behavior and the ends justifies the means is the only thing left driving your actions…”. 😉
Right now, we’ve got both red and blue states wanting to secede.
No, we have unethical morons in both red and blue states who want to secede. These movements are not widespread enough to have any real effect, and the people running them are con artists.
I was wondering why you didn’t list Rachel Maddow’s hypification of the tax returns, along with MSNBC’s countdown clock, as an ethics issue. Then, I realized why: She and MSNBC didn’t do anything unethical by interviewing a guy who purportedly had the ‘goods’ on Trump; it was just dumb and it backfired on them in a spectacular fashion. While being dumb can raise ethics issues, in this situation they got their just desserts, along with a healthy dose of egg-on-the-face. Even the Wall Street Journal was snickering under its breath at their naivete. The really funny thing is that in 2005 Trump paid MORE than his fair share, to the eternal shame Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, Warren Buffet and his secretary, and probably a whole host of other righteous social justice warriors.
Perhaps there is an issue on confirmation bias, but that is probably worth its own ethics post (or a series of them from the past as you have addressed that point on many, many occasions).
Another thought just popped into my Dr. Pepper-addled brain: The Left does not comprehend that Trump is a master at media manipulation. During the Republican primaries, Trump sucked all the oxygen out of the room, to the delight of the CNNs, NBCx, etc. They gave his campaign an unbelievably large amount of tree air time by focusing on everything he said, did or tweeted. They did that (probably) with the idea that if he became the Republican candidate, he would be easier to beat in a head-to-head confrontation between Hillary and Trump. Now, Trump has turned that exposure directly on the mainstream media and they do not like it.
What they forgot is that Trump, while not a schooled, polished politician, resonated with the electorate because he said and did things that the middle and upper middle classes wanted to hear, in much the same way Sanders appealed to the Democrat voters. Trump talked directly to the “Fly Over” states; he went to Iowa, Michigan, Wyoming, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. Those voters responded to that because they were sick of being taken for granted or completely ignored by the establishment in both main parties. Now, the media has no idea how to deal with him.
Trump uses social media in a way that the mainstream media cannot control and it drives them nuts. He told Tucker Carlson last night that he has over a 100 million follows on Twitter, Facebook and other platforms. He is communicating directly with the electorate in a way that has never been done before and the electorate is keyed into what he says. (Example: My son [12 years old and a swimmer] admires Michael Phelps so he followed Phelps’ twitter account. Phelps’ accounts sent an autoreply to him, personalized thanking him for all of his support. My son believes that Phelps actually sent that message to him.) Trump, in his own way, brings the issues directly to over 100 million people, typos and all, and that is having a ‘Uge impact on the country. People long overlooked feel engaged and included in the discussion. Trump is talking to the beleaguered autoworker, the coal miner, the factory worker, the self-employed A/C guy and Joe the Plumber in ways that the establishment has not done in decades.
And now the tax return shows up in someone’s email account from some unknown source. I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump sent the tax return (or had someone send it) to veteran investigative reporter David Cay Johnston, knowing fully well thath3e would jump all over it Woodward-Bernstein style and hold it out as a smoking gun that Trump is in league with Moscow and Beijing and a host of other oligarchs and ne’er-do-wells. Then, they looked at it and discovered:
“Uh. . . Hmmmm . . . . He paid $25 million in taxes . . . based on $150 million in income . . . See! That’s not his fai – wait that’s about 25% in alternative income taxes . . . Uh . . .Um . . . What rate did Buffet’s secretary pay? . . . Oh . . Let me get ba- . . . WHAT?! We’re on the air?! Oh no.”
jvb
Logically, huh? You do like to make things difficult. Okay, here goes.
1) Absolutely nothing. Trump is a racist and a misogynist and we have to get his out of office.
2) Absolutely nothing. Trump is a VIOLENT racist, misogynistic pig and must be removed from office.
3) Why, we’d be back in power again, with Hillary as President and all would be right with the world.
Alright, so logically is impossible. I’m still trying to figure out what, if anything, they have to gain is Trump is removed from office and/or what he has done that is an impeachable offense.
1. Whoever leaked the return broke the law, and doing so was unethical. No, it’s not illegal for the news media to take material stolen by others and sanctify it via their First Amendment protections. It should be though.
I may be forgetting, Jack, but I don’t remember this being your stance when the illegally hacked DNC e-mails were released.
Please correct me if I’m wrong.
As a sidenote, I am concerned and disturbed over the turn this thread has taken into conspiracy theorism, racial grievance, and paranoia. The comments I’m seeing from certain right-wing commenters here are more hysterical and unhinged than anything I’ve heard from the liberals I know.
No, no one is going to start an apartheid or genocide against white people. States are not going to secede. There will be no second civil war. And if you start breathlessly fantasizing over such things because…someone releases the president’s tax returns… you really don’t get to call liberals “triggered snowflakes” anymore.
Chris wrote, “I may be forgetting, Jack, but I don’t remember this being your stance when the illegally hacked DNC e-mails were released. Please correct me if I’m wrong.”
The very first sentence of the blog Jack wrote, ” In case you missed it—and there were a lot of people trying to make sure you did—the illegal hacking organization Wikileaks released nearly 20,000 stolen e-mails from the Democratic National Committee.”
Observations On The Leaked DNC E-mails
Consider yourself corrected.
I’m curious; with the shear importance of that thread at that time, why weren’t you part of that thread. You were part of other threads around that time?
Thanks for the correction, Zoltar.
Not sure why I didn’t comment on that one. I typically comment when I have something to disagree with; maybe there wasn’t anything I disagreed with in that one.
Chris wrote, “As a sidenote, I am concerned and disturbed over the turn this thread has taken into conspiracy theorism, racial grievance, and paranoia. The comments I’m seeing from certain right-wing commenters here are more hysterical and unhinged than anything I’ve heard from the liberals I know.
No, no one is going to start an apartheid or genocide against white people. States are not going to secede. There will be no second civil war. And if you start breathlessly fantasizing over such things because…someone releases the president’s tax returns… you really don’t get to call liberals “triggered snowflakes” anymore.”
Nice little Political Attack Dog, now sit BoBo, sit!, or would you rather like to figuratively step out behind the shed and go at it again with a few of your fellow commenters, again?
I have no idea what this is supposed to mean, Zoltar.
Really Chris?
You should never use the word obtuse again.
Rachel is a madcow.
Hillary is a Madcow.
They both need to be tested for Kuru.