Michael Cohen, Roger Stone and Paul Manafort. Photos: Getty Images.
Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi posts an emergency chapter of "Hate Inc.: How, And Why, The Press Makes Us Hate One Another," which he calls a "serial book, delivered by email."
His provocative thesis: "WMD damaged the media’s reputation. Russiagate may have destroyed it."
Stories have been coming out for some time now hinting Mueller’s final report might leave audiences "disappointed," as if a President not being a foreign spy could somehow be bad news.
Openly using such language has, all along, been an indictment. Imagine how tone-deaf you’d have to be to not realize it makes you look bad, when news does not match audience expectations you raised. To be unaware of this is mind-boggling, the journalistic equivalent of walking outside without pants.
There will be people protesting: the Mueller report doesn’t prove anything! What about the 37 indictments? The convictions? The Trump tower revelations? The lies! The meeting with Don, Jr.? The financial matters! There's an ongoing grand jury investigation, and possible sealed indictments, and the House will still investigate, and
Stop. Just stop. Any journalist who goes there is making it worse.
For years, every pundit and Democratic pol in Washington hyped every new Russia headline like the Watergate break-in. Nothing Trump is accused of from now on by the press will be believed by huge chunks of the population, a group that (perhaps thanks to this story) is now larger than his original base.