Alarming Precedent
As a proud alum of United Press International it pains me to say anything nice about my former chief competitor, the Associated Press.
The first thing we did starting a shift was to check the logs to see if we beat “Brand X” on a story. Some of my favorite personal memories involve the same rush to get it first but get it right.
UPI is now but a shadow of its former self, best remembered for the legendary Helen Thomas and being the first major news organization to hit the financial skids.
The AP has also been battered by the financial winds but is still the authoritative source on events in the United States and around the world.
That’s probably why Donald Trump is trying so hard to bend them to his will.
At issue is Trump’s unilateral renaming of the Gulf of Mexico, a name that has stood the test of time since 1550.
While Google and Apple have accepted renaming for maps available in the United States, the AP has demurred, noting its stylebook is geared to serving news outlets beyond the 50 states (plus any countries Trump is contemplating on seizing). It will note Trump has changed the name for domestic consumption.
That has apparently outraged the vindictive “Leader of the Free World,” who demanded that his mouthpieces exclude AP reporters from at least two Oval Office scrums (photographers are apparently OK for the Pretender King of All Media.)
He trotted out press secretary Karoline Leavitt to issue the following dictum:
“I was very up front in my briefing on day one that if we feel that there are lies being pushed by outlets in this room, we are going to hold those lies accountable. And it is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America.”
Actually, to borrow a phrase from Trump 1.0 that’s not a lie but an “alternative fact” peddled by a regime that has declared war on the media in all-but-name only.
Take for example, the Pentagon, now led by former Fox Propaganda Channel weekend host Pete Hegseth, began “rotating” newsroom assignments so the New York Times and NBC News have been moved out of longstanding space to make room for the New York Post and One America News.
“It is alarming that the Trump administration would punish AP for its independent journalism,” AP Executive Editor Julie Pace said in a statement. “Limiting our access to the Oval Office based on the content of AP’s speech not only severely impedes the public’s access to independent news, it plainly violates the First Amendment.”
It’s certainly a better look than the ones offered by ABC News and CBS News in the face of absurd-on-the-face lawsuits.
ABC, owned by Disney, agreed to a $15 million donation to the future Donald J. Trump Library to make a lawsuit go away. The case stemmed from anchor George Stephanopoulos’ admittedly inaccurate on-air assertion that Trump had been found civilly liable for raping writer E. Jean Carroll.
The reality is the jury found him liable for sexual abuse and the judge presiding over the case said that was a legal distinction for what most would consider rape.
The allegations against CBS, in the form of a $20 billion defamation suit, was that ‘60 Minutes” improperly edited an interview with Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
CBS took the unprecedented move of turning over both raw video footage and a transcript demanded by the Federal Communications Commission — a act that proved the edits involved normal journalism practice.
But Paramount, the parent company of the Tiffany Network, is looking to merge in a multi-billion dollar deal that would require federal government approval. And that appears to be more important than journalistic integrity.
Edward R.Murrow is probably spinning in his grave.
So far the White House Correspondents Association is standing by the AP, at least in words, saying:
“The White House cannot dictate how news organizations report the news, nor should it penalize working journalists because it is unhappy with their editors’ decisions. The move by the administration to bar a reporter from The Associated Press from an official event open to news coverage today is unacceptable,” WHCA President Eugene Daniels said in a statement.
A better test will come when, not if, Leavitt tries to oust the AP from the White House or Pentagon briefing room.
At that point the appropriate press corps should make a clear stand and refuse to give Trump the media oxygen he craves unless the wire service they depend on to back them up, continues to hold its place as first among equals.
As George Orwell reminds us: “The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power.”