Don't forget the most important part of all: omitting details and testimony for the public good: https://jonathanturley.org/2023/12/04/the-responsibility-to-...
Ground News is the first "new" thing that seems to be a clear step in a good direction, but I don't know how much adoption it actually has vs flash in the pan VC money.
Second, recall: 1. There was basically (and as far as I know, still is) no evidence to support this being the case. There was a suspicion at most, and it was basically a conspiracy theory in 2020.
2. This conspiracy theory had a deep root in anti-China / anti-Asian racism. Anti-Asian hate crimes rose 150% in 2020 [1]. So I think it's pretty understandable that mainstream media outlets felt a responsibility to quell interest in conspiracy theories resulting in real-world harm.
[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-c...
If you're not aware of the evidence, it's not from lack of information being publicly available. From almost a year ago:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/28/politics/wray-fbi-covid-origi...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-origin-china-lab-leak-807...
And Fauci, et al actively worked to discredit the lab leak theory in Jan-Mar 2020 when there were some early clues.. therefore casting anyone digging into them as a conspiracy theorist as you just did:
https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Final...
Mainstream media doesn’t do that anymore. Completely random example that I just saw: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/05/politics/road-to-270-electora.... The article says: “Trump is a seriously flawed candidate who has promised to govern in undemocratic ways.”
That’s not in the opinion section.
I even happen to share that opinion. But when you can’t help yourself from interjecting it where it’s irrelevant, that’s a signal you can’t be trusted to do your job. Shut up and dribble.
And if there are going to be these extreme tactics, they have to work the first time to work at all. Politically speaking. In order to not look extremely inauthentic.
Maybe the RNC and DNC shouldn't have gone so hard in the paint starting in 2015, if they wanted anything done now to not have the oppposite intended effect.
It doesn't matter if he lost once. There isn't an authentic candidate to take his place. Many on the Right would rather see Joe Biden or even Hillary Clinton in office than Nikki Haley. Because at least they wouldn't be ruling inauthentically in the name of conservative voters.
Inauthentic candidates are seen as less trustworthy to do so. To varying degree. In other words, they are seen to be liars to varying degree. That is, inauthentic. Now you've caught up on how the American mind works in elections.
In the context of how the Get Trump Witch Hunt, ongoing since 2015, has affected eelections going forward: voters are now prone to see such unusual behavior from the opposition as a marker of candidate authenticity. Such is the nature of democracy poisoning actions.
In other words, if a candidate is not subjected to roughly equal treatment, then they will be widely seen as less authentic (more aligned with the opposing party than someone who is subject to it). This was obviously going to be the case going forward, beginning in 2016-17.
Which is a horrific situation for democracy.
To wit, in January 2024, Trump's RNC opposition have degraded themselves to appeals to the supposed fact that the opposition hates them less and therefore they will be more effective. They largely don't (at least effectively) sell themselves on authentic behavior. Possibly because they lack the actual conviction to sell it. Instead, they are essentially tacking toward inauthencity as their primary sales pitch. As a result, they don't stand a snowflake's chance if voters are the determining factor in a head to head primary.
Just like it is one that the 2019 riots were eight months of pre-election terrorism incited and protected by the party that now sits in the White House. And who is bent on making a four hour riot the center of attention instead. Funny that. We could do this all day.
Your narrative depends on a curated set of statements made in a very specific manner. To wit, it is a carefully crafted opinion.
You might not personally be willing to accept that your guy did that but it’s a matter of public record, and he notably had ample legal opportunity to produce evidence or question the state evidence in the many cases he lost. You aren’t entitled to personal facts because you find the real ones politically inconvenient. Many of the officials he railed against and the judges who found his claims unconvincing were Republicans, but they were also Americans who took their duties seriously and found against him.
Really? Show evidence of "pressure" that has any legal standing. Show me where it is illegal to use the language "find votes". Show me. Don't ignore me. Show me. Which is well within the boundary of English semantic use, that is common use in US elections, for prompting someone to assure that all of the votes are counted.
None of this intepretative bs is "public record" in your poor utilization of the concept, which attempts to imply that your narrative is factual.
This national scale partisan haggling of single word subjective language interpretation, resulting in prosecution of a President, is toxic in a manner that the Nation won't recover from. Especially when every word that every politician has ever said is eventually subjected to the same scrutiny. Or worse, when it isn't and this type of prosecutoriual scrutiny is only reserved for one side.
>try to avoid leaving office
When did they have to drag Trump out of the Oval? It is legal to contest an election. Your noisy bs doesn't substitute for argument.
>encourage their followers to commit acts of violence against government employees fulfilling their legal duties.
Show me where this happened, without resorting to having to paste your imaginative narrative onto it.
In contrast, we have lots of on-camera evidence of DNC politicians directly supporting mass-violent riots that went on for months prior to the election that installed "their guy". Subjecting the US populace to months of horrific terrorism during pandemic lockdowns. Getting away with excusing the ludicrous notion that lockdowns were necessary except when it comes to massive riots.
The single thing that DJT is guilty of is beating Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Which was made perfectly obvious by the media beginning in the 2015 election season, and since.
Especially considering the front-and-center involvement of Bush operatives in the national drama since 2016.
None of this nonsense has a degree of credibility.
It amounts to the uniparty and the media needing to distract from culpability for eight months of pre-election riots that they incited and covered for. Which resulted in the murders of almost thirty American citizens. Not after the fact strokes. But in-process murders.
It amounts to the uniparty and the media mandating that they dictate exactly which protests and protests turned riots, whether they go on for eight months or a few hours, are legitimate no matter what and which are not legitimate no matter what.
When they can do this, we do not have a democracy.
>ample legal opportunity to produce evidence or question the state evidence in the many cases he lost.
Lost what? He hasn't been convicted of anything. Your abuse of language does not constitute a point.
>You aren’t entitled to personal facts
There isn't a single aspect of the J6 narrative that doesn't rely on carefully crafting it around fact omission.
>Many of the officials he railed against and the judges who found his claims unconvincing were Republicans,
That a significant portion of the RNC is rabidly against Trump was made evident in 2015, and has been since. Many of GW Bush's advisors openly defected to support the DNC in response. Some went on to try to ruin democracy by advancing the false narrative that those supporting Trump were significantly comprised of Russians.
Again, the people engaged in this subversion are operatives closely tied to the man who lost the 2016 RNC primary to DJT.
Citing supposed party affiliation carries zero cache in this argument. The voters are permitted to elect whomever they wish, and any interference in that adminstration, or viciously authoritarian efforts to unseat or otherwise prosecute that candidate and his followers, is not buoyed whatsoever by party affiliation. It has to be valid only on its merits. If democracy is what you believe in.
>but they were also Americans who took their duties seriously and found against him.
"They were also Americans who took their duties seriously". Hyperbolic propaganda is your concluding remark? It is fitting to your general take, I suppose.
They are going to try to turn J6, an event over which they are prosecuting grandmothers who were let into the Capitol by the Police, into the new 9/11 mostly because they are terrified of being prosecuted for the actual terrorist riots in 2019. Until they are assured that this danger has passed, J6 will continue to be propagandized.
Though, the nasty authoritarian dichotomy will remain with Americans for generations. Just keep in mind that, according to Biden as the opposition President, American citizens have been sentenced collectively to over 800 years in prison over J6 and under his adminstration. Some have committed suicide. You have alphabet agencies deeply involved in American electoral politics now. You are very cavalier with this situation, considering.
It may have been easier, and healthier for democracy, to quietly allow DJT his adminstration and thus to instead support democratic norms. Instead of getting into bed with the people with whom the conservative voter base had more experience in leadership than you, and elected DJT in order to get away from.
For individual news shows I think the best are 60 Minutes and Frontline.
“He says, you're not going a dictator, are you? I said, no, no, no. Other than day one. We're closing the border, and we're drilling, drilling, drilling. After that I'm not a dictator.”
He’s clearly turning back the “dictator” comment and using a metaphor to talk about things within his executive authority. Trump has the power to close the border. He also has the power to approve oil drilling permits. He then specifically says: “after that I’m not a dictator.”
The way CNN ran with this comment was unmistakably in bad faith.
Why do Trump fans pretend to care about democracy after Jan 6, just take the mask off. Everyone knows Trump and the cult do not care about democracy ;)