It hasn't been since 2008.

I wonder what that story would have looked like if he was dropping a deuce when it broke instead?

That's actually what he should be doing. This bit of presidents watching and communicating real time with the mission team is absurd. If I'm running a special op, the last thing I want is Washington on the horn trying to micromanage me.

Along that line:

https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/4...-into-2020

"The journalism industry has much in common with the NFL’s Cincinnati Bengals. Both had horrendous seasons in 2019 and have disintegrating fan bases. The Bengals, fortunately, get a No. 1 draft pick for their futility. The news media get no such reward for ineffectiveness. The journalism world just keeps digging a deeper credibility hole, seemingly unable to generate the professionalism that citizens demand and the nation surely needs....

Frantic, misguided coverage of the Covington Catholic students in the nation’s capital last winter was a terrible way to start the media year. That was quickly followed by more media frenzy covering the ridiculous Jussie Smollett situation which, amazingly, was taken seriously and garnered much more space on the news agenda than was warranted....

They are the kinds of blunders created when journalistic culture breaks away from the culture of its audience. Careless and needless mistakes happen when accountability and accuracy are devalued in favor of pushing ideological high-horses or generating shrill headlines to get clicks and ratings.

Objectivity, proportion and fairness are valued by news consumers. Citizens can sort out for themselves what to make of the information they receive from the media. They don’t want to be worked — or lectured to — by a news industry that increasingly mixes reporting with agenda-pushing. Socio-political analyst G.K. Chesterton warned the public 100 years ago that journalists think they are smarter than the public for whom they report, which eventually leads to journalism becoming “barbaric and unintelligible."

A Rasmussen Reports survey this fall found that almost two-thirds of Americans are “angry at the media.” An Economist/YouGov poll reported by Ballotpedia indicates that 41 percent of Americans consider the media either unfriendly to or an enemy of the American people...."

(01-04-2020 09:56 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  That's actually what he should be doing. This bit of presidents watching and communicating real time with the mission team is absurd. If I'm running a special op, the last thing I want is Washington on the horn trying to micromanage me.

Agreed.

You need people who actually know what they are doing and close to the situation doing it.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2...ter-092771

Humorous piece. They don't intend to be, but they draw all the wrong conclusions. They are studying misstatements and how people react to factual corrections. They note that its harder to convince people something President Trump said is wrong when presented with a correction than if Sen. McConnell said it. Its a reflection on the lack credibility of the "fact-checkers," especially regarding President Trump.

They think they need to double down on "fact-checking."

This all started when they got rid of Van Earl Wright.

I think the period of time where honest media coverage that was well researched and fact checked was actually an anomaly. With a reliable budget based on subscriptions and ad revenue, papers and TV could afford to the editors and staff needed for credible reporting. Such investment was proven to be a profitable to grow. But the advent of the internet has resulted in a 30 year erosion of those financial streams, have led to the return of the Hearst era of news media. The sensationalism of today is no different than the muckraking, yellow journalism that is the true foundation of the 4th estate.