As everyone knows by now, President Trump has been totally “exonerated” for everything, ever, by a four-page letter from William Barr, the Attorney General whom he appointed expressly to “exonerate” him. With regard to potential obstruction-of-justice, on page three of his letter, Barr cited Special Counsel Mueller’s statement that “while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”
Understandably, Trump’s allies and surrogates are ecstatic that Trump has been so unequivocally and unconditionally exonerated by a letter about a report that “does not exonerate him.” But the gloating does not stop there. A contingent of “left” journalists and self-styled pundits are jumping in the self-congratulatory bandwagon.
The “leftist” critique of the Russia collusion story follows a certain “dialectical” logic: first, the lesser of two evils is the greater danger and therefore my foe and second, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Alleged journalist Glenn Greenwald presents an inarticulate version of this critique when he sputters hyperbole on Democracy Now. Greenwald magically transforms not establishing an actionable criminal case into not a shred of evidence.
Matt Taibbi gives a more nuanced performance in comparing Russiagate to the Bush administration’s lies about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction. Taibbi qualifies his hyperbole by noting the hundreds of thousands of deaths and trillions of dollars wasted as a result of the latter. “Unless Russiagate leads to a nuclear conflict, we’re unlikely to ever see that level of consequence.” But in terms of journalism?
As a purely journalistic failure, however, WMD was a pimple compared to Russiagate. The sheer scale of the errors and exaggerations this time around dwarfs the last mess. Worse, it’s led to most journalists accepting a radical change in mission. We’ve become sides-choosers, obliterating the concept of the press as an independent institution whose primary role is sorting fact and fiction.
What a load of bollocks. Are we now supposed to believe that up until the time of the Steele dossier, the corporate news media was “an independent institution whose primary role is sorting fact and fiction”? Fox? Breitbart? Daily Caller? Not to mention non-stop CNN and NYT coverage of Trump rallies, diners in rural Pennsylvania, personable neo-Nazis, Clinton emails and climate change…
In his comprehensive critique of journalistic failure, Taibbi mentioned Fox once and the Daily Caller twice — to note their coverage of Michael Cohen’s denial of having ever been in Prague. Throughout the whole affair, the vast right-wing propaganda Wurlitzer was presumably acting as “an independent institution whose primary role is sorting fact and fiction.” Thank you, Matt Taibbi for your bold refusal to choose sides!
Not that it matters, but the mainstream media framing of the Russia collusion story was orchestrated by the “victim” of the “witch hunt.” The Mueller investigation was initiated by the Trump-appointed Deputy Attorney General who wrote the memo to give Trump cover for firing James Comey. The soi-disant “left” critics of Russiagate have bought that framing and are now gloating that “their side” has won.
Greenwald I dismissed years ago with his “McCarthyism” bs. Taibbi’s rant is just horribly written, meandering through hundreds of thousands or words and concentrating on errors made by various media people while ignoring the accuracy of may others. And as you mention, the idea of comparing this to the Iraq War is beyond the pale.
Meanwhile, I am having a hard time understanding how the Dems somehow orchestrated this entire investigation despite not having any such power to do so.
The only way it makes sense is that trump wore them all down.
Honestly, I think there is no way it “makes sense.” Narrative conventions give us the illusion that somehow events have to “add up” to some coherent meaning. But we are deceived, reality is not fiction. The Democrats and the media have been given the hot dog and peanut concessions at the Colosseum. They can make speeches about how the gladiator combat and throwing Christians to the lions are unconscionable spectacles but at the end of the day they have to count their hot dog and peanut sales receipts. And so the circus continues.
The press deserves the Steno Sue award for parroting what Team Trump said. He is on the TV right now claiming the Mueller report “said no obstruction and no collusion”. After all the economy is doing better than it ever was so Herr Trump can do no wrong. Is he an idiot or does he just assume the rest of us are idiots?
“is he an idiot or does he just assume the rest of us are idiots?”
Those are not mutually exclusive options.
Sorry guys, the Dems got the actual Mueller report………and they are using it to extort from the Republican party, ACA especially, which is religion to them. Repubs got until April 2nd to give them what they want or they start leaking and will probably some of its red meat by the end of the week just as a shot across the bow. Mueller was never going to indict. If the districts and more importantly, the states want to go there, by his guest.
Mueller the Bush lackey wants the Bush’s back in control of the party. Trump who needs his con to move on, will have to concede some positions behind the scenes to Democrats to keep his power base. Either that or the Bush’s push for impeachment so they can run their lackey in 2020. The problem is, not enough Republicans are on board with the Bush’s. Why do you think Lindsey Graham is sucking Trump’s cock all of the sudden the last couple of months? Republicans are named in the bribery/extortion racket besides the Trump organization. Hence, come the fixer, William Barr. Mitch and Rand are 2 I know of, right now. Thus, Mitch is trying to suppress.
Democrats will sell out the country for ACA.
The truth hurts doesn’t it. The Avenatti fraud was interviewed in CNN and MSDNC over 200 times while far more important problems were completely ignored. Some of us have big enough brains that we can comprehend that the legacy media AND Faux & Brietbart both represent the enemy, which is the oligarchy that owns us all. Alas, most are not.
merde
Bert and Karl are two of Trump’s troll. Their comments here are utter BS but then that is their job.
PGL:
In many cases, we are an equal commenter board. Barkley has one himself. They can get me to react; but, they have not cross the line today. I do read their comments too.
Honestly people say the darndest things when they get their political gander up. This whole dang mess is so stinky that every dammed horsefly in the circus showed up, and then every clown went and vomited up their half digested onions. sigh.
the told you so’s are terrifically annoying and predictable. but then a population isn’t an individual. opinions diverge, but no one credits it.
The Movie Sucked, I think I will get the book.