Bomb threat Boston Globe after editorial condemning trump

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Donald J. Trump
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There is nothing that I would want more for our Country than true FREEDOM OF THE PRESS. The fact is that the Press is FREE to write and say anything it wants, but much of what it says is FAKE NEWS, pushing a political agenda or just plain trying to hurt people. HONESTY WINS!

Bomb threat made at Boston Globe after editorial condemning Trump
BY JUSTIN WISE - 08/16/18 05:17 PM EDT 1,344

A bomb threat was reported at The Boston Globe on Thursday, the same day the newspaper spearheaded a campaign to publish coordinated editorials at multiple papers condemning President Trump's attacks against the press.

Officials from the Boston police told Boston 7 News that they do not believe the threat was "super serious" but that they have increased patrols around the building.

The station noted that the FBI is conducting an investigation.

A building manager at the Globe's headquarters said the paper received "several threats via phone call" on Thursday, according to an email obtained by Axios.

"Based on this threat the local and federal authorities have recommended some additional security measures for the property," the email read, according to the report. "For the remainder of the day you will see uniformed Boston Police officers in the lobby and around the property."
A spokesperson for The Globe confirmed the development to Axios, adding "that alarming turn of the president’s rhetoric — the specific labeling of the press as an 'enemy of the American people' and the opposition party — does cause us concern about media outlets and the stories we have heard around the country."

"Journalistic outlets have had threats throughout time but it’s the president’s rhetoric that gives us the most concern," the spokesperson said.

The threat comes as hundreds of newspapers around the country published editorials denouncing the president's frequent attacks against the media.

“To label the press ‘the enemy of the people’ is as un-American as it is dangerous to the civic compact we have shared for more than two centuries," the Globe wrote in its editorial.

Trump responded to the coordinated editorials by accusing the Globe of "collusion with other papers."

In a later tweet, the president said "there is nothing I would want more for our Country than true freedom of the press," before asserting that the media regularly pushes political agendas.
http://thehill.com/homenews/media/40223 ... ning-trump

[JackRiddler]

Babies in cages were no ‘mistake’ by Trump but test-marketing for barbarism

Correct. And so is this talk of the press as "the enemy of the people." It's probably already brought death. (I'm thinking of the Annapolis case, which has disappeared.)

[82_28]

Babies in cages were no ‘mistake’ by Trump but test-marketing for barbarism

Correct. And so is this talk of the press as "the enemy of the people." It's probably already brought death. (I'm thinking of the Annapolis case, which has disappeared.)

Both good points. It has been causing me to ask myself what am I doing about it? Life has gone on while greatly worrying me on a minute to minute basis, but I don't know what to do. Definitely a test run and I have felt that about this "governance" for a couple decades. Perhaps we are nearing the point where they finally turn the stove to high to at long last bring shit to a boil. But I don't know. I was across the street from The Stranger's offices the other day and saw some of the writers and staff come out for lunch or some shit. I really wondered how long that will last. It gives me the chills that I just wrote that. I guess it will just come down to what it comes down to.

I have long said, like I'm an expert or anything, but sorta am dealing with skins as a "punk" as a kid, there is no stopping this bullshit. It has to run its course. But this time the inciter is the president. Previous GOP dicks never totally incited.

[JackRiddler]

And it's also always more complicated than one thinks. Since this all is also true:

- www.counterpunch.org -

The Trump-Media Logrolling

By Sam Husseini

August 16, 2018

Today, hundreds of newspapers, at the initiative of the Boston Globe, are purporting to stand up for a free press against Trump’s rhetoric.

Today also marks exactly one month since I was dragged out of the July 16 Trump-Putin news conference in Helsinki and locked up until the middle of the night.

As I laid in my cell, I chuckled at the notion that the city was full of billboards proclaiming Finland was the “land of free press“.

So, I’ve grown an especially high sensitivity to both goonish behavior toward journalists trying to ask tough questions — and to those professing they are defending a free press when they are actually engaging in a marketing exercise.

As some have noted, the editorials today will likely help Trump whip up support among his base against a monolithic media. But, just as clearly, the establishment media can draw attention away from their own failures, corruptions and falsehoods simply by focusing on Trump’s.

Big media outlets need not actually report news that affects your life and point to serious solutions for social ills. They can just bad mouth Trump. And Trump need not deliver on campaign promises that tapped into populist and isolationist tendencies in the U.S. public that have grown in reaction to years of elite rule. He need only deride the major media.

They are at worst frenemies. More likely, at times, Trump and the establishment media log roll with each other. The major media built up Trump. Trump’s attacks effectively elevate a select few media celebrities.

My case is a small but telling one. Major media outlets were more likely to disinform about the manhandling I received in my attempt to ask about U.S., Russian and Israeli nuclear threats to humanity — I’ll soon give a detailed rebuttal to the torrent of falsehoods, some of which I’ve already noted on social media — than to crusade against it.

Other obvious cases: None of the newspaper editorials I’ve seen published today mention the likely prosecution of Wikileaks. If there were solidarity among media, the prospect of Julian Assange being imprisoned for publishing U.S. government documents should be front and center today.

Neither did I see a mention of RT or, as of this week, Al Jazeera, being compelled to register as foreign agents. State Department Spokesperson Heather Nauert has openly refused to take questions from reporters working for Russian outlets. Virtual silence — in part because Russia is widely depicted as the great enemy, letting U.S. government policy around the world off the hook.

The above are actual policies that the Trump administration has pursued targeting media — not rhetoric that dominates so much establishment coverage of Trump.

Then there’s the threat of social media.

My day job is with the Institute for Public Accuracy. Yesterday, I put out a news release titled “Following Assassination Attempt, Facebook Pulled Venezuela Content.” Tech giants can decide — possibly in coordination with the U.S. government — to pull the plug on content at a time and manner of their choosing.

You would think newspaper people might be keen to highlight the threat that such massive corporations thus pose, not least of all because they have eaten up their ad revenue.

The sad truth is that this is what much of the media have long done: Counter to the lofty rhetoric of many of today’s editorials, the promise of an independent and truth-seeking press has frequently been subservient to propaganda, pushing for war or narrow economic and other interests.

The other major story of the day — quite related to this — is that of Trump pulling former CIA Director John Brennan’s security clearance. NPR tells me this is an attempt to “silence a critic”. But Brennan has an op-ed in today’s New York Times and is frequently on major media. He oversaw criminal policies during the Obama administration, including drone assassinations. If anything, this has elevated Brennan’s major media status.

Those who have been truly silenced in the “Trump era” are those who were critical of the seemingly perpetual U.S. government war machine since the invasion of Iraq.

Trump attacks on the establishment media — like many media attacks on him — are frequently devoid of substance. But recently one of his rhetorically tweets stated that media “cause wars“. I would say “push for war”, but that’s quibbling.

Trump is technically right on that point, but it’s totally disingenuous coming from him. He’s actually been the beneficiary of the media compulsion he claims to deride. When he exalts U.S. bombing strikes in Yemen, Syria and elsewhere, CNN calls him “presidential“.

Many consider “Russiagate” critical to scrutinizing the Trump administration, but the two reporters, apparently picked by the White House, during the Helsinki news conference focused on “Russiagate” — which eventually led to Brennan and others attacking Trump as “treasonous”. Meanwhile, much more meaningful collusion that can be termed Israelgate is being ignored as the U.S. and Israeli governments attempt to further mold the Mideast.

The need for genuinely free sources of information is greater than ever. It is unclear to me if traditional newspapers can be part of the equation. Quite likely, the institutions desperately needed to carry out that critical mission are yet to be born.



Article printed from www.counterpunch.org: https://www.counterpunch.org

URL to article: https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/08/16 ... ogrolling/

[82_28]

The Stranger, since I brought them up, did publish this yesterday on the Jack tip here. I still worry about them though. But I worry about everything anyway.

Three Hundred Papers Circle Jerk to Their Own Image

The big news in media land today is that 300 newspapers across the U.S. ran editorials calling Donald Trump out for shit-talking the press—or, more specifically, for calling the media "fake news," "the enemy of the people," etc etc etc.

The move was coordinated by the Boston Globe. Here's an excerpt from the letter in the Globe:

The greatness of America is dependent on the role of a free press to speak the truth to the powerful. To label the press ‘the enemy of the people’ is as un-American as it is dangerous to the civic compact we have shared for more than two centuries.

And from the New York Times:

Insisting that truths you don't like are 'fake news' is dangerous to the lifeblood of democracy. And calling journalists the 'enemy of the people' is dangerous, period.

The Atlantic:

The president’s rhetoric doesn’t merely spread division and distrust; it is dangerous, and sick. Like all Americans, he has a right to critique the press. But he is also sworn to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution—and this is what he must do.

And, my personal favorite, North Dakota's Tioga Tribune (emphasis mine):

A recent Ipsos survey shows an overwhelming number of people—85 percent—believe 'freedom of the press is essential for American Democracy,' but the same survey illuminates a growing belief among some that the government should be able to silence 'bad' media. But who gets to decide which media is 'bad'? Your guy may be in office now, but what if your side was in the minority? Would you want the party in power to have the right to silence all dissension?

It's a good point! The idea that government should be able to "silence" bad media is truly terrifying, reminiscent of nations more authoritarian than this and/or the 1950s. But here's the thing: While every reporter and editorial board member in this country may get cold sweats at the idea that of the government shutting down "bad" media, when it comes to the private sector, it does seem a little rich that we—members of the media—are literally begging companies to do the very same thing. Look at Twitter, where (literally) every day, people working in media lambaste CEO Jack Dorsey for failing to kick loathsome people like Alex Jones (or even the President of the United States) off the platform. And it works: Twitter, following Apple, Facebook, and YouTube, finally suspended Jones this week.

Of course, private enterprise is not the government and outside of violating anti-discrimination laws, companies have every right to decide who can or cannot use their service. "No shirt, no shoes, no problematic opinions" is how the old slogan goes, right? But social media platforms are not unilaterally opting to kick Alex Jones off because he's a libelous asshole; they're banning him for "hate speech," a nebulous standard that changes depending on who is employing it.

In this case, it's hard to argue that Alex Jones getting a smaller microphone is a bad thing, but this will not end with him. "Hate speech," however you define it, is protected by the First Amendment, but which is exactly why the ACLU continues to defend it. In places where hate speech isn't protected—for instance, Europe—hate speech laws are used to not just silence bigots but to hush political dissent. In France, for instance, the nation's highest court upheld the convictions of 12 Palestinian activists who protested Israeli occupation by wearing shirts that said, “Long live Palestine, boycott Israel." The shirts, the court ruled, were anti-Semitic. If the U.S. had hate speech statutes, it's certainly not hard to imagine the Republican-held Congress, White House, and Supreme Court ruling that Black Lives Matter t-shirts constitute anti-white hate speech. Most of us are not willing to take that risk with the government, and yet we are begging social media platforms to police our speech for us.

Like the Tiago Tribune wrote, "Who gets to decide which media is 'bad'"? Clearly, it should not be Donald Trump, but should it be Mark Zuckerberg or Jack Dorsey or people on Twitter screaming for The Atlantic to fire Kevin Williamson because they disagree with his position on abortion instead? Or should it be people screaming at the New York Times for hiring Quinn Norton or Sarah Jeong, both of whom are guilty of posting bad tweets? Jeong, who, over the course of about three years, tweeted anti-white rhetoric many, many times, kept her job at the Times despite conservative Twitter mobs trying to get her fired, but Williamson and Norton weren't so lucky: The Atlantic and the Times bowed to social pressure and both writers quickly found themselves out of work. Sure, call out Donald Trump for his damn-the-press rhetoric, but it would take a much stronger backbone for 300 papers to write editorials on why they will no longer bow down to social media mobs that come howling for controversial writers' heads.

There's another problem with this nationwide editorial: If the goal is to either send a message to Trump (lol) or to his supporters, it ain't gonna work. The editorials were penned by editorial board staffers, not reporters, but most Americans don't know the difference. If anything, this stunt will reinforce the idea that the media is biased against Trump. And it is! Because Donald Trump is a threat to national and global stability and very few media figures outside Fox News and Breitbart are too blind to see it. That doesn't mean reporters don't cover him fairly—most do—but this editorial will be taken by Trump fans as further evidence that the media is out to get him. In reality, the reason Trump's press coverage is so poor is because it's simply a reflection of his performance, but these editorials do nothing to convince Trump supporters that the problem isn't us, it's him.

Of course, it's also possible the goal of this editorial isn't to change hearts and minds but to capitalize on the hearts and minds that have already been won. And if that's the goal, fine. The newspaper business isn't exactly profitable; sometimes, you've gotta fire up those subscribers any way you can.

https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2018/0 ... -own-image