I occasionally write about national issues and this blog is one of those. As people demonstrate in the streets of seven major cities tonight (11/9/2016) shutting down traffic (Portland , OR) or wreaking havoc (Oakland, CA) at the expense of small businesses and fueled by Black Lives Matter and other anti-Trump movements the talking heads’ post mortems have begun on not only why Trump won but why MSM did not see it coming.

 I felt compelled to comment after reading this tweet today: “Resonating comment from Peter Thiel: the media took Trump literally and not seriously while voters took him seriously and not literally.” I’m sorry. This statement is too simplistic and is but just one of the current rationales that popped up today, giving Main stream media (MSM) a pass for their actions during this election cycle. MSM still doesn’t get it. Who is MSM? It’s ABC, NBC, CNN, ad nausea and every major city’s newspaper.

I am a “deplorable” – a well-educated, middle class, senior, white woman. All of my life I valued MSM. I can remember every Sunday, after Mass, my parents would get the Sunday edition of the New York Times. We all divvied it up and would devour it. I cut my teeth on their word puzzles. News on TV consisted of objective reporting by the likes of Walter Cronkite and investigative reporting by the Morley Safers of the journalistic world.

Whether it is TV or print they have failed all of us (Republicans, Democrats, Independents, etc.) and I will not buy their theory that they failed to recognize the movement to which Trump has given a voice. MSM became corrupt as its members sought even greater recognition, fame, power and wealth. They salivated to be part of the “inner circle” – to be movers and shakers. They insulated themselves from the very people who relied upon their reputation for fair and unbiased reporting. They were not co-opted. They deliberately chose their path.

They believed to their very core that if they hitched their star to the Clinton campaign it would further their personal agendas. So, they corrupted themselves, through collusion by feeding Clinton debate questions, by submitting their reporting to the Clinton campaign for editing, by pushing a negative Trump narrative daily at the rate of 10 negative Trump stories to every 1 negative Clinton story. MSM deliberately and willfully ignored the consequences of Benghazi, Clinton’s failure to preserve our national security with her personal email server and the Clinton Foundation’s pay-to-play schemes. It willingly became a propaganda arm of the Clinton campaign.

Gone is fair and unbiased reporting and it has done a major disservice, especially to the younger generation. Gone is hard news. It has been replaced with drivel designed to placate and divert. Now the masses are fed the crime of the day, recipe of the day, new decorating ideas for your home…yada, yada, yada…all pablum, no substance, no facts, no hard news about our economy, the world we live in or anything else of real value. MSM has played a major role in giving birth to a generation that accepts no responsibility for anything and who wishes to be wrapped in a cocoon of emotional thinking whose only reality is to pursue the illusion of happiness and “safe spaces.”

In the past year and a half, first I stopped watching ABC, CNN, etc. Then I stopped watching cable stations, even FOX. Lastly I stopped reading the newspaper. I still get plenty of good, solid news from other sources like the BBC. I suspect I am not alone. Viewership and readership are diminishing daily. MSM is no longer relevant to half the country – the half of the country that they perceived to be stupid and ignorant – not of their ilk.

© Joyce Clark, 2016        

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