A Quote by Charlie Sykes
Some people ask how the conservative media can continue to defend Trump. It's very easy for them: No matter how bad Trump is, the mainstream media and the Left will always be worse, you know? Don't expect Rush Limbaugh to turn on him.
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How the media covers [Donald] Trump-Hillary [Clinton]? Who knows yet how it's gonna manifest itself, but I guarantee you a lot of people are thinking - and I made the prediction. Well, it's not a prediction, but I said, folks, it's entirely possible that the media will continue to be sort of hands off on [Donald] Trump.
Trump walked into a media setting for which he was far better suited than the other contenders because he actually knows how to do reality TV and made them all look like pretenders. And I would argue that our news media has only gotten worse since Trump got in office. Trump is media crack. The ratings have never been higher. The reason CNN would run an hour of an empty podium waiting for him to show up during the campaign is because they were terrified if they turned away from Trump their rating would go down.
I don't think the rhetoric toward President Trump from media sources or media commentators is any worse than what Franklin Roosevelt got from a conservative press in another era. And Roosevelt was, you know, not as blunt as Trump about the press, but, you know, there was an ideological press back then, when we had multiple newspapers in town.
The media are used to being able to control the agenda of both their friends and their enemies, their buddies and their opponents, and Trump doesn't play by their rules because Trump is not afraid of them. And Trump knows that he doesn't need them. That's the big equalizer. Unlike most Republicans who think they can't get anywhere without at least some favorable treatment in the media or at least less criticism from the media, Trump doesn't need the media. He's got his Twitter account and he's got his rallies.
Trump knows how to play the media all on his own. He creates his own Twitter feed and uses it. He knows how to get the media's attention without the benefit of a state-controlled media. He does it all on his own. Trump understands how a free media works.
Trump base is solid, and there's nothing the media can do to break it. There's not a single thing they can do. They are never gonna give that up, either. They are doing everything they can to split up Trump supporters from Trump. Only Trump can do that. The media didn't make Trump and, as I repeatedly say, they can't bust him.
Trump needs the media to act the way they do so he can dunk on them and look good by comparison. The media are enjoying the short-term rush of their war with Trump, wearing his abuse as a badge of honor among their peers.
[Donald Trump] said, "Maybe the Russians could find those [Hillary Clinton's] emails - and if the Russians find 'em, please give them to the media." Well, I don't know how you get there from here, but the media then reported that Trump was encouraging the Russians to hack the Hillary campaign and produce the evidence to the media.
The story is whether or not the villains, in the eyes of the media, will win or can be stopped. But when you change the dynamic and make it [Donald] Trump versus Hillary [Clinton]? Well, we already know the media has already once gotten caught up and captured and totally engrossed in the Trump story 'cause they don't know how it's gonna end day to day.
I'm getting a little fed up with some of the pessimism that I'm hearing. I know some people who will not be convinced we've really won anything until the media changes. And that isn't gonna happen. They look at the media not liking Trump and they think it's failure. They look at the media ripping Trump and destroying him and they think it's gonna work and it means failure. And I get so fed up. I said, "Do you people not understand we're on the cusp here of one of the most exciting next four years?" The growth potential, the potential of putting America back together.
Donald Trump's fought, quite frankly, the entire mainstream media, who is always, you know, who's always counted him out, never thought he could do this, who's always put him down.
I was on television a couple of years ago and the reporter asked me, "How does it feel being on mainstream media? It's not often poets get on mainstream media." I said, "Well I think you're the dominant media, the dominant culture, but you're not the mainstream media. The mainstream media is still the high culture of intellectuals: writers, readers, editors, librarians, professors, artists, art critics, poets, novelists, and people who think. They are the mainstream culture, even though you may be the dominant culture."
The media has been trying to undermine Donald Trump from the moment he got into the race, and he has triumphed over them at every turn - and they can't stand that, either. And they've realized they alone don't have the power to get rid of Trump. So now it's join forces with the deep state, the sabotage going on with the Obama army that is working in quiet and invisibility within the shadow government, if you will. And even that is not distancing Trump's supporters from him. They know full well what's happening, and they're infuriated by it, and they're furious.
There may be some who wish that he would have taken the occasion to first comment on the Brexit vote, but they're not going to abandon him. They're not gonna let the media do it. Romney people? The media could separate his supporters from him, but they can't from Trump. They don't understand this yet. They think one of these times when they do a trick like this it's gonna work and they're gonna be able to really harm [Donald] Trump.
The conservative media ecosystem - like the rest of us - has to recognize how critical, but also how fragile, credibility is in the Orwellian age of Donald Trump.
Trump doesn't need to spend a dime to get his message out. Trump doesn't have to run an ad. Trump doesn't have to run a series. He doesn't have to pay people to show up. He doesn't have to buy TV advertising, because he gets more coverage than the combined advertising the rest of the Republicans could buy. And aside from the overwhelming, significant upset that is, the very fact of all that ticks them off. Donald Trump has direct access to his supporters. And you know who gives it to him? The media.
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