President Trump slammed the media as hateful Thursday morning, after a night of broadcasts dedicated to blaming the President for the crude pipe bombs sent to leading Democratic figures.
Trump blamed “purposely false and inaccurate reporting” for a swell of “anger” in today’s society.
A very big part of the Anger we see today in our society is caused by the purposely false and inaccurate reporting of the Mainstream Media that I refer to as Fake News. It has gotten so bad and hateful that it is beyond description. Mainstream Media must clean up its act, FAST!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 25, 2018
Trump’s comments follow similar sentiments he expressed at a Thursday night rally, where he called on the media “to set a civil tone and to stop the endless hostility and constant negative and oftentimes false attacks and stories.”
Chief among those to point fingers at Trump over the packages was CNN’s Anderson Cooper, who argued that Trump does not see the targets of the attacks as human beings.
“He made no mention of an explosive device sent to this building behind me. The headquarters of CNN. A news organization he routinely attacks. He calls reporters the enemy of the American people. And, yet, he said it’s the media’s fault for the kind of reporting that media organizations have been doing.” Cooper snided.
“He also made what appears to be a first attempt at something familiar, putting the perpetrator and victim on equal footing,” Cooper continued.
“He gave no names, nothing to indicate he sees them as individual human beings and distinguished former public servants.” Cooper exclaimed later in the broadcast.
In a further display of indignation toward Trump, CNN Newsroom’s panel spewed vitriol toward Trump and blamed him for the pipe bombs.
Former Obama official Carrie Cordero said Trump’s comments were “the absolute bare minimum that the American people could expect from the President to say given the circumstances”
Political analyst David Gregory, host Brianna Keilar and chief political analyst Gloria Borger were all annoyed that Trump didn’t mention CNN by name.
“I just wish he could have said some other things in the context of CNN being targeted here as well, in the context of so much animus that he himself has against CNN and other news outlets to make a point about the fact that violence directed toward the news media is unacceptable.” Gregory said.
“Nobody’s mentioning the name” Borger said, adding “[i]t’s as if it can’t roll off the tongue unless you’re complaining about it and you know, I’m sorry about that, I’m very sorry about that.”
Borger then explicitly tried to blame Trump for the devices, arguing that his criticism of people like George Soros, Eric Holder, and Hillary Clinton is the direct cause.
“He’s funding everything according to conspiracy theorists and these are names, as you point out, that come up all the time in his rallies. I mean, he’s not particularly kind to Barack Obama either. I think it would have behooved him to be a little bit more complete.” Borger said.
“These are people who are dialed in to what the dialogue is and who the targets are, rhetorically targets, of political figures from Maxine Waters to Obama to Holder to Clinton and on and on.” Gregory added.
CNN President Jeff Zucker also weighed in on the situation, releasing a statement urging that Trump and Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders should consider the “seriousness of their continued attacks on the media.”
Statement from CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker: pic.twitter.com/OXyIT6oSLT
— CNN Communications (@CNNPR) October 24, 2018
Over at NBC Nightly News, anchor Lester Holt described Zucker’s statement as “blasting the White House and the President,” while chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell declared that Trump had delivered “another fiery speech attacking his favorite targets, Democrats” this week and was “[g]oing after Hillary Clinton and the media, especially CNN.”
“While there are no answers yet on what led to today’s incidents, President Trump has the biggest megaphone,” Mitchell stated, adding “there are growing questions about how he’s using it.”
Over at MSNBC, Hillary Clinton aide Philippe Reines was wheeled out to firmly lay the blame on Trump.
“If you look at who they’ve targeted so far, it’s almost like they’re following Donald Trump’s Twitter feed,” he said. “You have to be really concerned that while everything so far has not hurt anyone, that might not hold.”
“I think you have to ask how much Donald Trump is responsible for the climate that we’re in where things like this happen,” Reines added.
Picking up this morning where the evening broadcasts left off, Morning Joe’s Mika Brzezinski urged that the incidents are a “reflection of [Trump’s] rhetoric.”
She then argued that “it’s no longer OK” to support Trump.
“And note to Republicans, this is something you can’t let go by anymore. You can’t. Our country is at risk. We have been attacked. It’s no longer okay to say I don’t like his tweets but — it’s no longer to say I don’t like his bullying, but — it’s no longer okay to say I don’t really support that, but. It’s no longer okay to say nothing, It’s no questions, to not speak out when it is very we have dangerous rhetoric resonating from the White House every day.” Brzezinski said.
Presumably it is still OK to harass conservatives in public and at their homes though, and issue death threats, which has been going on for months with zero leftist media coverage.
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