Why has the WaPo story about Trump's meeting with fossil fuel executives (Trump essentially said give me $1 billion and I'll support policies that benefit your companies) not been discussed more extensively by the media? Is the media just unable capacity-wise to cover important stories such as this?
I agree with the new focus of your newsletter. Thank you!
With respect to "flagging" the Alito matter: What is truly concerning is not that he throws his wife under the bus but, as The Daily’s Michael Barbaro observed, “Crucially, Alito doesn’t deny the flag was flying upside down, doesn’t deny its meaning, doesn’t express any disapproval for it and doesn’t disavow it.”
In addition, he lied in attempting to justify his actions to Fox News, by saying the argument supposedly had something to do with a "Fuck Trump" sign close to a school bus stop. (Though how flying the flag upside would protect children from obscene language isn't explained.) However, "deputy chief of staff for Representative Don Beyer (D-VA), who represents the town in which the Alitos live, noted that the local schools were all remote in January 2021 because of the pandemic." “No children were waiting for buses,” he noted on X.
Judge Alito needs to immediately resign. There is nothing more vile than to breath, eat, and live off your salary provided by the United States Government, and then defile and disparage the flag that represents your employer. Elizabeth
Your decision to focus your newsletter on the ‘stakes’ over the “odds” is exactly right.
You asked what your readers were doing. For me, it’s building a digital library of the crimes against democracy in the Trump era. In beta for about six months, the library has been primarily used by law enforcement and a few journalists to uncover relationships between people who played important roles in the fake elector schemes and the 2021 fraudulent “audit” in Maricopa County,AZ.
One article from the Arizona Republic won first prize for “Explanatory Writing” in the 2024 Best of the West journalism contest. The winning article showed how the leader of the Cyber Ninjas simply made up the numbers in their final report.
Soon, we will be making this repository available to journalists, law enforcement and researchers free of charge.
I try to do my part. I'm on the local Citizens Advisory Committee to inform town management of issues of concern to citizens, I'm on the Democratic committee for my town and today am starting to put up signs around town for our Democratic candidates, I donate to democratic candidates across the country and talk extensively to friends and neighbors, but I don't know any republicans and have lost one friend to MAGA and any talking to him or his wife is a complete waste of time.
With respect Margaret, while I’ll credit Jodi Kantor for the story about Alito’s treasonous behavior, your former employer gets almost no credit from me, becauser they delayed the story three years.
That’s just one example of the ongoing and perpetual failures today at the NY Times.
The clear anti-Biden bias of the NY Times, along with the severe hubris of far too many Times staffers - especially on stories about domestic U.S. polutical reporting - has destroyed my trust in them, as a news org.
If I had the power, I’d take both a literal a metaphorical flamethrower to much of the NYTimes today, and replace every last person with people willing to fight at the cost of their careers to put stakes above odds. Don’t even get me started on Arthur. Further proof inheriting power is a bad idea.
I’ll second your kudos for Mark Jacob & Ruth Ben-Ghiat. I’ll also add Michael Tomasky to that list of kudos, even though there’s much produced at the New Republic these days I disagree with. He’s revived that publication, and he’s often pushing the envelope these days - which, FWIW, is what I expected of him.
As for what I’m doing to push the media to do things correctly? The same as I have for years - working both in the media and outside of it to push our colleagues to do better, and to bring to the top the best news & information for anyone who wants it.
It’s self-serving to mention that I’m the Executive Producer/Showrunner of “The Randi Rhodes Show,” and that we have a weekday newsletter here on Substack that features the too news of the day we talk about on our weekday TV & radio show. But I’m proud of the work we do, and how we make sure the framing of the news is treated as it should be, putting stakes over odds.
I’ll also note that yes - I do contact editors, producers, and occasionally executives in media in ways that have resulted in discipline for some in our industry.
So, yes - carrots & sticks.
Appreciate your work in this vein, Margaret. May all such efforts help to push the world towards freedom & democracy, and away from fascism & authoritarianism, in such a way that maybe, someday, we can once again expect all media orgs & journalists to fight for stakes above odds at all times.
You imply, without evidence, that the Times intentionally sat on the story for three years. As the story said, the Times only recently obtained photographic proof. As a former longtime editor myself, without that proof I would have been extremely reluctant to publish that story, too.
Ah, yes - attack me for pointing out what you’d rather hand wave away. Always a winning strategy, Lex.
For the record, I’ve got 30 years in professiobal media as well, most of it as an executive producer, assistant exec. producer, and showrunner of national political TV & radio news-based programs. So your CV doesn’t impress me Lex.
Given your CV, and likely knowledge of the news industry, you’re also likely aware that had the NYTimes put the force of their efforts behind it, it’s likely they’d have had those images long ago.
That they didn’t only further proves my points about them.
A good editor wouldn’t have sat on that story for three years. They would have pushed to get the images. Given that some of Alito’s neighbors appear to be at odds with him, and the influence of the NYTimes, it’s hard to believe - had they truly pushed - that they wpuldn’t have had the images sooner.
But, hey. You do you, Lex. Go on believing whatever bull the NYTimes is willing to feed you.
I’d have thought a long time editor would have more skepticism, even about the NYTimes, but clearly not in this case.
Son, I don't want to wave away anything, but if one of my reporters had assumed half as much on a story as you're assuming here, I'd've fired them as a serious libel risk. The Times has an incredible list of problems, but based solely on the information right here in front of our faces, this story isn't one of them.
Excellent decision to focus on the real information and consequences rather than the stories where that DOESN'T happen, Margaret!
As for what I'm doing...I donate monthly to Biden's campaign, I'm going to work at my local polling place counting ballots in November, I lobby my members of Congress, and I've called a left-leaning regional news org and my local newspaper to ask them to cover Project 2025. (Imagine my horror when neither of the executive news editors I spoke with had heard of Project 2025! I'm still reeling.) I don't think they're going to cover it, so I'm going to research and write one story myself and see if I can figure out some way to disseminate it. In 2016 I wrote a carefully-neutral voter's guide with local resources and a theme of "one vote can decide an election." Half of the businesses I approached in my very blue town said they couldn't put the guide out because people would complain it was "too political" (sigh)....but I'm going to try to distribute it again this year.
Have you connected with Blue Voter Guide? Their team members develop the information for the down ballot like you have. Then anyone can type in an address for a Blue Voter Guide specific to that location and which can be easily shared:
Hi, Margaret—Your refocus on 2024 is much appreciated. What I’ve been doing for several years, however, is working with others to eliminate the numerous, highly damaging effects caused by the Electoral College. Making Every Vote Count (MEVC), a tax exempt organization, has taken a leading role in this effort. While we realize this is a long-term project, perhaps requiring a Constitutional amendment, MEVC also recently contributed to the successful legislative improvement of the Electoral Count Act after the January 6 riot. It’s vital that the country not lose sight of the need for structural changes to our broken election system while we simultaneously focus on the 2024 election. Regardless of who wins the presidency this year, the strains on the presidential electoral process will be at least as extreme as they have ever been, and indeed the opportunity for taking action to relieve them may be swiftly approaching. MEVC is seeking to support and succeed in that effort.
Anything you can do Margaret to get the media and the public to focus more on judicial appointments & elections, as well as judicial ethics and judicial decisions that hit a range of decisions related to democracy and the rule of law, is key to your new mission. Indeed, these issues have been largely ignored and little understood by most in the media during my lifetime. I first saw this media gap close and up-front as a media source during the Clarence Thomas hearings. The consequences of this institutional neglect and oversight to our democracy have been devastating and only gotten worse ever since. Unfortunately we can no longer rely on Congress to protect our democracy. In today’s world, we’re going to have to rely much more on the Supreme Court and our judiciary, along with the Executive branch, to lead and chart a new democratic path. We know from experience that these institutions won’t and can’t effect real change without strong public support that emanates from a bright focused media spotlight. We must publicly acknowledge that our venerable but flawed Constitution and our democratic institutions need to be updated and reformed in the 21st century. It will take a public village and a focused media to make this happen. Fingers crossed!
I appreciate what you're doing and I like "the stakes not the odds." My own work is supporting local government and local public officials with interviews, writing and events.
I'd like to see major media run some stories featuring authoritarian regimes, not just China and Russia, but Hungary and others, and outline some of the ways that life in an authoritarian state really sucks for most citizens. Then link that to Project 2025. There's your stakes.
Thanks again for your posts, Margaret. It's easy to get stuck in a rut lamenting the state of democracy and the health of our devastated news sector. We need reminders that we're not powerless...we can all do something to effect change. So, your reminders are encouraging.
Democracy is also fragile in Canada.
In the wake of the pandemic lockdown in early 2020, I joined with half a dozen of my former newsroom colleagues to form a grassroots pro-democracy, pro-journalism advocacy group we call Ink-stained Wretches. (We're now about 45 volunteers.)
We're working to build a culture of appreciation for quality journalism in aid of democracy.
In addition to hosting an annual journalism film festival, we ask municipalities to recognize UN World Press Freedom Day (May 3) by issuing proclamations, raising the UN flag or lighting their City Hall or a piece of infrastructure. This year, more than 30 municipalities and two provinces participated. Also this year, Niagara Falls and the CN Tower were lit blue and white (UN colours) for WPFD.
Why has the WaPo story about Trump's meeting with fossil fuel executives (Trump essentially said give me $1 billion and I'll support policies that benefit your companies) not been discussed more extensively by the media? Is the media just unable capacity-wise to cover important stories such as this?
This April article from Just Security explains why: SCOTUS, along with all the other problems it is causing, has made it just about impossible to convict someone for public corruption: https://www.justsecurity.org/94515/supreme-court-public-corruption-ethics/
I agree with the new focus of your newsletter. Thank you!
With respect to "flagging" the Alito matter: What is truly concerning is not that he throws his wife under the bus but, as The Daily’s Michael Barbaro observed, “Crucially, Alito doesn’t deny the flag was flying upside down, doesn’t deny its meaning, doesn’t express any disapproval for it and doesn’t disavow it.”
In addition, he lied in attempting to justify his actions to Fox News, by saying the argument supposedly had something to do with a "Fuck Trump" sign close to a school bus stop. (Though how flying the flag upside would protect children from obscene language isn't explained.) However, "deputy chief of staff for Representative Don Beyer (D-VA), who represents the town in which the Alitos live, noted that the local schools were all remote in January 2021 because of the pandemic." “No children were waiting for buses,” he noted on X.
Judge Alito needs to immediately resign. There is nothing more vile than to breath, eat, and live off your salary provided by the United States Government, and then defile and disparage the flag that represents your employer. Elizabeth
Hi Margret,
Your decision to focus your newsletter on the ‘stakes’ over the “odds” is exactly right.
You asked what your readers were doing. For me, it’s building a digital library of the crimes against democracy in the Trump era. In beta for about six months, the library has been primarily used by law enforcement and a few journalists to uncover relationships between people who played important roles in the fake elector schemes and the 2021 fraudulent “audit” in Maricopa County,AZ.
One article from the Arizona Republic won first prize for “Explanatory Writing” in the 2024 Best of the West journalism contest. The winning article showed how the leader of the Cyber Ninjas simply made up the numbers in their final report.
Soon, we will be making this repository available to journalists, law enforcement and researchers free of charge.
Maybe you and your digital library work could partner with Simon Rosenberg and/or David Pepper:
"Six new things about Trump..."
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/the-dow-closes-above-40000-six-new
"Trump vs. Freedoms"
https://davidpepper.substack.com/p/its-trump-vs-you?initial_medium=video
I think you’re right. Perhaps Margret could pass this along.
For the curious nerds, here's a link to the Arizona Republic's winning article.
bit.ly/4ar0A0M
I try to do my part. I'm on the local Citizens Advisory Committee to inform town management of issues of concern to citizens, I'm on the Democratic committee for my town and today am starting to put up signs around town for our Democratic candidates, I donate to democratic candidates across the country and talk extensively to friends and neighbors, but I don't know any republicans and have lost one friend to MAGA and any talking to him or his wife is a complete waste of time.
With respect Margaret, while I’ll credit Jodi Kantor for the story about Alito’s treasonous behavior, your former employer gets almost no credit from me, becauser they delayed the story three years.
That’s just one example of the ongoing and perpetual failures today at the NY Times.
The clear anti-Biden bias of the NY Times, along with the severe hubris of far too many Times staffers - especially on stories about domestic U.S. polutical reporting - has destroyed my trust in them, as a news org.
If I had the power, I’d take both a literal a metaphorical flamethrower to much of the NYTimes today, and replace every last person with people willing to fight at the cost of their careers to put stakes above odds. Don’t even get me started on Arthur. Further proof inheriting power is a bad idea.
I’ll second your kudos for Mark Jacob & Ruth Ben-Ghiat. I’ll also add Michael Tomasky to that list of kudos, even though there’s much produced at the New Republic these days I disagree with. He’s revived that publication, and he’s often pushing the envelope these days - which, FWIW, is what I expected of him.
As for what I’m doing to push the media to do things correctly? The same as I have for years - working both in the media and outside of it to push our colleagues to do better, and to bring to the top the best news & information for anyone who wants it.
It’s self-serving to mention that I’m the Executive Producer/Showrunner of “The Randi Rhodes Show,” and that we have a weekday newsletter here on Substack that features the too news of the day we talk about on our weekday TV & radio show. But I’m proud of the work we do, and how we make sure the framing of the news is treated as it should be, putting stakes over odds.
I’ll also note that yes - I do contact editors, producers, and occasionally executives in media in ways that have resulted in discipline for some in our industry.
So, yes - carrots & sticks.
Appreciate your work in this vein, Margaret. May all such efforts help to push the world towards freedom & democracy, and away from fascism & authoritarianism, in such a way that maybe, someday, we can once again expect all media orgs & journalists to fight for stakes above odds at all times.
You imply, without evidence, that the Times intentionally sat on the story for three years. As the story said, the Times only recently obtained photographic proof. As a former longtime editor myself, without that proof I would have been extremely reluctant to publish that story, too.
Ah, yes - attack me for pointing out what you’d rather hand wave away. Always a winning strategy, Lex.
For the record, I’ve got 30 years in professiobal media as well, most of it as an executive producer, assistant exec. producer, and showrunner of national political TV & radio news-based programs. So your CV doesn’t impress me Lex.
Given your CV, and likely knowledge of the news industry, you’re also likely aware that had the NYTimes put the force of their efforts behind it, it’s likely they’d have had those images long ago.
That they didn’t only further proves my points about them.
A good editor wouldn’t have sat on that story for three years. They would have pushed to get the images. Given that some of Alito’s neighbors appear to be at odds with him, and the influence of the NYTimes, it’s hard to believe - had they truly pushed - that they wpuldn’t have had the images sooner.
But, hey. You do you, Lex. Go on believing whatever bull the NYTimes is willing to feed you.
I’d have thought a long time editor would have more skepticism, even about the NYTimes, but clearly not in this case.
Son, I don't want to wave away anything, but if one of my reporters had assumed half as much on a story as you're assuming here, I'd've fired them as a serious libel risk. The Times has an incredible list of problems, but based solely on the information right here in front of our faces, this story isn't one of them.
Boy, if ypu were one of my assistant producers I’d have fired your arrogant ass for calling me “son.”
I’ll let you go be a troll somewhere else. (Blockez)
Excellent decision to focus on the real information and consequences rather than the stories where that DOESN'T happen, Margaret!
As for what I'm doing...I donate monthly to Biden's campaign, I'm going to work at my local polling place counting ballots in November, I lobby my members of Congress, and I've called a left-leaning regional news org and my local newspaper to ask them to cover Project 2025. (Imagine my horror when neither of the executive news editors I spoke with had heard of Project 2025! I'm still reeling.) I don't think they're going to cover it, so I'm going to research and write one story myself and see if I can figure out some way to disseminate it. In 2016 I wrote a carefully-neutral voter's guide with local resources and a theme of "one vote can decide an election." Half of the businesses I approached in my very blue town said they couldn't put the guide out because people would complain it was "too political" (sigh)....but I'm going to try to distribute it again this year.
That’s a lot!
Have you connected with Blue Voter Guide? Their team members develop the information for the down ballot like you have. Then anyone can type in an address for a Blue Voter Guide specific to that location and which can be easily shared:
https://bluevoterguide.org/
Thank you so much, Ellie!!! I'll check that out. :)
Hi, Margaret—Your refocus on 2024 is much appreciated. What I’ve been doing for several years, however, is working with others to eliminate the numerous, highly damaging effects caused by the Electoral College. Making Every Vote Count (MEVC), a tax exempt organization, has taken a leading role in this effort. While we realize this is a long-term project, perhaps requiring a Constitutional amendment, MEVC also recently contributed to the successful legislative improvement of the Electoral Count Act after the January 6 riot. It’s vital that the country not lose sight of the need for structural changes to our broken election system while we simultaneously focus on the 2024 election. Regardless of who wins the presidency this year, the strains on the presidential electoral process will be at least as extreme as they have ever been, and indeed the opportunity for taking action to relieve them may be swiftly approaching. MEVC is seeking to support and succeed in that effort.
Anything you can do Margaret to get the media and the public to focus more on judicial appointments & elections, as well as judicial ethics and judicial decisions that hit a range of decisions related to democracy and the rule of law, is key to your new mission. Indeed, these issues have been largely ignored and little understood by most in the media during my lifetime. I first saw this media gap close and up-front as a media source during the Clarence Thomas hearings. The consequences of this institutional neglect and oversight to our democracy have been devastating and only gotten worse ever since. Unfortunately we can no longer rely on Congress to protect our democracy. In today’s world, we’re going to have to rely much more on the Supreme Court and our judiciary, along with the Executive branch, to lead and chart a new democratic path. We know from experience that these institutions won’t and can’t effect real change without strong public support that emanates from a bright focused media spotlight. We must publicly acknowledge that our venerable but flawed Constitution and our democratic institutions need to be updated and reformed in the 21st century. It will take a public village and a focused media to make this happen. Fingers crossed!
Good direction, Margaret. Will do my bit at local level and keep you informed. Thank you.
By refocusing your column on the stakes, I think you're walking the talk and leading by example, Margaret. Thank you.
Thanks, Lex!
I appreciate what you're doing and I like "the stakes not the odds." My own work is supporting local government and local public officials with interviews, writing and events.
I'd like to see major media run some stories featuring authoritarian regimes, not just China and Russia, but Hungary and others, and outline some of the ways that life in an authoritarian state really sucks for most citizens. Then link that to Project 2025. There's your stakes.
Thanks again for your posts, Margaret. It's easy to get stuck in a rut lamenting the state of democracy and the health of our devastated news sector. We need reminders that we're not powerless...we can all do something to effect change. So, your reminders are encouraging.
Democracy is also fragile in Canada.
In the wake of the pandemic lockdown in early 2020, I joined with half a dozen of my former newsroom colleagues to form a grassroots pro-democracy, pro-journalism advocacy group we call Ink-stained Wretches. (We're now about 45 volunteers.)
We're working to build a culture of appreciation for quality journalism in aid of democracy.
In addition to hosting an annual journalism film festival, we ask municipalities to recognize UN World Press Freedom Day (May 3) by issuing proclamations, raising the UN flag or lighting their City Hall or a piece of infrastructure. This year, more than 30 municipalities and two provinces participated. Also this year, Niagara Falls and the CN Tower were lit blue and white (UN colours) for WPFD.
It's slow and tedious work. A long-term project, indeed. For details, feel free to visit https://www.ink-stainedwretches.org/campaigns.html
Thank you for those efforts!
And thanks also for your contribution to (participation in) the film festival last year. Much appreciated.
Suggestion: focus on swing states. Who are the influential voices there, what are they saying, are they factual, etc.
Yes
Thank you , Margaret. I subscribe to 2 national newspapers and several local ones, and talk to whomever will listen.
That’s good to hear!