Cancel Culture

[Vrede too]

Democracy Dies In Darkness

Right Jeff Bezos?

Major blowback for WAPO and LA Times for their non endorsements.
https://x.com/MarkHamill/status/1849914582141370643
https://x.com/MuellerSheWrote/status/18 ... 0946856373
https://x.com/thedailybeast/status/1849918616008794555
https://x.com/MaryLTrump/status/1849902512087654845
https://x.com/gtconway3d/status/1849903173726765390

It's a large and growing community:

Washington Post Hit With 200,000-Plus Subscriber Cancelations After Jeff Bezos Nixed Presidential Endorsement: Report

More than 200,000 people have canceled their subscriptions to the Washington Post — about 8% of its base — after Jeff Bezos, the paper’s owner and founder of Amazon, barred the editorial board from running a presidential endorsement, according to a report.

NPR, citing anonymous sources, cited the figure in a report and said the number of cancelations “continued to grow” on Monday afternoon. The controversy threatens to put a major dent in the Washington Post’s circulation of 2.5 million subscribers....

Two contributors to the Washington Post’s opinion pages — Michele Norris and Robert Kagan — severed tied with the paper in protest. In addition, 20 Post opinion columnists have co-signed a column blasting the decision to not endorse a presidential candidate as “an abandonment of the fundamental editorial convictions of the newspaper that we love.”

On Friday, former Post editor Marty Baron called the paper’s decision “cowardice, with democracy as its casualty,” in a post on X. Baron wrote that “@realdonaldtrump will see this as an invitation to further intimidate owner @jeffbezos (and others). Disturbing spinelessness at an institution famed for courage.”

Former Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, whose reporting brought down Richard Nixon, also bashed the decision on Friday, saying, “We respect the traditional independence of the editorial page, but this decision 11 days out from the 2024 presidential election ignores the Washington Post’s own overwhelming reportorial evidence on the threat Donald Trump poses to democracy. Under Jeff Bezos’s ownership, the Washington Post’s news operation has used its abundant resources to rigorously investigate the danger and damage a second Trump presidency could cause to the future of American democracy and that makes this decision even more surprising and disappointing, especially this late in the electoral process.”...

x 200,000+

[O Really]

There are a variety of deals and discounts, but I think the standard WaPo annual digital subscription is $100. So that's 20 mill out the window. Maybe a pittance to Bezos, but still.

Edit: just got this -

FLASH SALE
We never miss a story, but we have missed you.
Come back and save on your next year.
MONTHLY
50¢ every week for the first year
billed as $2 every 4 weeks
YEARLY
$120 $29 for the first year

Resubscribe

[GoCubsGo]

Thought I read the editorial board quit.

What I find amazing most of all is Bezos and Muskidoodle bowing down to trump because......they're skeered of him?

They're both alienating their biggest consumer markets. Do they somehow think trump will make them richer as they lose customers?

[Vrede too]

Thought I read the editorial board quit.

What I find amazing most of all is Bezos and Muskidoodle bowing down to trump because......they're skeered of him?

They're both alienating their biggest consumer markets. Do they somehow think trump will make them richer as they lose customers?

The editorials editor and an editorial writer quit at the LA Times. "The Washington Post editor at large Robert Kagan resigned in protest, too."
viewtopic.php?p=203939#p203939
Idk about others, but this flap ain't going away soon.

[GoCubsGo]

Thought I read the editorial board quit.

What I find amazing most of all is Bezos and Muskidoodle bowing down to trump because......they're skeered of him?

They're both alienating their biggest consumer markets. Do they somehow think trump will make them richer as they lose customers?

The editorials editor and an editorial writer quit at the LA Times. "The Washington Post editor at large Robert Kagan resigned in protest, too."
viewtopic.php?p=203939#p203939
Idk about others, but this flap ain't going away soon.

Three out of nine editorial board members have stepped down so far.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/28/media/wa ... index.html

[Vrede too]

Three out of nine editorial board members have stepped down so far.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/28/media/wa ... index.html

A state legislator friend liked colleagues who didn't support him in an election or legislative fight that he won because they then owed him. If Kamala wins Bezos and the LA Times will owe her big time. The payback may not be visible to us, but it will be there.

[Jasmine]

I actually applaud the Post for not making an endorsement. I have always felt that the news media should be objective and not display any bias. When you think about it, why should anyone care what a bunch of elitist editors think, anyway? Why should their opinions carry any weight at all?

Let every voter make his/her own decision.

These Post officials are mad because they don’t get to “officially” endorse Kamala over Trump. That reaction alone should tell you the level of their bias.

If Inhad my way, editorials penned by newspapers would be a thing of the past. I’m fine with opinion columnists and letters to the editor, however.

[O Really]

News media are expected to be objective in news reporting, but have always been able to express opinions, including biases, on the editorial page. And newspaper editorials have done a lot of good over the years to bring attention to things of interest or importance to their readers. But sure, a paper can decide it doesn't want to endorse any political candidates and had WaPo announced a couple of years ago that they are changing their policy and will no longer endorse candidates, probably few if anybody would have gotten torqued over it.

This is a different issue. The Washington Post, along with several others, has well over a hundred years of being an excellent and trustworthy source that has included some major investigations. The editorial board (who decides what gets printed as well as sometimes writing editorials) remained independent regardless of corporate ownership, and was never subject to interference from the profit side. When Bezos bought the Post, however, there was concern that he would turn it into his own publicity/propaganda rag like the Murdochs have done. So far, that didn't seem to be the case. Now it is.

[Vrede too]

I actually applaud the Post for not making an endorsement. I have always felt that the news media should be objective and not display any bias. When you think about it, why should anyone care what a bunch of elitist editors think, anyway? Why should their opinions carry any weight at all?

Let every voter make his/her own decision.

These Post officials are mad because they don’t get to “officially” endorse Kamala over Trump. That reaction alone should tell you the level of their bias.

If I had my way, editorials penned by newspapers would be a thing of the past. I’m fine with opinion columnists and letters to the editor, however.

What O Really says.

Canceling the Kamala endorsements is not "objective" and unbiased. It's a gift to TRE45QN. Plus these are not acts by "the Post" or the LA Times. Rather, these were unilateral de facto endorsements of Dolt .45 by 2 nonprofessional fat cats - far more "elitist" than the journalists. This is not how OUR fourth estate should operate.

[O Really]

I actually applaud the Post for not making an endorsement. I have always felt that the news media should be objective and not display any bias. When you think about it, why should anyone care what a bunch of elitist editors think, anyway? Why should their opinions carry any weight at all?

Let every voter make his/her own decision.

...

Outside of coin tosses, a voter's decision is based on something or on some knowledge/information from some source(s). Reading the opinion of a person or persons who follow politics closely and have access to huge amounts of information isn't unreasonable. But before you actually vote with them, however, you've got to know if their interests are the same as yours.

What do you think are the best sources of information for a voter to use to make his/her own decision?

[GoCubsGo]

If Inhad my way, editorials penned by newspapers would be a thing of the past. I’m fine with opinion columnists and letters to the editor, however.

Bit of a contradiction, opinion columnists are de facto employed by newspapers unless it's a guest columnist with the typical disclaimer of not necessarily endorsed or reflect the views of whatever the publication is.

That being said, it's important to make the distinction between the WAPO news division and the editorial board as with all periodical and a lot of tv stations, they are separate divisions and don't portend to be actual news.

In WNC our local station was owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, notoriously right. They'd do their two minute shtick at the end of the news and oftentimes the anchors would do an eye roll or wink signifying the difference.

[O Really]

Yeah the heavy hand of ownership, such as Sinclair, has long been present. It's just a shame to see it happen to what are essentially journalism icons like WaPo, NYT, and LA Times

[GoCubsGo]

Yeah the heavy hand of ownership, such as Sinclair, has long been present. It's just a shame to see it happen to what are essentially journalism icons like WaPo, NYT, and LA Times

Icons or not, these days Sinclair is reaching more people. If Jasmine had her way they wouldn't be able to editorialize.

She may have a point, it cuts both ways.

Of course, what would Fox et al do for content?

https://sbgi.net/tv-stations/

[Vrede too]

Yeah the heavy hand of ownership, such as Sinclair, has long been present. It's just a shame to see it happen to what are essentially journalism icons like WaPo, NYT, and LA Times

NYT endorsed Kamala.

My consumption of the local Sinclair news is sporadic, but I'm not seeing their RW corporate editorials anymore. Of greater concern to me is what influence they exert over the local news and the ABC stories that are offered. Media consolidation is a rotten idea and never should have been allowed to progress so far.

[O Really]

Media consolidation is a rotten idea and never should have been allowed to progress so far.

Fershure, but I don't know exactly how anybody could stop it. Most of the smaller newspapers that have been swept up by Gannett, et. al., would have gone belly-up anyway and everybody would still end up reading USAToday except without any local supplement.

[Vrede too]

Media consolidation is a rotten idea and never should have been allowed to progress so far.

Fershure, but I don't know exactly how anybody could stop it. Most of the smaller newspapers that have been swept up by Gannett, et. al., would have gone belly-up anyway and everybody would still end up reading USAToday except without any local supplement.

Newspapers are a dying tool. Almost all articles in the Hooterville T-N are already USAToday. I was thinking more of Sinclair's tentacles reaching into so many markets. We used to have a mechanism to prevent that.

Speaking of USAToday, it also declined to endorse, but its history is different. Biden in 2020 was its first ever endorsement.

[Vrede too]

Yeah the heavy hand of ownership, such as Sinclair, has long been present. It's just a shame to see it happen to what are essentially journalism icons like WaPo, NYT, and LA Times

1945
We defeated the Nazis at an almost unbearable cost.

2024
NYT endorsed Kamala.
WaPo and LA Times stayed neutral in the face of a Nazi candidate.

2025
It's not okay to criticize a Nazi.

CBS Meteorologist Gone From Station After She Slammed Elon Musk's Salute
Meteorologist Sam Kuffel was targeted by a conservative media personality for comparing Musk's gesture to a Nazi salute.

[Vrede too]

RepuQs are weird:

Well, We Have Barron Trump’s First College Scandal

... Though the competition for this week’s stupidest news event will no doubt be fierce, I’d venture to say we’ve got a contender in this nonstory about Barron Trump leading to the forced resignation of the president of the NYU Republicans.

This all started last week, when NYU senior Kaya Walker was quoted in a write-around Vanity Fair piece about Barron Trump, his life at NYU, and the fascination surrounding him, particularly among his fellow members of Generation Z. Walker, who was identified as the head of her school’s chapter of the College Republicans, told the magazine, “He’s sort of like an oddity on campus. He goes to class, he goes home.” This seems anodyne enough, so much so that you might question whether it’s a sentiment worth quoting at all—“sort of like an oddity”? Not exactly trenchant commentary! Honestly, I have more questions about Walker citing Lana Del Rey as the most exciting celebrity in right-wing culture in the same article. But apparently the “oddity” quote was enough to get her in trouble with the College Republicans bigwigs, who pressured Walker to resign and said in a press release that her statement “does not align with the values and principles upheld by our organization.”

In her resignation letter, which the NYU College Republicans shared on X, Walker apologized but said that her comments were “ridiculously misconstrued.” In a later interview with the New York Post, Walker elaborated, blaming the conservative X account AF Post, which shared the story, for taking her comments out of context. AF Post “took it to say that I was saying that Barron was strange for being a commuter—which I thought was crazy because I’m a commuter,” Walker told the Post. The tweet was viewed millions of times and sparked many outraged-on-Barron’s-behalf reactions. “They [made it] look like I was calling the president’s son weird, but I feel like anybody who can read would know that’s not what I was doing,” she went on. I mean, since when is seeing a world-famous 6-foot-7 teenager flanked by Secret Service agents on a college campus not an oddity?

Did they want her to lie and say that Barron doesn’t stand out, that actually no one notices him? Trick question: What anyone who got remotely caught up in a tizzy about this on social media obviously wants is for Walker never to have spoken to the evil media at all, never mind that speaking to the media, though it’s usually the campus paper and not Vanity Fair, is often part of the job description for these sorts of roles in college organizations.

... Just so we’re clear, the conservative movement’s stance is that if your wildly racist tweets surface, you deserve another chance to do important government work, but if you acknowledge the existence of Barron Trump on the record in your capacity as a leader of a relevant group at his college, that’s out of line. Walker seemed very dedicated to the group, and the cause, and while this certainly seems like one of the milder examples of casualties of the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party, it’s an example nonetheless....

Good on Barron, dividing the GQP without even trying.

[GoCubsGo]

RepuQs are weird:

Understatement.

[Vrede too]

RepuQs are weird:

Understatement.

https://x.com/RpsAgainstTrump/status/19 ... 8887471111

The lifelong cowardly "bone spurs" Chickenhawk in Chief LIES, as usual. Hanks is still getting the award.

West Point alumni group scraps prestigious award celebrations honoring Tom Hanks

The alumni group at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point has scrapped an official award celebration for Tom Hanks. The West Point Association of Graduates was scheduled to host a ceremony and parade honoring the 69-year-old actor and veterans advocate on Sept. 25.

A U.S. official who said he is not authorized to speak publicly on the matter confirmed the news, which was first reported in The Washington Post. The official told NPR that Hanks will still get the prestigious Sylvanus Thayer Award, and did not state why the formalities had been abandoned.

The Post said the decision was announced in an internal email sent to faculty by Mark Bieger, president and CEO of the West Point Association of Graduates, a copy of which was obtained by the newspaper. In the email, the Post said that Bieger stated the Army needed to focus on its core mission of "preparing cadets to lead, fight, and win."

The Army can't multitask? The issue is anticipated WHINING from vindictive Dementia Don and Jagoff.

Hanks' long history of veteran advocacy

A statement from the alumni association announced the award in June, praising Hanks for his ongoing support of veterans, noting his role as a national spokesperson for the World War II memorial in Washington D.C., his help with fundraising efforts for the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial in D.C., and his work as a spokesperson for the Elizabeth Dole Foundation, which supports military veterans and their caregivers. Hanks has also appeared in and produced many movies centered on U.S. military stories including the 1998 World War II drama Saving Private Ryan and 1994's Forrest Gump, in which Hanks' character serves in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War.

"Tom Hanks has done more for the positive portrayal of the American service member, more for the caring of the American veteran, their caregivers and their family, and more for the American space program and all branches of government than many other Americans," said West Point Association of Graduates board chairman Robert A. McDonald in the June statement....

More than Dementia Don and Jagoff would do in several lifetimes.

Readjustment under Trump

West Point has been going through a period of readjustment since the start of the Trump administration. In February, West Point eliminated student clubs for women and minority students following Trump's crackdown on diversity programs in federal institutions.

Male White supremacy, again.

... Meanwhile, Hanks has been public about his support for Democratic presidential candidates in the past. His name has appeared on lists of celebrities who endorsed former President Joe Biden during his 2020 campaign. After Biden's victory, Hanks hosted the Celebrating America televised special which was organized by the Biden Inaugural Committee. He got behind Barack Obama's campaign in 2008. Obama awarded Hanks the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the country's highest civilian honors, in 2016. The actor has also been outspoken in his criticisms of President Trump. In remarks at the Rome Film Festival in 2016, captured by the Associated Press, the actor called the then-Republican candidate a "self-involved gas bag."

There it is, this is just more of DonOLD's infantile vengeance tour.

Instituted in 1958, the Sylvanus Thayer Award is the most highly valued civilian accolade given by West Point. Its recipients include Henry Kissinger, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, and Bob Hope.

In an email to NPR, retired U.S. Army brigadier general and professor emeritus of history at West Point Ty Seidule said the history of the Thayer Award has until now remained pretty uncontroversial. The ceremony is rarely canceled or postponed. Unexpected snowfall upended the celebrations for author, editor and former ambassador Clare Boothe Luce in 1979, and the events of Sept. 11, 2001 caused them to be postponed for U.S. senator Daniel Inouye, a Hawaii Democrat.

Unlike Vietnam-dodging PINO, Inouye was a volunteer and a war hero many times over.

"The award isn't a heavy lift," Seidule — who is currently a professor of history at the Hamilton College in New York — said. "It's a parade and a dinner. Cadets love to rub elbows with some of America's greatest citizens."

Hanks still gets his award and he's seen more ceremonies than he can count. It's the Cadets who will suffer for Dementia Don's pettiness. He has a lifetime of sacrificing American youth in uniform for his own interests.

Seidule said that, over the years, the award recipients have come from both sides of the political aisle and from all walks of American life. "West Point is a staunchly apolitical institution," Seidule said. "I feel for everyone at West Point trying to navigate an administration whose decisions are capricious and cruel."

Seidule said he doesn't buy the idea that Hanks' ceremony was axed in order for West Point to focus on its military goals: "West Point is capable of focusing on the Secretary of Defense priorities and still having a parade and dinner."

Duh.