A national press with similarly lousy credibility as Trump is one that is ineffective. Bill Maher uses actual examples of their screw ups to point out what they should do.
Bill Maher commended the press then shredded them
Now more than ever we need a robust and assertive press. It is the time that the media gets back to the basics but most importantly grow spines to confront our political bully.
“Now that polls show that the public finds the news media less trustworthy than Donald Trump,” Bill Maher said. “They have to fight to get their reputation back. And there are encouraging signs that that fight has been joined.”
Maher then pointed out that the New York Times called out Trump’s untruths by name, lies. Chuck Todd, Scot Pelley, and George Stephanopoulos slammed Trump spokespersons when they came on the air with their alternative facts.
“We are going to need a lot more of this,” Maher said. “Trump has the White House. He’s got Congress. He’s got a crazy loyal fan base. What do we have? Pussy hats. But also people under them. There is something about getting in the streets that make a powerful statement, that we care. That we are not afraid. So we’ve got the streets. We still got the courts. But judges die. And if only Republicans are in power to replace them, that could be bad. Which leaves the press, the free press that is enshrined in our constitution. But for the press to be effective, these numbers have got to change. Can you imagine how this must make a reporter feel? To be losing a truthful contest to Donald Trump? It is like losing a rap battle to Mitt Romney. Donald Trump is the apotheosis of the Alt-Right. And the media gave him the biggest platform ever. They covered every Trump rally like we put a game show host on the moon. They made him look like he was president before he was. Even during the primaries, Trump got three times the coverage of the entire rest of the field. He got almost twice as much coverage of Hillary and Bernie combined because they are policy people. And now, with so much happening all at once, we really need our news sources to bore in. But the second half of the nightly news, still looks like this.”
Maher then played snippets of the feel-good-mostly-silly filler stories they play including Panda stories, animal stories, and other superficial stories.
“Guys, for the sake of the republic,” Maher said. “You got to get serious again. You have to win your respect back. So Trump can’t say, ‘The people don’t believe you. You are a joke.’
Maher then segued to the Time Magazine website where they had yet another silly and distracting story.
“The news media lost trust because they became eyeball chasing clickbait whores,” Maher said. “Who bumped the story about climate change for the one about grizzly bears in the jacuzzi. There is an answer to this. When TV started, there was an understanding between the folks who owned the airwaves, the American people and the folks who made TV. And that understanding was that the news wasn’t supposed to make money. It was something the corporation just gave us as a public service.”
Bill pointed out that news is negligible to the bottom line of most of the networks.
“Guys,” Bill Maher implored. “Take one for the team.”