We have a problem: the goings-on at the NY Times

[sharedvalues]

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I think this is right. Unfortunately too many people read only the headlines.

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And FINALLY people are being upset at Dean Baquet.

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The NY Times does great investigative reporting. They have some good and some bad columnists.

But their politics coverage is harming America. They were a tool for the Clinton Cash book. They published the “no Russia” story in fall 2016. Then Dean Baquet inexplicably fired the public editor!!!
Now, for the past two years, the Times has been normalizing Trump with inaccurate, untruthful politics coverage and especially headlines. “Both sides” is just a lie when it’s one sides’ fault, and the NYT has ridden “both sides” deeply into untruthfulness.

They need to fix it. The NYT is harming our country.

[sharedvalues]

1. Why it matters: the NYT is helping Trump get away with it.

Link to tweet

[mia]

5. In other words:

If you don't unite in support of Trump - racist violence may continue.


In "The Five Stages of Fascism," published in 1998, Paxton defined seven feelings that act as "mobilizing passions" for fascist regimes:

The primacy of the group. Supporting the group feels more important than maintaining either individual or universal rights.

Believing that one's group is a victim. This justifies any behavior against the group's enemies.
The belief that individualism and liberalism enable dangerous decadence and have a negative effect on the group.

A strong sense of community or brotherhood. This brotherhood's "unity and purity are forged by common conviction, if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary."

Individual self-esteem is tied up in the grandeur of the group. Paxton called this an "enhanced sense of identity and belonging."

Extreme support of a "natural" leader, who is always male. This results in one man taking on the role of national savior....

https://www.livescience.com/57622-fascism.html

[58Sunliner]

9. Stockholm Syndrome works well too.

[sharedvalues]

2. Beto and Booker weigh in.

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I like Cory Booker’s response here. He’s right.

[Liberty Belle]

28. Trolls WANT you to cancel the NYT. Don't do it. Here are the other articles today:

That was a poor headline but only one of several. Read these other examples in this morning's edition, on the front page of the online version I subscribe to:

"Trump on defense in debate over extremism and guns"
"Trump's racism is a global problem for our country" (Susan Rice)
"The Nihilist in Chief"
"Trump is a white nationalist who inspires terrorism"
"White nationalism has been linked to some of the deadliest shootings in America in recent years"

Cancelling an NYT subscription is a terrible idea. The NYT is one of our last bastions of true investigative journalism and honest editorials speaking truth to fire. It costs a lot of money to do the deep investigative stories they do. Unsubscribing is striking a blow for the death toll of a free press.

Writers do NOT write their own headlines. A note to the paper questioning that particularly headline is fine. I think the editor will get the message and improve (maybe already has, based on today's headers which are not at all pro-Trump).

[intheflow]

39. You do know they can tweak their online content to most appeal to individual readers, right?

It's a marketing tool that's been used for decades, and online perhaps most notably by Google tailoring the results you get for any given search based on past algorithms. It's also what contributed to (and continues) the development of red and blue Facebook feeds.

But don't take my word for it. Here's what they have to say about it:
https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/360003965994-Personalization

Just in case you don't know about Facebook's red and blue feeds, here's a tool from the WSJ that allows us to compare trending posts on some political topics: http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-feed/

*Edited for bad sentence construction.

[sharedvalues]

42. Be careful with WSJ.

NYT is merely both sidesist and subscribes to the cult of the savvy.
They don’t have a planned agenda to harm America to benefit billionaires.

The WSJ has a planned agenda to harm America to benefit billionaires. That’s what Rupert Murdoch does.

Be careful with ANYTHING that comes out of WSJ. Some is good, but much is twisted through a rightwing lens.

[intheflow]

45. This tool was developed during the run-up to the 2016 election

and was promoted by everyone from Duke University to MSNBC. It was developed by John Keegan of Columbia's Journalism School's Tow Center for Digital Journalism. He worked for the WSJ before Murdoch's takeover. I'm a librarian and I don't need to be schooled on how to vet my sources, thank you very much.

[sharedvalues]

46. Dems shouldn't cite WSJ though- we are helping Murdoch and the right.

Gerry Baker was most active pushing WSJ to be pro-Trump in 2015 and 2016.

I hear what you’re saying and this article sounds fine.

But I really really wish all of us would start telling the world how Murdoch uses WSJ — I’ll bet you that Bill Barr reads WSJ and that’s a big reason he believes Trump is good.

[sharedvalues]

41. No. Until the NYT fires the editors, cancel away

Writers suggest their own headlines.

Here are the biggest problems at the NYT:

- Patrick Healy: Politics editor. He’s the real problem. He writes the headlines or approved them.

- Dean Baquet: Head editor. Healy’s boss. He ultimately makes the calls on headlines. He’s susceptible to pressure- he probably changed this one. He FIRED THE PUBLIC EDITOR, the person at the Times who is meant to reflect on their errors. He’s a huge problem- and the tweet above says many NYT employees are angry at him.

- James Bennet, opinion editor. Hired Bret Stephens and continues to employ him. Nuff said.

- Peter Baker: news analyst, not a reporter. The most bothsidesist and craven and “savvy” of any writer on the NYT News side.


I’m cancelling my sub and will not re subscribe till at least two of the four above are fired.

The NYT is not what it has been. Cancel it. Read instead the New Yorker, the Atlantic, and the Washington Post.

[blm]

3. Russia holding Baquet hostage, too, perhaps.

Maybe he's been LindseyGrahamed.

[sharedvalues]

4. I think he is just in a cocoon of upper middle class privilege

I think Baquet has somehow deeply internalized the idea that it’s not ok to make conservatives angry.
Without understanding the basic truth that conservatives are willing to lie if it will push the NYT to the right.

[zentrum]

13. This says it.+++

[jayschool2013]

22. Yes

Not an evil, complicit cabal, as so many on the right and on the far left would have it.

Journalists sometimes make bad decisions in good faith. This is one of those times.

[RAB910]

6. Remember the NY Times is complicit in the GOP's rise to power

this latest lurch to the anti-American right and lying is already part of a pattern

[58Sunliner]

7. Wow indeed. How did they ever get "a call to unity" from his history of racism.

[Perseus]

8. A good quote

"Fascists are inferior people who believe it when somebody tells them they're superior."
~~ Kurt Vonnegut - "Slapstick"

[Mme. Defarge]

30. Reminds me of Ayn Rand followers

back in the day.

[Suburban Warrior]

10. I'm old enough to remember...

...when the NYT helped George Bush and Dick Cheney lie us into a war.

[FiveGoodMen]

37. That's still the first thing that springs to mind when the NYT is mentioned

Judith Miller

[mgardener]

11. I live in NY

And grew up reading the NYT. I always liked it.
But for the last several years have been very unhappy with their coverage.
I bought a subscription for the Washington Post and really like is so much better.

[Ponietz]

12. "Palpatine urges unity against rebel scum"--Mo Ryan

Quoted here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/08/06/new-york-times-headline-trump-backlash/

[50 Shades Of Blue]

14. I canceled my online subscription months ago because of shit like this, and

they didn't make it easy. I couldn't cancel it online. No. I had to call them. And of course the service rep wouldn't just cancel it, done. No. He wanted to know why I wanted to cancel. I know he was following a script and he didn't personally care, so I tried to be polite, but it really pissed me off.

[Ponietz]

17. Same here

The tedious and time-consuming cancellation process made me even happier I did it.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

25. Oh damn, I hate a hassle.

I had just subscribed for the cooking section.
But “...Urges Unity”!? Hell no!

[aggiesal]

33. The easist way to cancel your account is ...

not to pay them.

I set up my online account to automatically pay.
When I cancelled, I just changed 1 number on my payment account.
When payment wouldn't go through, I'd get the standard email about
my payment not being processed and please update my account.
I don't update it, they didn't get paid, my account was cancelled.

No explanation, no form, no NYT.

[50 Shades Of Blue]

35. Too late for me with the NYT but that might come in handy for other stuff. Thanks!

[aggiesal]

36. It actually works for all kinds of payments ...

If you pay with an account, debit card, credit card, ... just change 1 number.

That number could be the account number, credit card number, expiration date, the 3 or 4 digit secret code, ...
anything will trip up the payment.

[BumRushDaShow]

15. Seems they didn't want to be "the failing New York Times"

so they sucked it up and chose to spew his bullshit.

[cannabis_flower]

16. Washington Post..

does some good investigative journalism. They've been better than the NY Times lately.

[Paladin]

18. The editorial section will make me cancel my subscription, before long.

Way too many third-rate, right-leaning opinionistas---Dowd, Brooks, Douthat. Sure as hell isn't the liberal bastion it once was. And I want my editorial cartoons back, you NYT chickenshits!

Their cooking section is still outstanding, however. Lots of good recipes.

[ancianita]

19. Especially since it has historically been called "the paper of record." This is bad journalism.

[llmart]

20. Trying to normalize his awful behavior.

I prefer the Washington Post these days. The NYT has devolved into a "both siderism" paper.

[evilhime]

21. They appear to be changing the headline

I just opened my digital copy of the NYT and found a different appearing front page than that above. The story appears to be the same but with a new headline: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/us/politics/trump-guns-white-supremacy.html - it is still a different front page now after about 15 minutes of doing other things. I wonder how much backlash they got . . . or someone saner took charge?

[jayschool2013]

23. THANKS!

Journalists generally correct mistakes.

Politicians and ideologues don't.

Please know that anything other than a slim cadre of journalists — the attention-seekers (i.e. Judith Miller) and partisan hacks (Fox News) — seek to make things right.

To paint us as an evil monolith of bad morals and judgment is nonsensical.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

24. holy shit 🤬

[George II]

26. The NY Times "were a tool for the Clinton Cash book"?

[MBS]

27. I never have trusted NYT coverage of national politics

The NYT seems to have an endemic tropism to power that too often leads them in unhealthy or irresponsible directions like this headline.

Not that any media are immune to this disease, of course. But in general, I find the Washington Post to be a much more reliable source for reporting and analysis of national politics, especially in election years, than the NYT,

[KY_EnviroGuy]

29. "Trump Urges Fascism vs Democracy" would be most accurate....

on behalf of his plutocratic minders just about three miles from the NYT building.....

[Ponietz]

31. The Hill is a huge problem, too, stenographers for propaganda

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[MyOwnPeace]

34. Yes, we have "seen him on the ground........"

riding his cart down the fairway on the back nine.................

[GeorgeGist]

32. Sure have a lot of college dropouts ...

in prominent positions in journalism.

Baquet studied English at Columbia University from 1974 to 1978; he dropped out to pursue a career in journalism.[7]

[Liberty Belle]

38. NY Times has changed the headline!

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/aug/06/new-york-times-front-page-headline-changed?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Facebook&fbclid=IwAR0AlohuZvkBwv8JD_-e8TaK7r9Mrq64pAAk2mDXuwxsuwbVtoieEF-Bg7w

It now says "Assailing hate but not guns." The Washington Post reports the NY Times changed the headline in response to public complaints.

They did the right thing after an editor erred (and the writer was unhappy with the headline, too).

Please don't cancel subscriptions - the Times is still one of the best and only investigative newspapers left in the U.S. doing the deep digging into Trump administration scandals and so much more.

Perhaps some notes thanking them for listening and making this change would be in order.

[Ponietz]

40. Succinctly put--

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[sharedvalues]

43. Update: reporter Nick Confessore and CJR both weigh in.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1174&pid=3151

[sharedvalues]

44. Another update

From Jay Rosen and Will bunch

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