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One Newspaper Begins the Media Purge

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Nov 13, 2024
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.

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Anti-Social Media – LOS ANGELES TIMES

  • This might make many of them happy, after all.

There has been upheaval at the Los Angeles Times for weeks now. Since the paper announced it would not formally endorse a candidate, a staff and executive suite revolt took place, with loud complaints internally and many resigning in protest.

Now, the owner, Patrick Soon-Shiong, has announced he is gutting the editorial staff entirely and starting from page one.

This is a start to how it is done.

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Reporting on the Mirror – VARIOUS OUTLETS

  • Get in on the rage-quitting in the press – it's all the rage!

Following the election, the press has been grappling with the unexpected ignoring of their pleas in a number of ways. One that is becoming a trend is journalists and outlets quitting Xitter out of…um, due to…well, we are not really sure. Not because they do not explain it, but frankly we do not care. 

We covered last week how The Atlantic had declared the platform a white supremacist haven (all while still promoting its work on the site.) Next, we watched as Jennifer Rubin locked her dysfunction-filled account, Don Lemon begged for attention as he posted a written message AND a video proclaiming he was leaving, and now we have The Guardian also ceasing its posting because simply shutting down an account is not an option.

Legalized Press-titution – MSNBC

  • We do not really enjoy calling a "reverend" a whore, and yet...

The coroner report on the spending of the Kamala Harris campaign will be a longtime source of content. She managed to blow through $1 billion, still came up with $20 million in debt, and lost in a landslide to Trump who spent less than half as much with a staff that was hundreds of people smaller.

A new report that has come out was an expenditure that compromises the integrity of the network MSNBC (um, further.) During the campaign, Harris sat for a tongue bath interview with Al Sharpton on October 20. It is now learned that ahead of that appearance, her campaign paid out half a million dollars to his non-profit organization, the National Action Network. Sharpton never disclosed the money exchange during her appearance.

Low-Octane Gaslighting – POLITICO

  • When these are your experts, you have no experts.

The announcement was made that Pete Hagseth was selected by Donald Trump to serve as his Secretary of Defense. While it is clear that the 20-plus year veteran was selected as a move to help flush out the deadwood in the Defense Department, the fact that Hagseth is also a weekend Fox News host was sure to throw many in a state of dismay. So, here rides in POLITICO to deliver a scathing rebuke from what it claims are members of "the Defense world."

Suffice it to say, these are not exactly members with impressive credentials. They found someone who is about 20 years removed from the Defense Department, and…a lobbyist.

  • "[Trump] puts the highest value on loyalty," Eric Edelman, who served as the Pentagon's top policy official during the Bush administration, said in an interview. "It appears that one of the main criteria that’s being used is, how well do people defend Donald Trump on television?"

  • One assessment was more blunt. "Who the f*** is this guy?" said a defense industry lobbyist who was granted anonymity to offer candid views. The lobbyist said they had hoped for “someone who actually has an extensive background in defense. That would be a good start."

Pre-Written Field Reports – POLITICO

Jonathan Martin attempts to perform his own postmortem on the election to determine why the Democrats lost, because that is of deep concern to him as a journalist. (A GOP loss would have surely led to a spiking of the football and a declaration that Republican policies were roundly rejected.)

But, of course, in supposedly looking over the unforced errors by Democrats, he has to dredge up things the GOP does that are unacceptable, and then compare and contrast. That he resorts to dredging up the claim of conservatives banning books can only be regarded as being plain lazy.