On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher stated that the news media has to win trust back, and “The news media lost trust because they became eyeball-chasing, clickbait whores, who bump the story about climate change for the one about grizzly bears in a jacuzzi.”
Maher said, “[N]ew rule, now that polls show that the public finds the news media less trustworthy than Donald Trump, they have to fight to get their reputation back, and there are encouraging signs that that fight has been joined. The New York Times no longer shies away from saying Trump lies on the front page.”
Maher continued by showing examples of members of the press criticizing Trump and confronting members of his administration. He then stated, “We’re gonna need a lot more of this.”
He later added, [T]he media gave him [Trump] 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 – although [Sen.] Marco Rubio (R-FL) was able to break through one week, because he gave a very important speech about how Trump had a small cock. Other than that, it was Trump, Trump, Trump. he got over twice as much coverage as Hillary and [Senator] Bernie [Sanders] (I-VT) combined, because they’re policy people, not tiny cock 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 clips of lighter news stories.
Maher further stated, “Okay, guys, for the sake of the republic, you’ve got to get serious again. You have to win your respect back, so Trump can’t say, the people don’t believe you, you’re a joke. … The news media lost trust because they became eyeball-chasing, clickbait whores, who bump the story about climate change for the one about grizzly bears in a jacuzzi.”
He concluded that not worrying about news being profitable would pay off in the long run because “the best customers are alive.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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