"A Right-wing newsletter, with recipes?" The sad part is that it's true.
Remember when the New York Time was "the newspaper of record?" Seriously, though, was it EVER really that? Or just too big for its britches?
IS the New York Times the mainstream media equivalent of an entitled trust fund baby with a seriously overdeveloped sense of its own importance?
thinks so, and I have to say I’m about a half-step behind him.For generations, we’ve been conditioned to hold the Grey Lady in high esteem as The Newspaper of Record ©. If the Times said it, then we were to assume that it carried some gravitas and was to be taken seriously. Come to find out, thought, that Publisher A.G. Sulzberger has a Napoleon AND a seriously overdeveloped sense of both his and the Times’ importance.
Especially where President Joe Biden is concerned.
Waitjustagoddamnedminute here. Isn’t it the media's job to REPORT the news, not to exact vengeance for whatever silly, petty grievances its publisher may harbor against the President of the United States?
And since when have newspapers had “birthrights,” ferchrissakes??
Like the man says, “check this shit out”:
According to Politico, New York Times publisher AG Sulzberger believes a long-form interview with Biden is the “birthright” of the Times and he’s been “aggrieved” that the president has refused to sit for one.
One unnamed Times reporter suggested to Politico that “tough reporting” on Biden’s advanced age and lagging poll numbers is “quietly” encouraged by Sulzberger in retaliation for Biden’s unwillingness to sit for an interview….
White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates, according to two people who spoke to Politico, has fed material to the “NYT Pitchbot” account on X, which relentlessly hammers the Times over its coverage of Biden and Trump.
Biden joked at last year’s White House Correspondents dinner that he “loves” the “NYT Pitchbot” account.
Could it be true that A.G. Sulzberger is an “nth generation nepo baby” who believes that, because he runs the New York FUCKING Times, Joe Biden OWES the Grey Lady a long-form interview?
And could it also be true that Sulzberger needs to put on his big girl pants and GROW THE FUCK UP??
Yes, America, two things CAN indeed be true at once.
Since when has the Pitchbot needed Joe Biden’s help? It looks like it’s hanging in there just fine by surviving on its wits, knowhutimean??
Sulzberger reportedly took minutes out of allotted time last May for an off-the-record meeting with Vice President Kamala Harris so he could ask why Biden was not agreeing to an interview. Harris was upset and later told aides the line of questioning was a waste of time for the meeting, which included dozens of staffers for the paper.
Harris told Sulzberger to contact the White House press office for his interview.
AYFKM??? That’s the political equivalent of going to Mom when Dad tells you that, NO, you can’t have the 2025 Lamborghini Countach you’ve been demanding because you’re only 16 and you’ve already spectacularly failed four driving tests. Why would anyone trust you with a vehicle worth more than a quarter-million dollars and that few humans on this planet can handle?
Besides, all Sulzberger wants is to sit down with the President, get enough information out of him that he can twist egregiously, and then fuck him on the front page of the Sunday Times.
Why would President Biden give the time of day to a newspaper that’s decided to focus on negative coverage to " force” his “cooperation?” Someone needs to grow up here- and it’s not the President of the United States.
During the pandemic, when Agolf Shitler went nuclear on the free press, Erin and I purchased subscriptions to the Times and the Washington Post. As fish-wrap, the Post has some utility, but it’s generally been owned and run by Conservative White males…so what does that tell you?
As for the Times, I like the characterization used by
, who calls the Grey Lady “a Right-wing newsletter with recipes.”Yeah, it’s pretty hard to fuck up recipes by somehow politicizing them, eh? Maybe using the wrong red state flour? Is that even possible?
But to refer to the Times as an exercise in Journalisme objectif is to stretch credulity well beyond its breaking point.
Case in point:
(Because stating the blindingly obvious at a time when it’s blindingly obvious is clearly a failure of objectivity, no? NO!!)
The Times article, by Benjamin Mullin, doesn’t get around to mentioning even a single example of criticism of NPR CEO Katherine Maher’s tweets until the fifteenth (15th) paragraph, when it tells readers:
Christopher Rufo, a fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute, called attention to many of Ms. Maher’s posts on X and shared a response from Tesla’s chief executive, Elon Musk, who had responded to one of Ms. Maher’s posts that Mr. Rufo highlighted, saying, “This person is a crazy racist!”
“If NPR wants to truly be National Public Radio, it can’t pander to the furthest-left elements in the United States,” Mr. Rufo said in an interview. “To do so, NPR should part ways with Katherine Maher.”
Yep, Christopher Rufo.
You saw that coming a mile away, didn’t you?
Christopher Rufo? The my-way-or-the-highway Conservative who makes Ron DeSatan look like a fucking choir boy?
How ‘bout I try to do a wee bit o’ my editing magic on that for you?
“If NPR wants to be truly National Public Radio, it can’t pander to those who jump on every instance of reporting the truth about Donald Trump as pandering ‘to the furthest-left element in the United States.’… ‘To do so, NPR should ignore self-righteous Right-wing diaperstains like Chrisopher Rufo…or tell him to forcefully and furiously fornicate himself forthwith.”
Of course, that’s me…and we all know I can be a we bit reactive. I hate diplomacy…especially when you have someone like Rufo who’s been a hypocritical asshat.
Yo, Chris…lose the blatant, impossible to ignore hypocrisy, or go fornicate yourself, ‘kay? Who knows, you’re such a freakin’ narcissist that you might actually enjoy it.
I should note at this point that the blockquote above — the Elon Musk quote Rufo solicited, and the Rufo quote the Times solicited from Rufo — constitute one hundred percent (100%) of the examples of criticism of NPR’s CEO’s tweets contained in the New York Times article headlined “NPR C.E.O. Faces Criticism Over Tweets Supporting Progressive Causes.” That’s it. Two quotes, zero paraphrases. And one of the quotes didn’t even exist before the Times began “reporting” this story; the Times itself brought the quote into existence.
This is absolute trash.
One quote, from…what, the Pleistocene Era…or whenever Trump’s rampant, virulent racism nauseated Ms. Maher enough that she felt moved to tweet about it. Like millions of good and decent Americans haven’t done the same thing (myself included, and I’m apologizing to no one).
If I were Kathleen Maher, I’d invite Rufo to my office (making it sound as if it’s an opportunity to bend the knee in submission, as it were), and, as soon as he stuck his hand out to shake mine, I’d sucker-punch him and break his nose.
Of course, this is why I will be the CEO of precisely nothing in my lifetime, and I’m OK with that. Diplomacy is for losers and people willing to (or who believe they can) deal with asshats and hypocrites, which I hate with every fiber of my being. I detest Conservatives (and anyone else) who live according to a double standard. There’s one ridiculous standard that can easily be applied across decades for Liberals and Democrats…and another, more fungible and far less onerous one for people on his side. It’s ridiculous, I hate everything about it, and I won’t stand for it.
The moral of the story, then, is that if you’re looking for diplomacy, call Anthony Blinken. I’m not and never will be your guy.
And the Times’ willingness to traffic in this sort of absolute trash is indicative of A.G. Sulzberger’s willingness to plant his flag in his definition of Journalisme objectif and live with the hypocrisy inherent in it.
As
goes on to say,A mildly discerning reader can tell it is a trash article even without knowing who Rufo and Musk are. Some Guy tweeting about NPR’s CEO, followed by Some Other Guy tweeting that the CEO is a racist, followed by the Times calling the first Guy up and getting a quote from him — that isn’t a story. That isn’t even the notes for a story. That isn’t even the idea for the notes for a story. It’s lazy and dumb and a completely transparent effort by a reporter and a news company to piggyback their own agenda into print with just the tiniest shred of pretext. It’s basically just a gigantic middle finger to Times readers.
Ah, but we do know who Rufo and Musk are: They are propagandists and racists. Not that the Times article mentioned this; that would have undermined the whole ridiculous thing.
If you’re going to base an entire article on Elon Musk calling NPR’s CEO a racist, as the Times did, you have to give readers some context to assess Musk’s credibility on such matters. The Times provides none; it describes him simply (and weirdly, given that it quoting a tweet2 he posted on Twitter,3 which he owns) as “Tesla’s chief executive.”
“A mildly discerning reader?” Hey, welcome to today’s coffee-spew moment, eh?? A mildly discerning two-year-old with a passing interest in journalistic standards knows you don’t base an entire argument, and thus an article in the New York Times, on a single tweet. That’s bordering on journalisme tabloïd.
Hey, Sulzberger? Is your Pecker leaking? Just asking for Christopher Rufo.
So, the Times (as well as every other rational human) is well aware of Elon Musk’s racism, and yet they have yet to call him out in the same way they seem to be trying to stamp out “Liberal bias” at the Grey Lady.
In three recent articles, all written by Benjamin Mullen, the Times has continued what appears to be a concerted effort to very publicly disavow the paper’s “history” of leaning Left.
If this sounds familiar, it should. We’ve seen it time and again- ad infinitum, ad nauseam.
Sound familiar? It should: This is the same playbook the Times, Rufo, and Elise Stefanik ran against Harvard last winter.
That’s because the New York Times is an active and eager participant in a right-wing culture war intended to demonize and destroy any institutions that might provide the slightest bit of resistance to Trumpist authoritarianism.
No one on the Left should be shedding tears for Harvard…or any of the Ivies, for that matter, but this is a time-honored and frankly yawn-inducing tactic, a game/con run by Conservatives practically since the dawn of time. It’s been run for so long that Nazi Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels employed it himself.
It’s deceptively simple. All you need to do is accuse your adversaries of doing precisely what you want to do. Then, while the public outrage cascades down upon them, you can do an end run and carry on practically without notice.
And now the New York Times is doing it, and it’s part of the reason I no longer have a subscription. If I wanted Right-wing propaganda, I’d pay for a subscription to Fox Nation or any Sinclair Broadcating channel.
There’s an endless supply of right-wing grifters and con artists like Rufo. He isn’t really the problem; he’s fungible. The problem is that whenever a new huckster on then Right emerges, the New York Times falls all over itself to amplify his lies. They did precisely the same thing with James O’Keefe almost 15 years ago.
At some point, when the same news company seems to keep falling for transparent bullshit, we’re the suckers if we don’t conclude that they’re just doing what they want to do. And we’re helping them get away with it: The Times’ doesn’t much care if liberals think the Times is easily manipulated by right-wing liars — they’d much prefer that to liberals recognizing that the Times purposefully helps peddle right-wing lies. The former merely leads to exasperation with the Times and frustration that right-wing propagandists are so effective; the latter would lead to cancelled subscriptions.
If the Times were publishing such transparent Left-wing bullshit, the weeping and rending of garments from the Far-Right would be loud, tiresome…and effective. But, the Times is carrying water for the Far-Right and has been for some time, so it’s all good. No matter how loud the protestations from the Left may be, they fall on deaf ears.
Previously on “Fuck this House,”
Dignity? Pfft…. Who needs dignity when A.G. Sulzberger is for all intents and purposes engaged in performative autofellatio and Christopher Rufo can be overheard in the background offering tips and best practices?
This just in from our Red Deer bureau: “Bothsidesism” sucks donkey balls. Especially when you can’t be bothered to even make the effort to camouflage your hypocrisy.
All of my posts are public at this time. Any reader financial support will be greatly appreciated. There’s no paywall blocking access to my work (except for a few newsletters), but that remains an option. I’ll trust my readers to determine if my work is worthy of their financial support and at what level. To those who do offer their support, thank you. It means more than you know.
Now that’s investigative journalism! 👏👏 So they hear it through the grapevine, and Voila, they produce a shitty whine with a “rich” bouquet of sedimental nonsense. They’ve become the dregs, scraping the bottom of the barrel. Makes me wanna stomp on their seedless grapes.
In addition to gutting its staff of actual reporters (keeping around a couple of big names who do nothing to challenge the status quo), NUT ... typo, I meant NYT ... has so internalized "both-sides-ism" that the idea of actually reporting *FACTS* is all but entirely alien to their corporate culture. WaPo is far from perfect, but I'll actually maintain my subscription to them. At this point, I wouldn't accept a gift subscription to NYT.