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This is not normal. I don’t have to tell you that.
When things aren’t normal, you can’t treat them as if they are. We need to talk.
In case you were among those who haven’t been paying attention, one of the presidential candidates is demonstrating erratic behavior, and by “erratic behavior” I mean batshit crazy. Saturday’s rally speech by Donald Trump in Latrobe, PA opened with an interminable, disjointed ramble about Latrobe legend Arnold Palmer that culminated with a comment about the size of Palmer’s dangly bits. He topped that by encouraging the crowd to proclaim his opponent a “shit Vice President.” This is not normal adult behavior when addressing a political rally. This behavior would get you booted from a lot of places.
Does that deserve neutral treatment from the news media? Is it incumbent upon editors and reporters to go seek out something, ANYTHING controversial from the other candidate and give it equal play? I mean, this happened, it’s on video, it’s not being denied, and when I saw it I, as a Floridian, immediately thought of the Baker Act. (Google it.) Yet this will fade into a forgotten anecdote as soon as, well, maybe even today, because what used to be front page news now dissolves before your very eyes as the social media-driven news cycle picks up on some other manufactured outrage.
It’s not a brilliant or original insight to note how the news media is failing the U.S. at exactly the wrong time, but it’s also not at all unprecedented. The New York Times is still trying to live down Walter Duranty’s pro-Stalin reporting from the 1930s (that won the Pulitzer). Fact-checking isn’t enough, either; the public seems inured to politicians’ lies, each side excusing their own candidate.
What seems to be happening is that, finally, once and for all, the traditional journalism model is broken. The press is acting as if this is a standard election and a standard political landscape, and that the traditional model of journalism that they learned at Newhouse or Columbia still applies. It doesn’t. The politicians are playing an entirely different game, and too many in the news media are resisting change in covering it.
That, in turn, is why the candidates are going on podcasts and talking to friendly media figures. Kamala Harris will reach the voters she needs through “The View” and Howard Stern and “The Shade Room” and Charlamagne tha God more efficiently than doing interviews with the Times. Trump can connect with the young male audience through Dan Bongino and Patrick Ben-David and Fox News. That doesn’t go down well with some of the traditional outlets, but, again, the game has changed. The news media has both-sides itself into irrelevance.
One solution would be for the traditional news media to stop the pretense of needing to do equal coverage in both content and tone. If something is happening right in front of everybody, reporters and editors should be calling it for what it is, not just ignoring it or waiting for the candidate’s handlers to provide them with the official spin. If a candidate is melting down and talking about a dead golfer’s penis, that should be the lead story, just as President Biden’s age and mental abilities were treated. Instead, on Sunday morning, the New York Times, Washington Post, and CNN buried the story, and the Los Angeles Times didn’t even cover it, not even with a wire service story (and it was fully covered on the AP wire, so there’s no excuse).
It’s probably too late for this election, but, assuming we still have a free press afterwards, the news media industry needs to reevaluate some of its long-standing principles and assumptions. The world changed, and the people who are supposed to be reporting on it didn’t do a very good job of explaining it. It might be time to throw it all out and start over. Maybe Arnold Palmer’s penis will end up saving the world.
Perry Michael Simon is a weekly news media columnist for Barrett Media. He previously served as VP and Editor/News-Talk-Sports/Podcast for AllAccess.com. Prior to joining the industry trade publication, Perry spent years in radio working as a Program Director and Operations Manager for KLSX and KLYY in Los Angeles and New Jersey 101.5 in Trenton. He can be found on X (formerly Twitter) @PMSimon.
