July 25, 2015 by David K. Sutton
Media’s Obtuse Un-Self-Aware Donald Trump Obsession
For the past few weeks, Donald Trump has dominated the news commentary shows. A common melody intoned from the mouths of hosts and guests is that Donald Trump is, well, trumping media coverage of all the other Republican candidates. The obtuseness of the media in its coverage of Donald Trump is nothing short of remarkable.
The media is by now famously un-self-aware that their coverage has become the story, not Donald Trump himself. It would seem Trump’s bloviating is matched only by media conceit. Because when a guest of one of these shows dares to point out the media’s obsession with Trump, the other guests, even the host, step all over themselves to defend their purpose in this carnival sideshow.
Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr
But, let’s be clear what passes for news here. You have a rich celebrity who is a celebrity due to his richness and his rhetoric. He has decided to run for president (again), but only this time he has taken it further than he has in the past. He can bankroll his own campaign, but really all he needs to do is fly himself around the country and be himself. He doesn’t need to pay for political ads, he has the “news” media that will do that for him. So, he is running for president, employing the same media-attention-grabbing tactics that he has always used every day of his adult life. But because he is a presidential candidate, the media now has carte blanche to do what it does best, discuss and dissect absurdity, stupidity, and bombast, and then do it some more, until they can no longer mine it for entertainment purposes. And if they get called out on it, they defend it as “news” because they are covering a presidential candidate.
So, let’s recap this sad state of affairs:
“News” media obsessively covers every nonsense statement uttered by a blowhard turned presidential candidate blowhard.
“News” media points out that the other Republican candidates are having a hard time getting any attention because of said blowhard.
Reset to the next day.
Repeat the process.
“News” media remains completely un-self-aware of their role in the shenanigans.
Too bad the “news” media isn’t in a place to do something about this. If you didn’t already understand it, you do now. The “news” media is really in this for the entertainment and the ratings. But, if we are watching, then so are we.
