Grumpy Editor

Mainstream media members surprised by Trump's scolding

Big names in cable and TV news channels are still grumbling about last week's off-the-record meeting with Donald Trump at Trump Tower in New York in which the president-elect criticized them for their election and post-election coverage, noted Grumpy Editor. 

A source told the New York Post that the "TV execs and anchors went in there thinking they would be discussing the access they would get to the Trump administration, but instead they got a Trump-style dressing-down.” 

Trump started with CNN chief Jeff Zucker and said, "I hate your network, everyone at CNN is a liar and you should be ashamed," added the source.

About three dozen people were in attendance --- and silenced.

Among attendees were NBC’s Deborah Turness, Lester Holt and Chuck Todd; ABC’s James Goldston, George Stephanopoulos, David Muir and Martha Raddatz; CBS’ Norah O’Donnell, John Dickerson, Charlie Rose, Christopher Isham and Gayle King; Fox News’ Bill Shine, Jack Abernethy, Jay Wallace and Suzanne Scott; MSNBC’s Phil Griffin, and CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, Erin Burnett and Zucker.

After the meeting, Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway said the gathering went well.

The following night at the annual dinner of the Committee to Protect Journalists, hosts included New Yorker editor David Remnick and CNN chief Zucker, both warning that the fight for press freedom has moved “close to home.”

Alan Murray, Fortune editor who attended the dinner, said, “How well the press can function in the era of Trump is one of many questions hanging over the months ahead.”

 

IN CASE YOUR FAVORITE NEWS OUTLETS MISSED THESE...

Now, about global warming --- or cooling:  While global warming folks continued to focus on warmer temperatures in the U.S., nothing was said about an unusual cold air mass in Japan where snow fell in Tokyo last week for the first time in November in 54 years. Meanwhile, Britain’s Daily Mail reported global average temperatures over land have plummeted by more than one degree Celsius since the middle of this year, the steepest fall on record. The news comes amid mounting evidence that the recent run of world record high temperatures is about to end, the paper added. The fall, revealed by NASA satellite measurements of the lower atmosphere, has been caused by the end of El Nino, the warming of surface waters in a vast area of the Pacific west of Central America.

The post-election stock market continued upward last week, reaching a new Dow Jones Industrial high of 19152.14 despite prognosticators, before Nov. 8, calling for a steep decline...Look for a boom in energy action as the Trump Administration sets its sights on job-building with offshore oil drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic...President Barack Obama last week shortened the sentences of 79 more prisoners, surpassing the 1,000 mark for commutations granted during his presidency…Univision Communications, the Spanish-language media giant, will lay off between 200 and 250 staffers and plans restructuring after it slipped into the red last quarter…Where is the Army?  U.S. Navy Senior Chief Petty Officer Scott Cooper Dayton, 42, was killed by an improvised explosive device in northern Syria, with no media outlet mentioning the veteran U.S. Navy member was far from sea --- on land with an explosive ordnance disposal mobile unit…President-elect Donald Trump named Fox News analyst K.T. McFarland as deputy national security adviser to serve under retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, Trump's national security advisor...About 5.6 million existing homes changed hands last month, a 2 percent year-over-year rise to the highest figure since February 2007, reported the National Association of Realtors.

 

     The military newspaper Stars and Stripes revealed hundreds of veterans with terminal brain cancer and their families were close to being fast-tracked toward millions of dollars in government benefits and compensation, before a White House decision prevented it.

 

Dark disrespect cloud drifts over United States

Disrespect and anti-American are the words coming into play in the past week linked to two shameful events --- both with limited media coverage, noted Grumpy Editor.  

A Gold Star family from California, on their way by plane to meet the remains of their Army son, Sgt. John Perry, killed by a suicide bomber inside Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, were greeted by boos from some first-class passengers when the American Airlines pilot of their delayed jet allowed a "special military family" to deplane first so they could make a connection in Phoenix.

The father, Stewart Perry, a retired Marine, said, “It was really disgusting on the passengers’ part.” 

Sgt. Perry, who will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery, was among four American's killed and 14 injured on Nov. 12.

Meanwhile, following a performance of the Broadway show "Hamilton," and with the cast lined up on stage for a curtain call at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, cast member Brandon Victor Dixon took to the microphone to address Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who was departing, with the message:  “We, sir, we are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights."

President-elect Donald Trump later demanded an apology to Pence from Dixon and the show's producers.

Meanwhile, the theater's PR person is probably having fits while bracing for a drop-off in ticket sales for the show.

 

IN CASE YOUR FAVORITE NEWS OUTLETS MISSED THESE…

Post-election media notes. The New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and CNN continued to take post-election jabs at Trump and his actions.  Example from a N.Y. Times lead: "With Donald Trump set to become the 45th president of the United States, the spirit of openness that has permeated everything from our increasingly global economy to how we travel may be poised to change.”…A majority (59 percent) of U.S. adults reject the idea of adding interpretation in news stories, saying media should present the facts alone, found a Pew Research Center survey..."One of the biggest disappointments of this election season has to be the final unraveling of the mainstream media," declared Mario Diaz, writing at CNSNews.com. "I hesitate to say it, but for practical purposes, the mainstream media are dead." He added, "They're dead because they cannot be trusted.” Díaz serves as Concerned Women for America's (CWA) legal counsel and leads CWA's Legal Studies Department…A Texas television reporter is out of a job after she criticized President Obama and praised President-elect Trump on her personal Facebook page --- claiming the country went “downhill” under the outgoing commander-in-chief.

Fort Motor Co. decided to reverse course on a plan to relocate Lincoln sport-utility production from Kentucky to a factory south of the U.S. border...And the slow legal action continues: Trial for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, accused of walking off his post in Afghanistan in 2009, is now slated for May 15, 2017...Projectiles fired from the Navy's biggest and most advanced destroyer cost too much.  So the USS Zumwalt is likely to be firing blanks...California quake chatter pops up again: Scientists discovered two fault lines link north of San Francisco, creating a risk for those living in the Bay Area…Three Trump Place apartment buildings along New York’s Hudson River were being renamed solely with their street addresses --- 140, 160 and 180 Riverside Blvd. --- after a group of residents started a petition before the election to take the name down. While built by the Trump organization, new owners took over in 2005…Fashion designer Sophie Theallet, who dressed first lady Michelle Obama, said she refuses to dress incoming first lady Melania Trump because of the “rhetoric of racism, sexism, and xenophobia unleashed by her husband’s presidential campaign,” reported the Huffington Post.

 

Look for major changes at Bloomberg Businessweek. The action will include layoffs, desk shuffling and new top leadership.

Pollsters, key media and stock mart analysts get it wrong

The "surprise" election of Republican Donald J. Trump illustrates the blushingly wrong-way predictions via political polls, mainstream media and stock market analysts, notes Grumpy Editor.

The question now:  will folks believe them next time?

Polls were way off base. A prime example is Reuters.  In late August, a Reuters/Ipsos poll proclaims Democrat Hillary Clinton, in winning key swing states, would have "a 95 percent chance of beating" Trump.  Then in newspapers on election day, a Reuters/Ipsos story trumpets "Clinton has about a 90 percent chance of defeating" Trump in the race for the White House.

Pollsters, in attempting to recover their blunders, claim their jobs are more difficult now because people are changing how they communicate, with cell phones taking the lead over land lines and the internet.  

Meanwhile, key media, including most TV news outlets, simply got it wrong along with their political pundits, losing touch with many Americans.  Right through election day they had Clinton riding a comfortable victory over Trump.

Pre-election predictions by most stock market analysts warned that with a Trump victory there would be a collapse in share prices.  Instead, the Dow industrials jumped 257 points the day after the elections and wound up the week in new high territory, with the Dow at 18847.65 points.

Believability will be a difficult effort for pollsters, key media and stock market analysts the next time around.

Associated Press got into the act, too, in updating its Stylebook's political terms, mentioning not to refer to the husband of Hillary Clinton as “first gentleman” in the White House but simply “former President Clinton.”

 

IN CASE YOUR FAVORITE NEWS OUTLETS MISSED THESE...

Washington is slow in revealing that the four people killed Saturday inside Bagram Airfield north of Kabul, Afghanistan were Americans --- two service members and two contractors. Sixteen other U.S. service members were injured when a man wearing a suicide vest detonated himself. The event didn’t get major headlines in the U.S…Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., the New York Times’ publisher, appeals to readers for their continued support, promising the paper would “reflect” on its coverage of this year’s election while rededicating itself to reporting on “America and the world” honestly…Got to double check those CNNMoney headlines on the web. On Thursday, one read:  People Magazine has come under fire by readers after publishing a cover featuring President-elect, Donald Trump. Then down in the seventh paragraph the “coming under fire” is attributed to “several of People's readers took to social media to claim they would be boycotting the magazine”…A Rasmussen Reports survey finds that, when asked to choose from a list of factors, 27 percent of likely voters say the character of the candidates was most important to their vote this year. Nearly as many --- 23 percent --- say the economy/jobs was most important, followed by national security and the war on terror at 15 percent while 13 percent say fiscal issues such as taxes, government spending and business regulation as most important…As what happened with the Chicago Tribune in 1948 when its headline incorrectly read: DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN, a Turkish newspaper mistakenly called the election result for Hillary Clinton early Wednesday. Tabloid Posta’s front page headline read "CLINTON PRESIDENT"…Police in Brisbane, Australian in searching the zippered canvas bag of a 50-year-old woman who was being arrested, find a three-pound baby koala. She tells police she had been caring for the animal since she found it the prior day. Police named him Alfred...General Motors plans to lay off 2,000 employees at two U.S. auto plants early next year. 

 

Remember this when ordering a hamburger:

Today is National Pickle Day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gallup poll finds most voters say media favor Clinton

A national poll finds most registered voters agree with what Donald Trump has been declaring in this presidential election:  media are biased, favoring Hillary Clinton, notes Grumpy Editor.

A Gallup poll tallies 52 percent of media are biased in favor of Clinton while eight percent are biased in favor of Trump. 

Meanwhile, the poll also counts 38 percent saying media show no bias toward either candidate, while two percent have no opinion.

The poll echoes what Trump has been working into his speeches for weeks --- simply that journalists are dishonest.



He cites an "important issue for Americans is integrity in journalism."

Trump hastens to add, "These people are among the most dishonest people I’ve ever met, spoken to, done business with. These are the most dishonest people. There has never been dishonesty like we’ve seen in this election."

A common denominator for many of today's journalists is simply that they have not received full journalism basic training.  That includes being fair and balanced or showing neutrality in reporting.

That's because many of those covering politics today are college graduates with political science degrees.

 

IN CASE YOUR FAVORITE NEWS OUTLETS MISSED THESE...

The 2016 World Series may be over but Las Vegas oddsmakers already are zeroing in on next year's World Series, giving last week's winning National League Chicago Cubs 3-1 odds, followed by 10-1 odds to the Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Dodgers and Washington Nationals.  And how does last week's losing American League Cleveland Indians fare?  The team is 12-1...And with this year's World Series, how did the TV viewing audience rate since there was no New York or Los Angeles team involved?  Game 7 in the series reached 40 million viewers, making it the most watched game since 1991.  The World Series as a whole averaged 23.4 million viewers, most since the Red Sox beat the St. Louis Cardinals in 2004.

Down days in print advertising revenue hit key newspapers.  The New York Times Co. reports third quarter earnings falls sharply as print advertising sinks 19 percent while print ad revenue in the latest quarter for Gannett Co. slips 15 percent and Tronc Inc., owner of Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times, among others, reports a 13 percent decline in print ad revenue...The Wall Street Journal next Monday will unveil a new format in its print edition that combines several sections while reducing the size of some coverage areas as the paper copes with an accelerating industrywide decline in print ads.

President Barack Obama last week grants clemency to 72 additional federal inmates. That follows 98 the previous week and ups his clemency to 944 people, including 324 serving life sentences…Thomson Reuters plans to cut 2,000 jobs and take a charge of up to $250 million as the news and financial information company seeks to streamline its business...With media overly occupied with election news, being overlooked is North Korea's plans to launch additional intermediate-range ballistic missiles...People's Viennaline, an Austrian airline, claims it has initiated the world's shortest regular international connection --- an eight-minute hop across Lake Constance, connecting St. Gallen-Altenrhein in Switzerland with Friedrichshafen in southern Germany…Next Monday Tucker Carlson, 47, takes over the hour slot on Fox News formerly held by Greta van Susteren, who left the network in September.

 

Who's afraid? 

A Chapman University Survey of American Fears Wave 3 (2016) provides an unprecedented look into the fears of average Americans. Here are the top 10 fears:

Fear	Fear Domain	% Afraid or Very Afraid
Corrupt government officials	Government	60.6
Terrorist attack	Manmade Disasters	41
Not having enough money for the future	Economic	39.9
Terrorism	Crime	38.5
Government restrictions on firearms and ammunition	Government	38.5
People I love dying	Illness and Death	38.1
Economic/financial collapse	Economic	37.5
Identity theft	Crime	37.1
People I love becoming seriously ill	Illness and Death	35.9
The Affordable Health Care Act/ObamaCare	Government	35.5

See the full list of 79 fears at:

blogs.chapman.edu/wilkinson/2016/10/11/americas-top-fears-2016

 

Sad story out of Waco, Texas.

A couple, married for 74 years, died only 10 hours apart last week.

High school sweethearts, Leonard Cherry, 95, had been in hospice care only days before his death while Hazel Cherry, 93, moved into a nursing home next door.