Rovinji, Croatia – photo by brotherside. Rovinji is a tourist resort and fishing port, situated on the Adriatic Sea. It is bilingual, with both Italian and Croatian spoken here.
Just over a third of Americans (37%) in 2017 say news organizations generally get the facts straight, unchanged from the last time Gallup asked this question in 2003. But…major partisan shifts in beliefs on this topic have emerged over the past 14 years. Republicans’ trust in the media’s accuracy has fallen considerably, while Democrats’ opinions on the matter have swung in the opposite direction.
49% of college graduates say the news media generally get the facts right, compared with 36% of Americans who attended college, but didnât graduate. 28% of those with no more than a high school education agree that the media get it right.
But education makes little difference in Republicans’ beliefs about the news mediaâs credibility. Among Republicans with at least a college degree, only 18% say the media gets the facts straight, similar to the 12% of Republicans without a college degree who say the same.
Republicanâs trust in the American news media has fallen steadily from 2003 to today. The numbers are striking: Republicansâ trust plunged from 35% in 2003 to 14%, while Democratsâ trust in Americaâs news media increased from 42% in 2003, to 62% today.
Gallup first polled on media trust in 1998. Back then, more than half of both Republicans (52%) and Democrats (53%) believed news organizations generally got the facts straight. Here is a Gallup graph:
Both groups’ belief in the accuracy of the media fell dramatically in 2000, possibly due to bad election-night projections of the 2000 presidential election. Some networks first declared Al Gore, and later, George W. Bush the winner, before ending the night with no official winner. When surveyed a month later In December 2000, just 23% of Republicans said news organizations generally get the facts straight, a 29-percentage-point decline in the two years after the 1998 survey.
The next big Republican shift downward began in 2003. What happened in 2003? The reporting about WMD (weapons of mass destruction) in Iraq on GW Bushâs watch. The media either lied, or suppressed the findings by IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) that there were no WMD in Iraq. That lie helped move us into an unjustified war that had catastrophic results for both the Middle East and for America.
The paradox is that the Republicansâ distrust grew after that, while Democratsâ views improved. Perhaps the Republicans were angry that the press eventually reported the truth. Perhaps Democrats forgave the press after they finally reported the truth, turning their anger to George W. Bush for lying us into war.
And our Monday discussion of Sen. Lindsay Grahamâs false meme that âObama failed to unite usâ can be linked to this as well. The Republicans lack of trust in the news media has led to their willingness to dismiss facts as âfake newsâ, enabling things like Grahamâs lie.
That willingness empowers distortion of the truth as a âgo-toâ strategy in the GOPâs politics of persuasion.
Given the Gallup findings, Trumpâs frequent attacks on the media may have been as much his taking advantage of GOP attitudes, as his creating a poor Republican view of the press by his use of the “fake news” meme.
On the Democratic side, their increased confidence in newspapers may be a counter-reaction to Trump’s criticisms. Gallup found in June that the percentage of Democrats who have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in newspapers nearly doubled from 2016, rising from 28% to 46%.
The overall finding that a solid majority of the country believes major news organizations routinely produce false information may have disastrous consequences for our democracy. It is at least related to Americans’ diminished trust in US institutions, and our rising cynicism about the American political system, and our elected officials.
Democracy is impossible unless both our politicians and the press are honest.
Here is âImmigrants (We Get the Job Done)â originally from the musical, âHamiltonâ. This isnât the version you hear in the musical. This version is from the âHamilton Mixtecâ, performed by K’naan, featuring Residente, Riz MC & Snow Tha Product:
Takeaway Lyric:
Itâs really astonishing that in a country founded by immigrants,
“Immigrant” has somehow become a bad word.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
US Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke announced that there would be no change for the Missouri Breaks National Monument. Zinke is from Montana, so saving one for his peeps isnât a big surprise.
Missouri Breaks is one of 27 monuments established during the previous 20 years by presidents using the Antiquities Act. The Antiquities Act allows presidents to set aside objects of historic or scientific interest to prevent their destruction. The law was created in 1906 to guard against looting of sacred American Indian sites.
In April, Trump ordered the Department of the Interior to review the status of every national monument designated since 1996. As a result of the review, these cultural and/or natural treasures could be significantly reduced in size or even eliminated, and the Antiquities Act itself could be severely limited. The land would remain owned by the federal government, but might lose its protected status, and be contracted to private enterprises. When you allow corporations to ‘lease’ land for oil, fracking, mining, ranching, etc. fences go up, private police forces are hired to keep people out for their ‘safety’.
Not everyone agrees that Trump has the authority to do what he wants. From the Washington Times:
If President Donald Trump or any successor desires the authority to revoke national monument designations, they should urge Congress to amend the Antiquities Act accordingly. They should not torture the plain language of the Act to advance a political agenda at the expense of regular constitutional order.
Indeed, those who claim that the Antiquities Act does not grant a reversal power cannot find a single case in another area of federal law that supports that contention. To override the norm, legislators have to clearly limit reversal powers in the original law; the plain text of the Antiquities Act includes no such limits.
Who knows? Next, Der Donald will lease the Grand Canyon to China for use as a landfill.
But the bigger picture is that behind the smoke and mirrors of Trumpâs pathological lying and the mediaâs obsession with Russia, his cabinet appointees are working like industrious termites, eating away much of the support beams of our nationâs rules-based edifice.
Consider Attorney General Jeff Sessions. From the New Yorker: (brackets and editing by the Wrongologist)
He [Sessions] has reversed the Obama Administrationâs commitment to voting rights…He has changed an Obama-era directive to federal prosecutors to seek reasonable, as opposed to maximum, prison sentences for nonviolent drug offenders…he has revived a discredited approach to civil forfeiture, which subjects innocent people to the loss of their property. He has also backed away from the effort…to rein in and reform police departments, like the one in Ferguson, Missouri, that have discriminated against African-Americans.
Although candidate Trump promised to protect LGBT rights, President Trump last week vowed to remove transgender service members from the armed forces, and Sessions…took the position in court that Title VII, the nationâs premier anti-discrimination law, does not protect gay people from bias. Most of all, Sessions has embraced the issue that first brought him and Trump together: the crackdown on immigration…
All across the government, Trump appointees are busy chewing through the existing regulatory edifice, ending not just Obama-era rules, but others that have been in place for decades.
Another truly damning thing is Trumpâs surrogatesâ efforts to undermine foreign policy. The WaPo reports:
Trump signed off on Iran’s compliance with profound reluctance, and he has since signaled that when Iran’s certification comes up again â as it will every 90 days, per a mandate from Congress â he intends to declare Iran not in compliance, possibly even if there is evidence to the contrary.
American officials have already told allies they should be prepared to join in reopening negotiations with Iran or expect that the US may [unilaterally] abandon the agreement, as it did the Paris climate accord.
It is difficult to see how this ends well for the US. Imagine, Iran and North Korea both pursuing nuclear weapons to deploy against the US. Why would we want to engage on two fronts, when one (North Korea) is already so problematic?
What is the Trump agenda? Are there any articulated goals? What are the strategies to achieve them?
Have we heard a concrete proposal for any of his big ideas (health care, tax reform, or infrastructure)?
We have not, but his termites keep chewing, and soon, our whole building will be compromised.
âGovernments last only as long as the undertaxed can defend themselves against the overtaxed.â â Bernard Berenson
(There is an extra ration of cartoons today. Wrongo is taking a few days to celebrate the hot dogs and potato salad he found in the fridge. Posts will resume on July 5th.)
If this week shows how well we are playing defense, we are all screwed. The party of personal responsibility always blames their opponents when things go wrong. The party of fiscal responsibility will blow up the budget whenever they get in power.
And the party of family values is merrily slashing away at programs that support families:
When it comes to health insurance, the GOP has all the right viewpoints:
Trump revealed his true self with the âMorning Joeâ tweets:
The Court-tested, Judges approved Muslim ban is now in effect:
Trump (or his lackeys) made fake Time Magazine covers featuring the Donald:
Trumpâs Press Team orders no cameras at most press conferences. So on to Virtual News:
Trump Election Commission asks states for each voterâs personal data, like party affiliation and social security number. What could go wrong?
The last weekend in February is now in the rear view mirror. The shortest month seemed like an eternity to most of us. Even thinking about looking forward is madness, March Madness that is, a favorite time for Wrongo, one of the few times when watching televised sports dominates at the Mansion of Wrong.
The Wrong family is off to Florida this week for the annual visit to his family. So columns may be like the Florida breezes, light and variable.
Remember Tuesday is Mardi Gras, which for some of you is your last guilt-free celebration until Easter. If you prefer less partying and more angst, by all means watch Donald Trumpâs Tuesday address to a joint session of Congress.
Politico reports that House Democrats plan to troll Trump during the speech. Rep. Jim Langevin (D-RI), is leading an effort to have his colleagues bring diverse guests to the speech on Tuesday. The effort is designed to focus on Trumpâs immigration and refugee policies, perhaps stealing a bit of the spotlight from the president’s speech. Wrongoâs advice to Dems is to respect the office of the president. They can sit on their hands when Republicans applaud the Overlord, but they should avoid overt displays that make them look like loonies on the floor of the Congress. Wrongoâs further advice is not to attend this manufactured event. After all, there is no requirement in law or custom for it; it isnât a âState of the Unionâ speech. And itâs the first time since Eisenhower that a president has given this type of out-of-sequence address.
So donât expect that each time Trump tells a whopper, Dems will yell out âyou lie!â despite the fact that since Republican Rep. Joe Wilson did it to Obama, it seems to be ok. And most likely if the Orange Overlord is speaking, this time, it will also be true.
So let’s wake up with a song about lyinâ politicians. Here is âPolitician Liesâ by Steve M:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A71e5KRS6Ig
Sample Lyrics:
Politician lies
Hide what money buys.
They know right from wrong
Still they come on like King Kong
With a fat superpac
You canât get them off your back.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
The NATO Defense Ministers are meeting this week, and a big issue is the financial support provided by the member nations. The US spends more of its GDP on NATO than any other member, 3.6%, or $664 billion in 2016. NATO countries have committed to spending 2% of their GDP on the military, but the only countries currently meeting that target are Britain, Poland, Estonia and Greece. At a preliminary meeting, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the ministers would âstress the importance of fair burden-sharing and higher defence spending,â
New US Defense Secretary, Gen. Jim Mattis, warned that continued American support for NATO could depend on other NATO countries meeting their spending commitments:
Americans cannot care more for your childrenâs future security than you do…I owe it to you to give you clarity on the political reality in the US and to state the fair demand from my countryâs people in concrete terms…If your nations do not want to see America moderate its commitment to this alliance, each of your capitals needs to show support for our common defense…
Europe is reluctant to pay for its own defense. The GDP of the EU approximates that of the US, but its military budget is less than half of ours. Trump is correct to question why Europe doesnât pay its fair share. Of course, he isnât the first US president to make that point.
This issue is well known, but a Win/Gallup survey provides a disturbing portrait of the will of people in Europe to defend themselves. The survey shows that 61% of people polled across 64 countries would be willing to fight for their country. However, there are significant differences in willingness to fight by region. It is highest in the Middle East (83%), but, it is lowest in Western Europe (25%).
Win/Gallup surveyed a total of 62,398 persons globally, and developed a representative sample of around 1000 men and women in each country. This is somewhat old data, the field work was conducted during September 2014 – December 2014.
In Europe, the highest number willing to fight was Finland at 74%. The Netherlands was at 15%, Germany was at 18%, Belgium, 19%, Italy, 20%, UK, 27%, France, 29%. Â Except for Turkey at 73%, Greece at 54%, and Sweden at 55%, a clear minority of people in the NATO countries said they would be willing to fight for their country.
Only 44% of Americans surveyed said that they would fight for our country.
We should remember that like us, most European armies have professional militaries, and that is probably reflected in the survey results. Neutral Finland still has a draft, and trained reserve of about 900 000. They also have an 830 mile border with Russia.
It is also possible that there was confusion, with some respondents thinking about fighting an offensive war, while some could have been thinking of a defensive war. Another difference could be due to whether the respondents think an offensive or defensive war is more likely for their country.
Europeans have become used to having the US foot much of the NATO bill. The bigger question is raised by the Gallup survey: What would they do if we had a real fight?
BTW, would most Americans fight for America? Survey says “no”.
With the Trump administrationâs moves to deport Mexicans, letâs remember a plane crash in Los Gatos Canyon in January 1948 that resulted in 32 dead. The news reported it as four Americans and 28 migrant workers whose names were not recorded. They were simply called âdeporteesâ in news reports, because they were being deported back to Mexico. Woody Guthrie wrote “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)” to remember them. Here is Judy Collins with âDeporteeâ:
On Labor Day, 2013, a monument was unveiled listing the names of the 28 who perished in the crash. After 65 years, the names of the 28 were finally known.
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Wrongo has never written about climate change, but will make an exception today. NASA recently released a series of then and now photos called “Images of Change” which reveal how our world has changed (not for the better) over the past 30+ years. The series provides a comparison of satellite images that depict everything from Arctic ice retreat to island building, to urbanization.
The series shows how rapidly our planet has changed in recent decades, due largely to urbanization and climate change. Perhaps, with the Trump administration firmly in control of a climate denial narrative, these photos will soon disappear from the internet, so please go and see all of them while it is still possible.
Here is one photo that shows the Arctic’s sea ice. It is clear that the ice has been shrinking for decades. The picture below compares September 1984 (on the left) with September 2016:
The total area of persistent (4 years or older) ice has declined from 718,000 square miles to 42,000 square miles in the 32 year time period. In the images, blue/grey ice is younger whereas white ice is older. But please calm down, you canât stop the Trump express to climate Armageddon unless:
We take control of the Senate from the Republicans, and
Win the White House in 2020.
And at a time when we wonât let most Muslims into our country, and absolutely zero Syrians, maybe itâs time we chill out with a beautiful song by a Syrian national currently based in Paris, Lena Chamamyan. Here she is singing âLove in Damascusâ. The accompanying video has many photos of Damascus; probably most taken before the rebellion. Wrongo could not find a reliable translation from Arabic for you, but the singing is beautiful:
Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.
Everyone knows by now that Trump signed an Executive Order (EO) on Friday barring people from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US. But many people traveling to the US from those countries, including some who are legally permanent US residents, were in the air at the time of the ban, and couldnât turn around.
By early Saturday evening, several federal judges in NY, MA, and including Leonie Brinkema of the Eastern District of Virginia, made rulings that would at least stall the implementation of portions of Trumpâs anti-refugee executive order. The Daily Beast reported:
As a result, airports across the country turned into Lawfare zones, with cadres of volunteer lawyers squaring off against bureaucrats in the Customs and Border Protection agency. Late-night rulings from federal judges made a legally unprecedented situation even more dramatic, with all three branches of the federal governmentâcongressional, executive, and judicialâwarring with each other.
There are three things to consider in this fast-developing story. First, how unprepared the Trump administration was to actually carry out their own EO. From CNN: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)
Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) leadership saw the final details shortly before the order was finalized, government officials said. Friday night, DHS arrived at the legal interpretation that the executive order restrictions applying to seven countries â Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen â did not apply to people who with lawful permanent residence, generally referred to as green card holders.
CNN further reports that the White House overruled that guidance, with the order coming from Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon. They decided that, on a case by case basis, DHS could allow green card holders to enter the US. It was decided by DHS that green card holders could fly to the US and would be considered for re-entry on a case-by-case basis after passing a secondary screening. But CNN reports that the guidance sent to airlines on Friday night said:
Lawful permanent residents are not included and may continue to travel to the USA.
It gets worse for Trump: Before he issued the EO, the White House did not seek the legal guidance of the Office of Legal Counsel, the Justice Department office that interprets the law for the executive branch.
CNN indicates that the EO did not follow the standard agency review process overseen by the National Security Council. Â That inter-agency process would have asked the Justice Department and homeland security agencies to provide operational guidance, but it didnât happen.
Brinkema…ruled that the travelers detained by Customs and Border Protection had a right to see lawyers.
After the judgeâs ruling, lawyers standing by at Dulles expected they would be able to see the detainees and try to help them get into the US. But, the CBP would not let them see their would-be clients. The Daily Beast reports that itâs unheard of for government agencies like CBP to prevent people who have the legal right to live in the US from seeing their lawyers.
But, thatâs what happened. In fact as the evening wore on, it became clear that CBP was defying, or at best slow-rolling Brinkemaâs ruling. The lawyers at the airport believe that meant someone must be in contempt of court. The judge could theoretically have sent in federal officers to force CBP to let the lawyers meet with the detainees, but, that would have been unprecedented, and it didnât happen.
The third issue is that Saudi Arabia was not on the banned country list. Thatâs right, the country most responsible for supporting and sustaining both ISIS and Al Qaeda skated. Our past few presidents found it convenient to cozy up to the Saudis, but should Trump be continuing that coziness?
If Trumpâs intention was to punish sponsors of terrorism, the ban should have hit Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which is where the money and most of the actual 9/11 terrorists came from.
This is what the next 4 years are going to be like. But the question is, are the Trumpets going to become more competent as they go along, or is this what we should expect going forward?
Todayâs wake up is for Donald Trump and his administration.They need to govern, not play pretend president.
To help them wake up, here is Xenia Rubinos performing “Mexican Chef“, from her album âBlack Terry Catâ. Itâs her ruthless critique of the undervalued labor that immigrants perform every day in America:
âAll of the true things that I am about to tell you are shameless lies.” –Kurt Vonnegut.
Quoting from Vonnegutâs âCatâs Cradleâ seems to catch the Trump zeitgeist. It was hard to focus on what the GOP and Trump were doing between the tweetstorms. So you could be forgiven for not noticing that Trumpâs ban on immigration includes Green Card holders from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. And Homeland Security says thatâs really the policy. Legal residents holding the wrong passport who happened to be outside the US are now stranded. This includes students, business executives, and even a few US business owners. You can leave, but you cannot come back is the message of the day. Christians will be allowed in though, so hereâs the best idea yet:
Trump builds a wall to keep Speedy out:
This is from Italyâs Matteo Bertelli. You can bet that in his next panel, Speedy jumps up on Trump’s head, and The Donald grabs a hammer…
Voter fraud is a yuuge problem only in the Orange Ahabâs mind:
When it comes to health insurance, the GOP has all the right viewpoints:
