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The good news Itamp8217s everywhere Indictments or not Donald Trump is prepping for a new TV season and broadcast and cable ratings already are perking up Fueling his coming controversies Elon Musk is proclaiming Twitter will go manoamano with the New York Times and the Washington Post publishing instant news not edited mainstream media pablum from its intrepid tweeters on the scene And donamp8217t forget the countryamp8217s political industry The cost of the 2024 presidential race could hit 20 billion the biggest share going to ads on screenThe attention paid by 60 Minutes to Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene a Trump and radical right wing cheerleader shows that broadcast news producers are already gearing up for the showtime to come Despite her wacko conspiracy theories and nonstop nonsense MTG has vaulted from the House bleachers to its box seats From scenes pumping iron in tank top and tights to a Scarlett Oamp8217Haralike stroll around her north Georgia version of Tara her 13 minutes on 60 Minutes were a GOP publicistamp8217s dreamThe coverage of course has had its share of critics The massive lies that underpin Greeneamp8217s notoriety barely took a glancing blow Indeed the bottle blonde with buffed up biceps had Leslie Stahl the CBS veteran correspondent who apparently drew the short straw by well her shorter hairs One interview doesnamp8217t make a season Nor is the issue Stahlamp8217s weak response to MTGamp8217s evasions when asked to explain herself The issue is lies and what the news needs to do about them Itamp8217s at the heart of the countryamp8217s problems and not just for the next two yearsTake Greeneamp8217s job as Trumpamp8217s traveling warmup act a schtick sheamp8217s used to spread his falsehoods about the last election coasttocoast Her unremitting mendacity wasnamp8217t a secret But neither 60 Minutes39 voicedover video nor Stahlamp8217s interview deviated from the politest of journalistic protocols in confronting her blatant lies In fact down home southern scenery and gauzy lighting substituted for the camera closeup bare bulb Gestapo interrogationlike format that once made invited guests squirm and arguably 60 Minutes greatThe 60 Minutes segment however represents more than an embarrassing performance for CBS Itamp8217s the latest evidence broadcast and cable news are struggling to cover Trump and his like Unfortunately for the electronic media as well as the rest of the journalism world the challenge will only get worse For political analysts the singledigit opinion poll ratings for virtually all the Republican Partyamp8217s wouldbe presidential nominees are the twobyfour in the wind Multiple indictments or not Trump TV will define the GOP contest guaranteeing a festival of lies from beginning to endquotThe content of much of our public discourse has become dangerous nonsensequot Neil Postman wrote in Amusing Ourselves to Death his 1985 treatise on television and its corrosive effects Postman was ahead of his time Indeed quotnonsensequot doesnamp8217t come close to describing the GOPamp8217s complicity in Trump39s prevarication Consider the fact Republicans have had virtually nothing coherent to say about any of the major issues facing the country for years They didn39t even bother to come up with a party platform in 2020 Expect the same in 2024 as they proselytize Trump39s growing miasma of liesHow broadcast and cable news respond to Trump39s rejection of fact as well as his degradation of truth amounts to more than a test of their correspondents39 cojones and the networks39 credibility That Trump and his baldfaced lies are destined to shape the GOPamp8217s coming presidential election campaign matters Trump and the Republicans have made his lies part of the American political canon as today their House leadership is seeking to do in rewriting the history of January 6th according to his script Striking at the lies will be an uphill fightFor the executives who run the entertainment giants that own the news it may well not be a priority After all along with sitcoms sports streaming theme parks and licensing deals for their big stars39 bobblehead dolls the news as Michael Corleone put it in The Godfather is just business Trump is a money machine Viewership soared with his indictment Take the leading news network As the upcoming courtroom shaming of Fox News appears likely to show Rupert Murdoch and his minions built a business model on Trump39s mendacity and its purveyors Ratings rise when reporting lies What39s not to likeIf the news is supposed to inform to provide the who what when where and the why what does Marjorie Taylor Greeneamp8217s 13 minutes on 60 Minutes tell us To be sure her success in her constituency says something about her voters39 views But her record and how it was treated on air also speaks to the challenge facing the media and the countryForty years ago Neil Postman foresaw the effects of television an entertainment medium on serious political discourse quotWhen serious public conversation becomes a form of babytalk when in short people become an audience and their public business a vaudeville act then a nation finds itself at riskquot Lies are no small part of that dangerPosted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership selfpublishing platformClick the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet

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Kent M. Harrington

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