Eric Boehlert: Missing -- where are the "Trump Lies About Voting" headlines?

[babylonsister]

Missing — where are the "Trump Lies About Voting" headlines?
Tell the truth
Eric Boehlert

snip//

It's part of an unnerving media trend of not calling out Trump lies, and specifically not labeling them as he barnstorms across the country trying to demolish faith in public elections. Wasting nearly all of Trump's first term hiding behind claims that he was merely spreading "inaccuracies" or he was "misinformed," the press has allowed Trump’s pathology to become normalized.

What Trump's now pushing goes far beyond the long-running, and bogus, conservative claims that U.S. elections are riddled with frauds, and that laws need to be passed to make it more difficult for Americans to vote. It also extends beyond the series of court battles across the United State that Republicans have waged trying to limit the time and opportunities voters have to send in early ballots.

What Trump is now promoting is stunningly simple: Don't tally all the votes. Specifically, he's lying about how votes are tabulated by the states days after Election Day, regardless if television networks declare a winner on Election Night.

On Monday, he claimed we "must have a final total by Nov. 3," which Twitter flagged as misleading and blocked users from seeing on their feeds. He made the incorrect claim that it’s “totally inappropriate” to count ballots after Election Day. (Voting ends on Election Day, the counting can continue for days and weeks.) Trump also suggested election results can't be trusted because voters can change their votes after they've been cast.

The lies are unprecedented for a presidential nominee, as is Trump's attempt to damage centuries of American election laws and guidelines. Yet much of the news coverage treats it all as merely a unique campaign strategy. "Trump advisers said their best hope was if the president wins Ohio and Florida is too close to call early in the night, depriving Mr. Biden a swift victory and giving Mr. Trump the room to undermine the validity of uncounted mail-in ballots in the days after," the New York Times reported matter-of-factly this weekend, without a hint of how stunning and dangerous that is to our democracy.

“If Trump’s “best hope” is stealing the election, newspaper should say that’s what he’s contemplating, and not describe it as a “best hope,” noted Crooked Media’s Brian Beutler.

more...

https://pressrun.media/p/missing-where-are-the-trump-lies

[Thomas Hurt]

1. Trump doesn't lie, he has an "unconventional presidency"...just ask NPR.

They don't have the balls to say what is true. Trump intends but will fail to become President for life of the USA.

[TwilightZone]

2. Might want to check again.

Check any of the fact-checking sites like Politifact or the WaPo or NYT fact-checkers. They've been calling him out on many of his recent BS claims.

The reaction to some of his claims was so quick he backtracked on them before they'd even been confirmed. The most recent being the claim that he said he was going to declare victory early.

[unblock]

4. They've been much better than 4 years ago. But really they should have dismissed him as a source ago

He has told far too many lies for a responsible media to treat anything he says at face value. Even subjecting sons of what he says to fact-checking is too kind to him. Journalists should know to avoid sources that burn them with lies.

If a crazy man says the sun rises in the north, that's a non-story. Just ignore him. Donnie had a rally and he made up a lot of nonsense and reiterated that he's an idiot and a liar and a racist and a sexist. End of story.

[Silent3]

5. This can't be a job on the sides relegated to specialist "fact checkers"

EVERY journalist needs to be a fact checker, all of the time. Pointing out Trump's lies and false narratives should be HEADLINES, not occasional mentions of his lying, only provided by a minority of journalists.

[unblock]

3. The media is also a willing accomplice in perpetuating hate and stereotypes

It's no longer news that Donnie is a bigot and a sexist, and giving voice to every stereotype he repeats only helps him divide the country.

If they must cover it, the headline should be "Donnie make another racist statement" and the actual statement should be relegated to paragraph 17, if they just cover it at all. The media should not encourage people to think along divisive, hateful lines, no matter what potus says.