The Shepherds have a Credibility Problem

Jaybird

Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com

Related Post Roulette

18 Responses

  1. Greg in Ak
    Ignored
    says:

    The MSM has been dead for a while. Also D’s (Biden especially) struggled and failed to use the MSM, for the limited use it has. We had a giant ship take down a bridge in Baltimore. It was a big frickin deal. In the last week or so they got the port up and running. That is the time a prez or candidate should be making speeches and bragging, but they didn’t and the MSM/larger social media space pays attention to bragging and much less about what actually happened.

    The “MSM”, in general and w/o actually looking up data, still makes enough money for it’s owners so i’m not betting on change.

    D’s need to move far more into the social media space on youtube, podcasts, etc. Cause the old MSM ain’t what it was and doesn’t have the juice.Report

  2. Doctor Jay
    Ignored
    says:

    This is the quote that seems to capture it for me:

    If half the country has decided that Trump is qualified to be president, that means they’re not reading any of this media, and we’ve lost this audience completely.

    The NY Times has 10 million subscribers. That seems like a lot but it’s a small fraction of the people who vote.

    Many of those people don’t read newspapers any more. Fox News doesn’t have that many viewers. People listen to podcasts and read Facebook, and watch Twitch and YouTube along with other stuff.

    The media climate is so, so different than we thought.Report

    • Greg in Ak in reply to Doctor Jay
      Ignored
      says:

      The NYT has 10 mil with most of them being in the NY tri state area then spreading down the Acela corridor. It’s always been local paper for NY with national add ons. That lots of old MSM/legacy media still have pay walls is part of their problem that limits there reach.Report

      • John Puccio in reply to Greg in Ak
        Ignored
        says:

        This is flat-out incorrect. The NY Times is a National paper with a NYC metro section. It sets the national news narrative with mainstream media and that has been the case since radio and tv news has existed. A headline in the NY Times in the morning is a block A story for the rest of the country.

        Just today I woke up to the “dark” headline and then an hour later on NBC someone was parroting the exact language.Report

        • Philip H in reply to John Puccio
          Ignored
          says:

          God you guys won and you STILL can’t stop lying.

          No one down here reads the NYT. No one outside the northeast corridor reads the NYT – and if the do its on line.

          That other news media follow its lead says nothing good about the NYT or those media, only that they are one big circular firing squad.Report

          • John Puccio in reply to Philip H
            Ignored
            says:

            You obviously don’t understand how the media ecosystem works.Report

            • Philip H in reply to John Puccio
              Ignored
              says:

              I understand it very well. And I am pi$$ed at it for preferring a horse race to reporting the truth.

              Still true the the NYT is not any more national presence. And hasn’t been for along time.Report

              • John Puccio in reply to Philip H
                Ignored
                says:

                If they have no national presence, why are you pissed at it?

                You have no idea what you’re talking about.

                The NYT still sets the narrative for national media. Your problem is that everyone understands that narrative is biased BS.Report

              • Philip H in reply to John Puccio
                Ignored
                says:

                My problem is the NYT refused to tell the good story of the Biden Administration’s success leading us out of COVID because they didn’t want to appear biased. My problem is the NYT withheld its endorsement of the better candidate because they got butt hurt over when they got interviews. My problem is the NYT still acts like a national organizations when they aren’t.

                And we are all going to pay dearly for that hubris. Some of us more likely then others.Report

  3. Jaybird
    Ignored
    says:

    The WaPo thing was a good start, I think. No more endorsements. Let your reporters say “I’m voting third party!” or whatever. Hell, let your editors say that. Don’t have the paper give an official one.

    It should be enough to know that 19 of the 20 reporters voted for Harris and the twentieth said that they don’t vote because they don’t want it to impact their own impartiality.

    And I can draw my own conclusions from that.

    That’s not a *FINISHING* point, mind… but it’s a starting point.Report

    • Philip H in reply to Jaybird
      Ignored
      says:

      The WaPO and NYT – to the extent they are to blame – did exactly the wrong things. They showed the bullies they could be cowed. This will not end well.Report

      • Jaybird in reply to Philip H
        Ignored
        says:

        One of Misha’s threads is pretty good about this:

        There seems to be a pattern that happens with groups where noble or convenient lies become so pervasive that no one knows truth, and so people get immense sharp surprises and can’t cope. If it’s Theranos, they go out of business. If it’s a political party, they lose elections

        I think the chain of events goes something like.

        We are good, and they are bad. Therefore it’s ok for us to fudge the truth so we win. We lie about how good we are and how bad they are and it’s fine because we’re good. Woops, we actually just have no idea what’s real anymore.

        It is evidently the case that lying about trump being a Hitleresque mass murderer got donations and acclaim, but did not actually convince enough voters.

        But it leaves everyone who bought the lie panicking right now.

        We have to go back to a place where we’re seeing reality. Reality, as it turns out, is important.

        Important enough to report on.Report

        • Philip H in reply to Jaybird
          Ignored
          says:

          And when he follows through on his promises – remember those were his word we reacted to – then what? When he commodifies my agency and I’m fired either because we no longer have the mission or because I won’t swear loyalty to him, then what?

          I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised you don’t believe him, but “you have to understand” is not exactly an assurance of comfort. Or your support.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to Philip H
            Ignored
            says:

            I’m not trying to comfort you.

            If I were trying to comfort you, I’d be lying to you instead of trying my best to tell you things that I believe are true.Report

            • Philip H in reply to Jaybird
              Ignored
              says:

              I don’t want your comfort, nor do I expect it.

              I demand your protection when the time comes, since its a high civic duty. I also do not expect your protection, in as much as your support of conspiracy theorires and third party candidates is one reason I am now in this pickle.

              I do not trust you Jaybird. That should worry you.Report

  4. Damon
    Ignored
    says:

    I’m going back a long time. i can’t recall what election it was. Might have been Bush 1 or 2. Maybe not.

    Some TV announcer in Wash or NYC said “how could he win, nobody I know voted for him?”

    Of course not. You live in a bubble. All your friends/co workers/neighbors/etc are all like you politically. This is just more of the same….

    And people wonder why I don’t talk about politics in person…..Report

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *