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Nancy Smith

All-Russia-All-the-Time Makes CNN the Network You Can Miss

July 18, 2017 - 6:00am

My favorite candidates lost in the Republican presidential primary, I admit it. And I've never seen a president use his own sense of self-importance to such strategic advantage as President Trump does.

Nevertheless.

Don't think for a minute I haven't noticed the ugly war CNN in particular is waging against the president, his family and his administration, while the vast complement of daily news goes begging.

Every day in Washington lawmakers discuss health care, the tax code, finance and banking, energy, education and any number of foreign policy issues including immigration and Korea. Where is CNN? On the Russia, Russia, Russia story.

I'm talking about 95 percent of the 24/7 news cycle, from my calculation: The network that colludes with Democrats is doing little more news coverage than building a case against the president -- never mind his family, it's Donald Trump CNN wants -- for collusion with Russia over hacked emails.

In a hidden-camera Veritas video in late June, John Bonifield, a supervising producer at CNN Health, talks about CNN using the Trump-Russia allegations to boost ratings and how directions to focus on it have come from CNN’s CEO Jeff Zucker.

When asked by the Project Veritas reporter, “But honestly, you think the whole Russia shit is just like, bullshit?” Bonifield replies, “Could be bullshit. I mean, it’s mostly bullshit right now. Like we, don’t have any big giant proof.

“I just feel like they don’t really have it but they want to keep digging. And so I think the president is probably right to say, like, look, you are witch hunting me. Like, you have no smoking gun, you have no real proof,” he adds.

Here, as reported in The Daily Caller, are five important issues CNN underreported because the Russia story crowded them out:

Sanders investigation: The FBI investigation into Jane and Sen. Bernie Sanders for allegedly committing bank fraud began in 2015, but barely mentioned, if ever, in the last year.

Va reform: On June 23, President Trump signed a bipartisan bill into law reforming the beleaguered Office of Veteran Affairs that has been the subject of mismanagement and subpar care for veterans in recent years, resulting in lost lives. The bill hastens the processes for VA Secretary David Schulkin to fire employees for misconduct, and bolsters legal protections for whistleblowers inside the department.

Regulatory reform: The GOP and Donald Trump were elected in part to roll back many of the Obama-era regulations. By mid-May, the Republicans had successfully removed 14 of the 15 Obama rules adopted at the end of his administration. Moreover, the House passed a  bill that dismantles parts of the Dodd-Frank banking regulations fulfilling a major campaign promise.

War on terror: Donald Trump delegated the authority of managing troop levels in Iraq and Syria to Defense Secretary James Mattis. Shortly after, Mattis, representing a major shift in U.S. military strategy in the Middle East, announced the president had ordered an “accelerated campaign” against ISIS, no longer waging a war of “attrition” but surrounding the enemy to “annihilate” them. On June 14, President Trump delegated the authority of managing troop levels in Afghanistan to Secretary Mattis, rounding out Mattis’ control of troop levels in the Middle East.

Infrastructure: On June 7, Trump gave a speech in Ohio outlining the details of his $1 trillion infrastructure plan. The president’s plan is to rebuild the “nation’s roads, bridges, highways, dams and inland waterways” only using American inputs. The president cited the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act as a means to “leverage cash” with federal, state, and private sector funding.

The Russia story a la CNN is like a soap opera you can miss for a month, then pick up again and figure out in 10 minutes you haven't missed a thing. Only, you've missed a whole bunch of other things.

Is collusion with Russia news? You bet it is. Anything that's part of an FBI investigation to see what illegal transpired between a presidential candidate's camp and the Russian government is news. It demands daily coverage. But, folks. It's only one story in Uncle Sam's nation of citizens who care more than anything else about their jobs, their health and opportunities for their children.

Maybe that's why, as the president's first-100-days benchmark was approaching, there was almost no buyer's remorse among the voters who put him in office.

None of the media, struggling to survive in the age of the Internet, is the white knight of democracy. But CNN, all by itself, is the most mean-spirited, one-note-Johnny of the lot. In recent years it has developed a sense of itself, as if it had some unifying political purpose. 

To send a clear message, CNN chooses as its chief guest analyst Bob Woodward, one of the men who exposed the Watergate scandal that toppled Richard Nixon. Its message: The press is not only here to hold President Trump accountable, but to bring him down.
 
Listen to Woodward when you get a chance, tone and content. It's unmistakable. He's gone from being a journalist reporting on a war to a soldier fighting in it.

You can find "collusion" defined on Google as “secret or illegal cooperation or conspiracy, especially in order to cheat or deceive others.” 

In the case of President Trump, collusion is anything the media and Democrats say it is. And on CNN in particular, the goal posts are movable. Any fact that supports the narrative that Trump is an illegitimate president is fit to air, while facts that don’t fit the narrative are either uninvited to the network's panel of talking heads or quickly dismissed by "moving to commercial."

I don't know about you, but I'd like to wait to hear the FBI's final report.

The last straw for me with CNN was a near-three-minute analysis of a handshake between President Trump and the president of France.

Admittedly, the White House seems disinterested in learning new crisis-handling skills. But what I'm seeing now are Americans who once weren't so sure about Donald Trump, slowly but surely beginning to sympathize with him. CNN's strategy is backfiring miserably. It didn't win the Hillary vs. Donald war (even though Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer and others made Hillary believe they would). Frankly, it's doubtful they'll win this one either.

Instead of bombarding Americans with anti-Trumpisms and preaching to the converted, wouldn't they have a better shot at winning minds and hearts in middle America by playing the Russia story straight and reporting all the news?

Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith


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Comments

You are apparently only watching the nighttime broadcasts on CNN when they mostly discuss political issues, and have journalist, with both left, right, and Trumpian partisans debate those issues. They cover many of the other issues you mention, purely as News without a panel discussion, during the morning and daytime. Yes, at night they tend to pound Russia quite a bit, but then they do that with every issue. They went on for days and weeks about the loss of Flight MH370 to excess. They're coverage of the carnage on the ground after Hurricane Harvey, Irma and Maria is over-wrought. Frankly, I think they do exact same obsessive thing with Russia, and actually are missing the most important peices of that story including the fact that Michael Cohen and Felix Sater were trying to build Trump Tower Moscow during the election because they felt it would help get "Putin to help them with the election." Sater has more recently stated that both he and Trump "are going to Prison." They've criticized Mueller for trying to get Manafort's Tax records going back to 2006, ignoring the fact that was the year he started being paid by Oligarch Oleg Deripaska $10 Million per year as a unregistered foreign agent to "aid the interests of Putin" in the U.S. and elsewhere. He offered to give Deripaska a "private briefing" on the status of Trump campaign, & Russian agents were reported recorded in surveillance discussing his "asking for their help against Clinton" just before the RNC. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/9/24/1700277/-What-will-happen-when-Paul-Manafort-the-first-likely-Russia-domino-finally-falls They don't talk about any of that, so yeah, they're unsatisfying - but it's not because they have a particular partisan agenda, they're just inept.

Yes, Trump is not sitting idly by waiting for praise, he is from most viewpoints working diligently to increase American values, strength, and character. He has done more in a short period than most modern day presidents. This is not the actions of someone who would like to destroy America. Meanwhile, most of the other politicians in Washington are too busy protecting their “seat” to get anything done. I think it is time for term limits in Washington!

Thank you, Nancy. America comes first and we deserve real News. All we are getting now is propaganda. I don't blame people for having wrong thinking opinions. What else can we expect when we are not given facts to base our opinions on? The media has turned on us. They are helping to bring down our government. We'll survive this. We had this problem during the McCarthy era and we survived.

If YOUR favorite Presidential candidates lost, it was no doubt because they were the usual "run of the mill", or "same old, same old" stunted "political cripples" Nancy. TODAY, Chuck Schumer pontificated about how helpful "his faction" would be to the "healthcare process" (nothing 'new' there..): The Democrats SOLELY created "Obamacare" ("We'll see what's in it when we pass it", said Nancy Pelosi). The CLEAR indication that the "swamp" of "Obamacare" was deep & murky, was the fact that Washington, D.C. politicians and Bureaucrats were "given a pass" exempting them from "Obamacare" thereby creating an overarching "ELITIST CLASS" that clearly indicated to Americans that they were truly the plebeian underclass. The Republicans had better ensure that the new Healthcare plan applies to ALL American Citizens and ELIMINATES Washington, D.C. "Political Elitist Exemptions",...if they expect America's Citizen VOTERS to "buy into it"...

How sad that so many choose the distorted story of Russia Russia Russia in these comments I think the poor polls that were rigged to give folks the idea that H was so far ahead by polling 50% more democrats than GOP they set up a massive disappointment for people who were prepared to ignore her faults especially of character and they got terminal cases of Trump Derangement Syndrome Much like the super bowl lead at half time was not the result BUT NHL fans accepted it better that the H supporters

Really libs? Have you forgotten Teddy Kennedy working with the Russian's and making promises to them if they helped stop Reagan from being re-elected. Or how about Obama spending U.S. taxpayer's money and sending people to Israel to stop Bebe from being re-elected. Or what about Obama being caught on a hot mic promising Putin he would be more flexible after he was re-elected. Or how about the relationship Hillary and Bubba had with the Russians, $145M in donations to their charity and $500K for a Bubba speech after selling 20% of our uranium to Russia. Or Skolkovo which transferred technology to those 'horrible' Russians and is now being used by them to develop a weapons-related project— a hypersonic cruise missile engine. Or what about Podesta's involvement with a Russian energy company that he failed to disclose. Or maybe the meetings Hillary's campaign had with the Chinese ambassador, Cui Tiankai, at his home revealed in a Jan. 7, 2016 email from Clinton's campaign aide, Kurt Campbell, to John Podesta requesting a "an informal, private, off the record get-together" with Clinton. We all remember the 'love' the Clinton's have with the Chinese based on all those 'coffee's' (i.e. $$$'s) at the White House. Remember -- Bubba gave North Korea nuclear reactors and China technology to get their rockets off the ground.

Very good letter and the facts you wrote about are true.The difference is this a "republican" that is being pillaged(ravaged,sacked,laid waste).Just reading the rest of the published letters there is a huge divide in our country.

I agree with one thing you have said in this whole article. There is an ongoing criminal investigation at the FBI. Let it run its course. There is clearly more to this than what the press can uncover. We all deserve to know the truth. From what they have admitted openly, brashly so far, this could amount to indictments for treason... To say there is very little there is misguided at best, just outright lying at worst. I don't like Trump. He is everything that is bad in the world today. However, he deserves the same fair investigation as everyone else. I can only hope, if this proves to be what it looks like, that he is held accountable like everyone else.

You source The Daily Caller?? InfoWars? Breitbart? Got Fox? Reporting the various shenanigans of the Trump administration's ever-spreading ties to Russia should concern everyone-especially the press. You must only attend to CNN (and other credible news organizations) sporadically or not at all. All, except Fox, have reported on the issues you list as being granted short shrift. Guess you missed the several Trump apologists CNN hired to spread the lies ? Fact-checking Trump's myriad false claims of his "accomplishments" is helpful-even for conservatives.As Barbara noted, the free (so far) press is crucial.

Don't kill the messenger - facts are facts.

Nancy. Stop embarrassing yourself. Trump and his team worked with RUSSIANS against AMERICA. That's TREASON.

"Ken",.. You have no ken regarding that of which you speak...

Look at every public figure and turn the mirror on society as a whole. We really should't throw stones...EVERYONE!

Same set of facts. Only difference-it was Hillary they were talking about. Where would you be, Goebbels?

Sorry Nancy you are so wrong. This could all go away if the White House were to start telling the truth.

Nancy I thought you loved democracy not communism. I you writing this article for Putin.

Brilliant retort, not! CNN is being ridiculous in its coverage. If Hilary and the DNC had NOT been in collusion their leaked emails would not have been a problem. It is reminiscent of Richard Nixon. He had the election in the bag but he still resorted to covert tactics like wiretapping the DNC and Ellsberg's pyschiatrist's office!

There is probably no bigger story of our time than the dismantling of our democracy while apologists looked the other way. Thank heaven for a free press that allows even misguided journalists to defend the undefendable

Ditto, Barbara's comment, above. Sorry, Nancy, but we have everything to lose.

Comments are now closed.

nancy smith
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