Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos pointed to the public’s distrust of the media as justification for not endorsing a president.
Man, Bezos fed a massive dose of reality to those who live in the Washington bubble.
The left lost its mind because WaPo refused to allow the editorial board to endorse a president. Over 200,000 people canceled their subscriptions. Some people have resigned.
Blah blah blah.
Then The New York Post reported that Bezos wants the paper to hire more conservative opinion writers! Whoa.
Well, the public does not trust the media.
I repeat: Us normies do not trust the mainstream media. Why do these people think non-traditional media outlets (like Legal Insurrection!) have become so popular?
Why have podcasts become popular? We do not trust the media.
As Bezos mentioned, the public trusts Congress more than the media and journalists:
Let me give an analogy. Voting machines must meet two requirements. They must count the vote accurately, and people must believe they count the vote accurately. The second requirement is distinct from and just as important as the first.Likewise with newspapers. We must be accurate, and we must be believed to be accurate. It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but we are failing on the second requirement. Most people believe the media is biased. Anyone who doesn’t see this is paying scant attention to reality, and those who fight reality lose. Reality is an undefeated champion. It would be easy to blame others for our long and continuing fall in credibility (and, therefore, decline in impact), but a victim mentality will not help. Complaining is not a strategy. We must work harder to control what we can control to increase our credibility.
We also know that newspaper endorsements don’t move the needles. To me, endorsements are a way for these writers to feel important and like they matter.
No one cares:
Presidential endorsements do nothing to tip the scales of an election. No undecided voters in Pennsylvania are going to say, “I’m going with Newspaper A’s endorsement.” None. What presidential endorsements actually do is create a perception of bias. A perception of non-independence. Ending them is a principled decision, and it’s the right one. Eugene Meyer, publisher of The Washington Post from 1933 to 1946, thought the same, and he was right. By itself, declining to endorse presidential candidates is not enough to move us very far up the trust scale, but it’s a meaningful step in the right direction. I wish we had made the change earlier than we did, in a moment further from the election and the emotions around it. That was inadequate planning, and not some intentional strategy.
Bezos promised that no politician influenced the decision to squash the presidential endorsement.
Bezos promised no one decided against the presidential endorsement as a favor to him or to help boost his businesses.
No personal interest went into the decision.
I enjoyed Bezos telling everyone that those who work at WaPo or The New York Times have “increasingly” started to speak “only to a certain elite,” and they mostly “talk to themselves.”
It’s 100% true.
These journalists and editorial writers think they’re the cream of the crop. They think we hang onto their every word.
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