Really ‘tough questions’  Although the president scooped his own interview by publishing the raw footage on his Facebook page last week (what), CBS aired Lesley Stahl’s “60 Minutes” interview that President Trump cut short last night, and as Jim Roberts says, “Leslie Stahl’s facial expression says it all.” To be fair, as John Levite points out, there were a lot of “Really ‘tough questions’ the equivalent of a job interview. ‘What's your biggest priority?’ and ‘Why do you keep calling scientists idiots?’ Crazy hard questions. No one's been asked harder questions since Abraham Lincoln.”
We did learn what was in that giant book Kayleigh McEnany lugged in. The pages weren’t actually blank, but “It was heavy. Filled with executive orders, congressional initiatives, but no comprehensive health plan.” He cut the interview short, but he did manage to make at least 16 false or misleading claims to ‘60 Minutes,’ according to Daniel Dale’s tally for CNN. How a powerful newspaper did its job In Trump Had One Last Story to Sell. The Wall Street Journal Wouldn’t Buy It, Ben Smith writes in his New York Times column about the White House’s secret, last-ditch effort to change the narrative, and the election — and the return of the media gatekeepers. Or “How the @WSJ Washington Bureau sorted fact from fiction in last week’s Hunter Biden story,” tweets Jared Malsin. Mark Schoofs calls it a “Newsy, thoughtful piece on the Trump campaign’s Bobulinksi allegations and how a powerful newspaper did its job.” “Important story by @benyt on traditional media cos. like WSJ & @nytimes reasserting agency over their reporting and rejecting attempts at infection by political disinfo ops (run by Bannon, Giuliani, etc.),” says Edward Wong, who adds, “Great details on Trump allies trying to spin WSJ.” It’s not you, it’s me  Also not buying the story apparently, one Vladimir Putin. Andrew Osborn of Reuters reports that Putin rejected Trump’s criticism of Biden family business and said he saw nothing criminal in Hunter Biden’s past business ties with Ukraine or Russia. The old "It’s not you, it’s me,” tweets Dave Bloch. “Some men just wanna watch the world burn, notes David Gardner. Or as Gerald Butts puts it, “Troll level: KGB.”
Meanwhile, Jonathan Swan and Alayna Treene of Axios are reporting that Trump plans to fire heads of FBI, CIA and Pentagon if he wins re-election. “A win, no matter the margin, will embolden Trump to ax anyone he sees as constraining him from enacting desired policies or going after perceived enemies,” they write. “Love to pretend we live in a democracy,” is Matt Negrin’s reaction to those details. Polling, voting, dysfunction Greg Bluestein of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports on the latest AJC poll, which shows deadlocked races for president, Senate seats in Georgia. Nationally, Nicholas Riccardi and Angeliki Kastanis of AP News report that the GOP is slowly chipping away at the Democrats’ advantage as the early vote total has already surpassed 2016’s. Nicholas Riccardi has the highlights: “More people have voted in the presidential election than voted early in all of 2016. 1/4 of them are new and infrequent voters, typically younger and more likely to be voters of color. GOP has started voting in person but still way behind.” “Hours-long wait to vote? Here's why,” says Penelope Wang — well, in New York, at least. Brian Rosenthal and Michael Rothfeld of The New York Times take us Inside Decades of Nepotism and Bungling at the N.Y.C. Elections Board. James Dennin notices “tons of wild details in this story about nepotism and dysfunction in the nyc elections board,” while Gerson Borrero thinks, “This, at a minimum, is gross incompetence. It is without a doubt voter suppression-intentional or not. And it’s borderline criminal. An independent NYS Attorney General should investigate.” That is how you ‘round the corner’? Maggie Haberman of The New York Times links to their initial story on the coronavirus outbreak in the Veep’s office, Members of Pence’s Inner Circle Test Positive for Coronavirus. At last count, “The total of aides around Pence in the coronavirus outbreak is up to FIVE people. Short, Obst and 3 additional VP office staff, per ppl briefed,” Haberman tweets. In a separate piece, Haberman, Michael Shear, Annie Karni and Sheryl Gay Stolberg report that the Infection of Pence Aides Raises New Questions About Trump’s Virus Response. “More on @maggieNYT’s scoop from last night on Meadows wanting to keep the Covid diagnosis in the VP’s office under wraps,” tweets Yashar Ali. Also, a Pence aide did not respond to a question about whether the VP has been treated with the Regeneron antibody cocktail as a preventative measure. “If they have been hit TWICE in 1 month in the W.H how, simply put, can they protect 330 million Americans?” Amr Khalifa wonders.  Basically, they’re not trying to. As Philip Rucker, Josh Dawsey and Amy B Wang report at The Washington Post, White House signals defeat in pandemic as coronavirus outbreak roils Pence’s office. “Further complicating Trump’s campaign-trail pitch was an extraordinary admission Sunday from White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows that the administration had effectively given up on trying to slow the virus’s spread,” they write. “I guess that is how you ‘round the corner?’” tweets Bill Marler.
Meanwhile, “This is an important story that my colleague @erinalberty and I (but mostly Erin) reported this week,” says Sean Means, who links to his reporting with Erin Alberty of The Salt Lake City Tribune, With coronavirus cases shattering records, Utah’s hospitals say rationing care will start in next two weeks. As Christopher Mims points out, “it’s October 2020, we’ve known how to contain this virus for at least 6 months, and yet doctors in Utah are going to have to start deciding who lives and who dies in the wealthiest country on earth.” “This is embarrassing, infuriating and heartbreaking. Anyone who who says the current administration has handled this pandemic well is either a liar or an idiot,” tweets Jimmy Malone. I am literally dumber now for having read this  Anyway, “The Santa ‘collaboration will not be happening,’ an HHS spokesman said.” Timothy Aeppel is quoting from the Wall Street Journal exclusive from Julie Wernau, James V. Grimaldi and Stephanie Armour, Health Agency Scraps Coronavirus Ad Campaign, Leaving Santa Claus in the Cold. (Mrs. Claus and the elves, too!) As Grimaldi shares on Twitter, “HHS promised to deem Santa Claus actors essential front-line workers and give them the coronavirus vaccine first. Then the health agency stopped returning phone calls.” Kevin Dugan emphasizes that this was a “$250 million program.”
T om Gara highlights “Three paragraphs of pure Trump-era magical realism here, truly miraculous stuff.” “I am literally dumber now for having read this. And so are you all too,” tweets Peter W. Singer. Matt Berman adds, “I’m sorry this story is just blowing my brain right up.” But you know our motto here at the Muck Rack Daily: If we have to know about it, so do you. Environmental abuse and scientific sleuthing A monthslong investigation by Maxine Joselow of E&E News shows GM and Ford knew about climate change 50 years ago. “The discoveries by General Motors and Ford Motor Co. preceded decades of political lobbying by the two car giants that undermined global attempts to reduce emissions while stalling U.S. efforts to make vehicles cleaner,” Joselow writes. Chris D'Angelo urges, “if you read nothing else this morning, read this blockbuster from @maxinejoselow.” In another big new must-read, Rosanna Xia of the Los Angeles Times reveals how the waters off Catalina became a DDT dumping ground. Patrick Fallon says it’s “Insanely worse than I remember hearing about as a kid.” “.@RosannaXia has nailed down the details of an environmental abuse that had been whispered about for decades among scientists,” notes Javier Panzar. “A fascinating story of environmental abuse and scientific sleuthing,” says Steve Clow. “It takes a lot to shock people these days, but this remarkable report by @RosannaXia should shock us all to our core,” adds Mitchell Landsberg. At Heated, Emily Atkin has some climate news Trump can use. She analyzed 30 news articles about Biden’s climate policy, and found that 25 adopted Trump’s preferred framing. “Many post-debate articles focused on Trump’s attacks on Biden’s climate plan, ‘& ignore the fact that Trump doesn’t have a climate plan at all.’ Heated looked at 30 articles about the debate's climate policy moments. Only 5 noted the cost of doing nothing,” tweets Kristin Toussaint. A rare and necessary infusion of joy We just came across this one, and in case you missed it, we’re thinking you might need it about now. As Gray Chapman says, “The daily updates from @englishanj’s tiny critter cafe have been such a rare and necessary infusion of joy in this bleak timeline — a little serotonin, as a treat.” At Bon Appetit, Angela Hansberger shares, I Miss Restaurants, So I Opened My Own…for a Chipmunk. Thelonius Munk is the luckiest chipmunk around because, as Anne Helen Petersen tweets, “The best new restaurant in Atlanta is on Angela Hansberger’s back porch.” As Stephanie Talmadge puts it, “oh my god this is the cutest shit I’ve ever seen.” More Monday reads - Sebastian Shemirani’s mother has became one of the leaders of Britain’s conspiracy community, collecting tens of thousands of followers with false claims – including denying coronavirus exists, blaming the symptoms of Covid-19 on 5G radio waves and likening the NHS to Nazi Germany. He spoke exclusively to the BBC’s specialist disinformation reporter Marianna Spring, sharing How my mum became a conspiracy theory influencer. “This is just horribly sad to watch, but mainly for seeing the human impact of a decade of algo-driven conspiracy shite,” says Jim Waterson.
- For the untold story of the bizarre, secret meeting Malcom X had with the Ku Klux Klan, read ‘Well, What Do You Mean, We Can’t Join the Klan?’ by Tamara Payne and her father Les Payne, published in Politico Magazine. Les Payne, who died in 2018, was a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and editor at Newsday. He is the co-author of “The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X.” Tamara Payne was the principal researcher and co-author of “The Dead Are Arising.” This is the part about “That time the KKK tried to solicit Malcolm X’s assistance in killing Martin Luther King,” tweets Jesse Walker, proving that “Sometimes truth is indeed stranger than fiction,” as Teresa Wiltz says.
- Next is “@RorySmith and I on the path that led to the erasure of @MesutOzil1088 - A strange tale encompassing a Tweet that angered China, accusations of laziness, a pay dispute, backing for a cuddly dinosaur and finally exile.” Tariq Panja links to his New York Times piece with Rory Smith on The Erasure of Arsenal’s Mesut Özil.
- “Remember Trump’s Carrier promise?” asks Shawn Donnan. Spoiler: “We end where we began,” tweets Brian Beutler. David Lynch of The Washington Post has a new piece on how Trump’s Carrier deal has faded as economic reality intervenes.
- The New Yorker has the first Excerpt from Barack Obama’s New Memoir, “A Promised Land,” and “Reading this just a week before Election Day feels like traveling back to ancient times,” says Rui Kaneya. This excerpt focuses on the inside story of the passage of the Affordable Care Act, and Travis Nichols calls it “Sobering, bracing, and inspiring.”
- At The Guardian, Jonathan Wilson pays tribute to Kevin McCarra: a pioneer who changed football journalism. “Such sad news. Kevin was a wonderful writer and all-round lovely guy,” tweets Tom Jenkins.
|
On the blog today, 
No comments:
Post a Comment