The constant badgering of the media by President Donald Trump as “the enemy of the people” appears to have taken root within the Republican party if a recent Ipsos survey is accurate. The new public opinion survey found that 43 percent of self-identified Republicans said that they believed “the president should have the authority to close news outlets engaged in bad behavior.” Such a power would eviscerate the core protection of a free press in our system and fundamentally alter our constitutional guarantees.
It is difficult to gauge the accuracy of such polls and surveys, but there has clearly been an increase in anti-media sentiment as vividly captured at Trump rallies where media like CNN have been subjected to threatening and abusive treatment.
Forty three percent of Republicans would probably belong to the German American Bund.if it was still active.
I might add that the 43% are all “thoroughbreds”. See the next topic.
Though interesting I would not accept this type of poll’s accuracy.
Objections:
1) selectivity: Only a certain type will be willing to fill out such a form
2) Online surveys are questionable and open to answers that wouldn’t be given in other venues. There are a lot of problems with telephone survey’s and IMO this is a lot worse.
3) The +/- error rate seemed high. The number interviewed was slightly more than 1,000. I’m not sure of how the validity of online polls is measured.
4) Though they have the demographics I didn’t see a breakdown of age, sex etc.
5) I didn’t like the wording of the question and the lack of questions that would help evaluate the validity of results
—
“3_6. Do you agree or disagree with the following statements? – The president should have the authority to close news outlets engaged in bad behavior.”
Bad behavior is too undefined for a question of this nature.
.”Do you agree or disagree with the following statements? – President Trump should close down mainstream news outlets, like CNN, the Washington Post, and The New York Times.”
“A final statistic is somewhat reassuring, only 13% of Americans agree that “President Trump should close down mainstream news outlets, like CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times.” Here less than a quarter of Republicans (23%) agree along with fewer than one in ten Democrats (8%).”
My guess is the response to both questions would be lower in the general population.
Jonathan:
I am a great fan of most of your posts and read them often; but if that poll is an online poll, it cannot have any degree of reliability. I cannot believe taht such a poll is remotely correct.
I do believe, however, that most of the mainstream press has long been thoroughly out of control with its gross bias against, and wildly unfair reporting about, Republicans and conservatives generally, the things they accomplish, and President Trump in particular. This is not to say that that aspect of the press should be shut down, however. It should just be called out for what it obviously has been and is.
Go NU CATS!!
Bob
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Bob Ryan – I am glad to see that you have your priorities straight. College football is about is about to start. Yay. 🙂
https://twitter.com/Thomas_Drake1/status/1027543811206144003
Representative Constitutional Republic Y es Socialist Autocracy NO
Shoiuldn’t be hard we have the entire USA Military backing us.
I think I’ve seen that guy, Drake?, on the city steets, carrying a sign and shouting “the end is near”.
That street performance and his writings are equally impressive.
Thomas Drake was an NSA whistleblower–amongst other things. The Wikipedia article on Drake is a fine place to start.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_A._Drake
P. S. anonymous says many things without actually typing them all out. And it’s generally more effective than an emoji-riddled spoof of a Tourette’s patient. Remember Trump’s mocking impersonation of Sergei Kovalevski??? Maybe there’s a connection. Maybe not.
If you believe in that trash, you must really miss InfoWars. But it was nice of Trump to pardon yet another convicted felon.
In the advanced democracies there is no private funding of candidates allowed, thus reduced influence by the mega rich, corporations, and special interests. This has lead to multiple political parties where more of the voting population is represented. Typically each political party has a newspaper that along with reporting the news, offers slanted political opinions in the editorial sections. The voters subscribe to their party’s paper and understand this. They don’t get their panties in a twist when they read stuff in other papers that they don’t like. The news in general is reported in all papers and what they like to hear is included as editorials and comments. This is typically what happens in advanced democracies.
In the US, which is not an advanced or in any substantial manner, a democracy, but an oligarchy, there are only two parties which scares the voters because it leaves no room for compromise or intelligent governance. It creates polarity and obstruction. Underneath it all the voters know that elections and choice is an illusion. No candidate will make it to the ballot box without the support of the oligarchs. No candidate will place the people’s best interests ahead those of the oligarchs. This produces a base level of frustration, if only subliminal in some cases. Add to this frustration the supposed choice between two options-one more than a dictatorship-and the level of frustration rises. Add to all this the necessary absence of substance from the election process; in order to distract from reality it is necessary to have a level of chaos and anger that obscures our sorry reality.
Anger, hatred, blame, lies, and in general, an overall circus is the fundamental substance of the American political scene. The road taken by the US now leads to the absurd where a buffoon of a President is calling for the control of the media expression of those that don’t agree with him and/or those who are disgusted by him. Americans have a choice, an advanced democracy or increase the illusion that carries these expressions of a dictator-a dictatorship has one party with no bad mouthing press. We have two parties with a bad mouthing President who admires the dictators of other countries.
Since we are an advanced, and the oldest, Republic and not a democracy your words have no meaning in our country.
We’re not the oldest, but don’t let facts get in the way of not bothering to read something you don’t agree with!
Michael
Your tidbit of information regarding the semantics of Republic and Democracy illustrates just how ignorant you and many Americans are. The US is a Republic with representatives elected in a Democratic manner; as opposed to the almost impossible structure that is a Direct Democracy. That is to say that it is next to if not impossible for everyone to get together and elect their leaders. In this way America is structured as a Republic with leaders of the US or THEM parties elected Democratically. Your want to pull your head all the way out, not just part of the way out.
My point, which is an acknowledged fact, an obvious practiced condition, and a travesty, is that the US, while structured in a way so that the voters choose their leaders, is in practice not so, regardless of what you call it. The electing of a representative is wholly conditioned on the exposure to the people through concentrated funding and media circus. The people do not choose Clinton. Clinton is chosen by the oligarchs as one of two choices. If elected she will be obligated to tow the line of those that bought her. The same is true with Trump. However, with Trump we end up with not only a puppet of the oligarchs but one of the head oligarchs, in it for himself and his kine, the mega wealthy. Remember, without all the rest of the people there would be no mega wealthy but without the mega wealthy, there would still be the rest of the people, or all the people, or We the People.
The perversion(s) that have come to be are somehow held sacred in the misinterpretation of the sacred texts. A corporation is not an individual with rights. All men created equal does not necessarily mean that some few can become more than equal. Your quagmire of semantics is reflected in the legal mumbo jumbo of this blog. The law is not justice and justice is not the law. The law is the tool kit utilized to organize the moral compass of the people at the moment. If it were all about non living constitutions and other non living sacred texts we would still have slavery, women would still have little to no rights, etc., etc., etc..
Issac, after reading your first paragraph I stopped because it was obvious that you had only a minimum of knowledge of what you are talking about. The sentences sound OK perhaps for a kid, but the in-depth understanding is obviously lacking.
Would it be easier for you if he just drew pictures in crayon?
“Would it be easier for you if he just drew pictures in crayon?”
Probably, because his command of the English language in this type of discussion is very limited. Are you going to loan him some of your crayons?
As a corollary, then, should news outlets have the authority to oust a President who is a chronic, habitual liar, especially one who tries to sow seeds of doubt about the veracity of the media because the media correctly points out his flaws, lies and mis-steps? So, if a POTUS did have the authority to shut down any media he doesn’t like, would the truth-telling news outlets have to go underground to survive? Sort of like Radio Free Europe?
Republican Trump supporters really don’t understand democracy, the value of a free press and don’t perceive the issue with a POTUS having the authority to shut down media outlets. They lack the intellectual capacity to be allowed to vote.
Republican Trump supporters really don’t understand democracy,
The idea that you are fit to instruct anyone on any subject bar how to game Medicaid to pay for your therapy sessions is most amusing.
And yours even less.
TS to Dance,…
-I just responded to Natacha with a moderate reply, an equally real-reasoned response to her comment.
Moderate and logical in comparison to her comment.
” Repiblican Trump supporters really don’t understand democracy”
And we have yet another outright lie from Natacha, who often goes beyond her “more moderate” wild exaggeration and into her outright lies” …
They lack the intellectual capacity to be allowed to vote”
That’s how your hard-cord Commie works. And an embittered shrew like Natacha was easy pickings, a perfect recruit for the Commies to convert.
And so-called people like Tom are easy pickings for Russia and Trump propaganda.
Just tryin’ to keep this har country safe from the likes if them thar commies like Natchacha
I see that you have concerns about my moderate views, but you did not comment on Natcuckcoo’s view that Trump voters should not be allowed to vote over
So, “silent on that issue” Fishwings probably think that loony extremism is OK, but my mock extremism isn’t.
Thanks for revealing that.
I meant, of course, thanks for clearing that up, you lousy commie.
Should “Not be allowed to vote”. I don’t know how the “over” got added at the end, but I commenting on Natcoukcoo’s remark thatvTrump voters should not be allowed to vote, and Fishwing’s predictable silence on that comment, and others by Batchacha.
She did use the words intellectual capacity, which would put you out of the running. I find it funny that JT would post this to people like you that really don’t believe in real democracy, and they try to bully and push their way around. Anybody that does not conform to your way, is no different than Trump pushing his lies and propaganda.
You have selective outrage at extreme, over-the-top political views.
That is not an uncommon trait in sanctimonious, hypocritical jackasses.
Bray on, Fishbrain, bray on.
FishWings – black conservative David Harris was shut out of his FB account today and demonetized yesterday. There is no notice of what he actually supposedly did to break the TOS.
Sure, what we need are Sedition Laws. /sarc off
Actually sedition laws are legitimate, contra creatures like the sorosphere rent-a-crowd who gave you the lallapalooza of undocumented shopping and arson in Ferguson, Mo. And prosecute Jay Nixon for aiding and abetting.
Prof. Turley, public opinion surveys have quite limited utility. Two reasons for that: (1) Talk is cheap and (2) it’s challenging for a pollster to get a respondent to answer the question as posed; the respondent will answer some other question which occurs to him.
A generation ago, Michael Kinsley used to write columns on poll results in re federal fiscal policy. You put the responses to five different questions down side-by-side and the series made no sense. (These were asked of different samples, not a single sample posed multiple question). The problem was manifest: the respondents were not asked to make real or simulated choices. The Roosevelt Center attempted to get more useful responses by inventing a game called ‘Debtbusters’ and recruit focus groups to play it. Presented with at least simulated choices, the focus groups made decisions which were at least mutually compatible (if not beyond criticism).
Dodging The Question?
SIDEBAR –
DOCUMENT: Peter Strzok Was CIA And FBI At The Same Time, Say Experts
Jul 16, 2018
“Washington is still reeling from Peter Strzok’s testimony on Capitol Hill, where House lawmakers grilled him about his efforts to use FBI government power to try to stop President Donald Trump’s campaign and current presidency. Strzok was the main operative in “Operation Crossfire Hurricane,” a Deep State plot to run legal attacks on President Trump’s team.Now we know that Strzok was really a CIA agent. He only held a ceremonial title in the Bureau, but was really operating under the leadership of the CIA, including Obama’s vindictive CIA director John Brennan.
intellihub reports:
“A sheep-dipped Peter Strzok has been covertly operating as the Section Chief of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Counterespionage Group during his secret 24 year tenure with the agency while masquerading as Deputy Assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Counterintelligence Division where he was in charge of investigating Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email server along with the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.”
https://bigleaguepolitics.com/howley-tapes-show-brennan-started-spying-on-trump-years-ago-in-reno/
You’re pivoting again. HRC is old news and not relevant any more.
How so? Your premise is false until proven factual. How is she not relevant?
Michael, Quite correct! HRC IS relevant! Her crimes were committed & covered up by the FBI, ‘Justice’ Department AND the press. What I think is going on is that the deep state is obstructing HER just desserts. What HRC has been allowed to get away with should have led to her being investigated, indicted & tried. LOCK HER UP comes from the deep frustration many of us have because of the now two tiered ‘justice’ system. One system for the leftists & one for, say a sailor on a submarine who sent A picture to his girlfriend.
The deep state would include what passes for a free press. I am not for shutting down the press. But there needs to be something in place to hold fringe stream media accountable for the biased disinformation they present as news. At present they are just the propaganda arm of the fascist deep state left & have been known to lie & fabricate.
Any thought to who OWNS most of the one sided ‘news’ outlets now? Maybe there is some kind of connection…
Oh well. The takeover will come when the world is made cashless. Total control of the planet won’t come via revolution. Physical currency is now being pushed to be made digital, so what’s the worry? 😀 When cashless comes & digital rules, who will be in control THEN?
Oh, by the way, wasn’t Mr. Trump referring to FAKE news in his comments about today’s media?
SamFox
NUTCHACHA
And as “old news”, any criminal charges that may be warranted against a “recent news” political figure does not apply to old news Hillary.
That is the advantage that many have conferred on her, so investigation of any possible criminal violations by Hillary, or on the part the Hillary campaign, should not even be discussed.
To even suggest otherwise puts you at risk for the briliant “…but…but ..what about Hillary” retort.
The double standard must be protected at all costs.
Go back to your first sentence. Then start over and insert the proofs of your original premise. After that you can do a rewrite.
Gee, I didn’t know that President Trump was a “leftie”. As they say in the old song: we don’t want him you can have him…..
Tell me how many Democratic or, for that matter, Republican Presidents have closed down media outlets that criticiased them?
As for closinig down the media that is a violationi of the first amendment which a good self governing inidependence cosntitutional centrist would never support
BUT
When a reporter writes….”I was given information on the condition of anonymity and told it was stolen and classified information and thus having stated culpability up front how does that comiply with the first amendment?
So skip the BS and get to the meat the heart of the issue or without any discussion or warning he or she is going to violate national security?
Shouldn’t at the least one of the tame judges you own plunk his magic twanger over the frogs invoived?
At what point may a reporter or a propagandist violate with impunity and what about the danger to the sons and daughters of the nation?
Remember one of the legacies of the left after Vietnam is shutting down the movement to repeal the draft. It is still running full tilt and in Fact is required for the men to sign up for if they want college funding.
Also why are women not under the same requirement…equal opportunity is not the same as special exemption treatment.
I can tell why that happened originally. Men were needed as cannon fodder and women as baby factories. So…. is their any reason today to keep that law in effect’? To keep women as second class citizens?
ss.mil. or ss.org is the basic website address.
/s/ 24 years Infantry and not one REMF assignment.
Wow – that is some combo platter of crazy, stupid, and ignorant. I bet none of them would think that was ok if Obama were still the president.
When America finally gets its very own Hitler, who will start taking out the garbage, he will have to shut the NON-COMPLIANT press down. We will still have a press, it will just be the defender of the entrenched interests who run the country. Kind of like how it is now.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
No, it’s not like that now!
Someone who agrees with me:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/14/independent-epitaph-establishment-journalism
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Trump has his own media outlet at Fox. It’s all the rest, those that criticize him, the non-compliant ones, that he wants to go away.
Betty, unbeknown to you it is the left that wishes to restrict freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion. Conservatives value the first amendment as written. Liberals or progressives wish to amend the first amendment so that it limits non-progressive speech and press.
Squeeky,…
Your post reminded me of something that happened years ( decades) ago.
A fairly liberal professor I knew at my college was married to a pretty conservative businessman.
I witnessed some interesting, ” energetic” exchanges between them.
It was a pretty even match in their debates/arguments.
She was exasperated with him at one point and said ” you should have been a Nazi in the last war”.
Without missing a beat, he said “maybe I will be in the next one”.😄😃
I was with 3-4 friends at the time……we’d all been watching their back and forth…..his remark had everybody laughing, including a few bystanders who didn’t even know the couple.
This shows the danger we are now in due to Trumps rhetoric
That shows how much danger were in and are in due to the rhetoric of the Progressive Left. And I do NOT care how many times they change their name.
The Trump “rhetoric” is danger, but multi media TV channels spewing negative 90% negative Trump news is OK? This is why FOX is so popular. They usually have both sides represented when “discussions/opinion” are presented. Many times no Democrat agrees to participate, which in itself should give you pause. Also, open discussion between several guests includes many sides of the issue. Let me give you an example where information on Twitter was presented as fact by Joy Behar. On Friday she read something (unverified) that didn’t bold well for Trump and she celebrated, had the audience celebrate. Come Monday she had to walk the celebration because an ABC News employee, in clarifying, took a side and made the decision to report it. Over the weekend, the ABC News Guy was fired and many retractions issued, on e Joy on Monday. But for the weekend the discussions centered around this bad reporting. Joy, however, did not get fired and continued her blasts at Trump, whether true or not. She constantly says he will start WWIII. So Martha, was that an exercise in news reporting? No, but several million people heard it and who knows if they consider this gospel or heard the walk back. We are in no more danger than when Obama left office. In many ways communication between supposed enemies is a plus.
M. Nelson,…It isn’t just Trump’s rhetoric….for starters, read some of Batachacha’s posts if you are unaware of the inflammatory non-Trump rhetoric.
The liberal press has responded (or was the first – depending on your perspective) by becoming increasingly partisan, shrill and demagogic.
Let’s be clear, the liberal press is trying to stage a slow rolling coup against Trump and is howling about their 1st Amendment rights being threatened.
I agree that the press has the right to be partisan and biased (both right and left), but then they have to accept the consequences of their actions – a president who fights back, a readership base that is partisan and very limited, a boycott on advertisers, and relatively low social standing for “reporters” (about on par with politicians and used car salesmen) among many in the country.
Let’s also be clear that Trump is not the only sinner against the 1st Amendment; the left perfected the boycott against conservative voices.
The left is now using its ownership of social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc) to silence the opposition. It is inevitable that there will be pushback and perhaps added regulation against these entities who have quasi monopoly standing and use the public owned wireless spectrum to violate the 1st Amendment rights of conservatives.
Oh please!
How come you have to sign up with facebook to comment on Fox these days?
Pretty good analysis Steve.
Pourquoi cela me rappelle-t-il les débuts de la Révolution française?
Why does this remind you of the beginnings of the French Revolution?
Don’t know. The socialist revolution started full flower 1909. The counter revolution started in earnest 2016. The secular progressives have been dubbed the sick frogs but nothing about the French. They are still selling slightly used white flags and slightlly dinged rifles – only dropped once… last I looked.
sur le visage. course en avant
And I should add here, also from the article – “The poll also has a credibility interval plus or minus 6.2 percentage points for Democrats, plus or minus 5.9 percentage points for Republicans, and plus or minus 7.8 percentage points for Independents.
Furthermore, this was an online poll, not a telephone poll. Ipsos states: “Statistical margins of error are not applicable to online polls. All sample surveys and polls may be subject to other sources of error, including, but not limited to coverage error and measurement error. ”
But, a great headline for democrats, even it it’s on par with “No path to 270….” or “Hillary in a landslide….” and other such polling gems.
Wally,…
I had never heard of Ipsos poll, Ipjo bipolar, whatever the name of the pollster is.
Looks like reeeeel scientific polling.😊😀😂
I was a bit surprises that virtually all of the guys and their babes in the biker bar…..their sample group…..had online access.
But that could be my own bias, a preconceived notion of a bygone era of bikers.
Tom Nash – they might have picked that biker group that makes $150k+/yr and rides on the weekend. They would have taken the survey from their Blackberrys. 😉
Perhaps you might have included the last paragraph of that article….
A final statistic is somewhat reassuring, only 13% of Americans agree that “President Trump should close down mainstream news outlets, like CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times.” Here less than a quarter of Republicans (23%) agree along with fewer than one in ten Democrats (8%).
YOU, of all people, using a clickbait headline. Not impressed with that.
Thanks Wally!
Congrads to the lefties on here. Tried to tell you. This may seem new to you, but we call it, “what is good for the goose is good for the gander.”
The news business needs a self-audit and a change in their programming. News and information free of one side or the other. Of course, “Mornin’Joe” is purely discussion and should be certain to clarify opinion versus news and information I have never heard.