Columns, Free Speech, Media, Politics

The Media Musk? Why the Cancel Campaign Targeting Jeff Bezos Could Backfire

Below is my column on Fox.com on the expanding boycott of the Washington Post by Democratic politicians, pundits, and members of the press. The reason? Because owner Jeff Bezos wants to stay politically neutral and leave the matter to the public. In an age of advocacy journalism, the return to neutrality is intolerable. The reaction is itself revealing. In a heated meeting this week at the Post, writers were apoplectic with attacks on Bezos and alarm over the very notion of remaining neutral in an election.  One declared to the group: “One thing that can’t happen in this country is for Trump to get another four years.”  The immediate and reflexive call of the left for boycotts and canceling campaigns is all too familiar to many of us.  The question is whether the targeting of Bezos could backfire in creating a major ally for the restoration of American journalism.

Here is the slightly altered column:

It is not every day that you go from being Obi-Wan Kenobi to Sheev Palpatine in twenty-four hours. However, Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos now has the distinction of having Luke (Mark Hamill) lead a boycott of his “democracy dies in darkness” newspaper as the daily of the darkside.

Figures like former Rep. Liz Cheney announced she was canceling her subscription as a boycott movement led a reported 200,000 people to give up their Post subscriptions. Some like George Conway even seemed to target Bezos’ company Amazon. It is a familiar pattern for many of us (on a smaller scale) who used to be associated with the left and faced cancel campaigns for questioning the orthodoxy in the media or academia.

Then something fascinating happened. Bezos stood his ground.

The left has made an art form of flash-mob politics, crushing opposition with the threat of economic or professional ruin. Most cave to the pressure, including business leaders like Meta’s Mark  Zuckerburg. That record came to a screeching halt when the unstoppable force of the left met the immovable object of Elon Musk. The left continues to oppose his government contracts and pressure his advertisers over his refusal to restore the prior censorship system at X, formerly Twitter.

Now, the left may be creating another defiant billionaire.  This week, Bezos penned an op-ed that doubled down on his decision not to endorse a presidential candidate now or in the future. Some of us have argued for newpapers to stop all political endorsements for decades.

The encouraging aspect of Bezos’s column was that he not only recognized the corrosive effect of endorsements on maintaining neutrality as a media organization, but he also recognized that the Post is facing plummeting revenues and readership due to its perceived bias and activism.

I used to write regularly for the Post, and I wrote in my new book about the decline of the newspaper as part of the “advocacy journalism” movement. As Bezos wrote, “Our profession is now the least trusted of all. Something we are doing is clearly not working.”

Bezos previously brought in a publisher to save the Post from itself.

Washington Post publisher and CEO William Lewis promptly delivered a truth bomb in the middle of the newsroom by telling the staff, “Let’s not sugarcoat it…We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. Right? I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.”

The response was that the entire staff seemed to go into vapors, and many called for Lewis to be canned. Bezos stood with Lewis.

Now, resignations and recriminations are coming from reporters and columnists alike. In a public statement, Post columnists blasted the decision and said that while maybe endorsements should be ended, not now because everyone has to oppose Trump to save democracy and journalism. The statement produced some chuckles, given the signatories, including Phillip Bump and Jen Rubin, who have been repeatedly accused of pushing false stories and reckless rhetoric. (Rubin later denounced Bezos for his “Bulls**t explanation” and said that he was merely “bending a knee” to Trump.).

Bezos could do for the media what Musk did for free speech. He could create a bulwark against advocacy journalism in one of the premier newspapers in the world. Students in “J Schools” today are being told to abandon neutrality and objectivity since, as former New York Times writer (and now Howard University journalism professor) Nikole Hannah-Jones has explained, “all journalism is activism.”

After a series of interviews with over 75 media leaders,  Leonard Downie Jr., former Washington Post executive editor, and Andrew Heyward, former CBS News president, reaffirmed this shift. As Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, editor-in-chief at the San Francisco Chronicle, stated: “Objectivity has got to go.”

Few can stand up to this movement other than a Bezos or a Musk. However, the left has long created their own monsters by demanding absolute fealty or unleashing absolute cancel campaigns. Simply because Bezos wants his newspaper to restore neutrality, the left is calling for a boycott of not just the Post but all of his companies. That is precisely what they did with Musk.

A Bezos/Musk alliance would be truly a thing to behold. They could give the push for the restoration of free speech and the free press a real chance to create a beachhead to regain the ground that we have lost in the last two decades.

The left will accept nothing short of total capitulation and Bezos does not appear willing to pay that price. Instead, he could not just save the Post but American journalism from itself.

If so, all I can say is: Welcome to the fight, Mr. Bezos.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”

114 thoughts on “The Media Musk? Why the Cancel Campaign Targeting Jeff Bezos Could Backfire”

  1. “We have the ability to see what can be, unburdened by what has been, and then to make the possible actually happen.”

    – Kamala Harris Quoting Karl Marx In The Communist Manifesto

  2. Perhaps the WaPo “Staff” should Buy the Post via an ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan). That way they could put their money (instead of Jeff Bezo’s money) where their mouth is.

    1. * Yes, it’s hysteria. A doctor could explain it. Mass hysteria ends with a scapegoat, a witch that must be killed. Salem Massachusetts was that. It’s very serious. If they lose the election they’ll be triggered.

  4. Read some of the language used by the WaPo opinion staff in their conversation about whether to stay or leave:

    https://nypost.com/2024/10/31/us-news/wapo-opinion-editor-tells-angry-staff-they-could-resign-over-bezos-endorsement-decision-during-tense-meeting/

    These people are spoiled brats. They think business owners have no right to look out for what will make the business succeed. They think they are entitled to other people’s money, no questions asked, so that they can promote their own viewpoints. They sound like grade schoolers. They’ve been indulged so long it has ruined them as functioning adults.

    1. OldManFromKS,
      He complained at the meeting that Bezos was destroying the WaPo’s reputation as an “independent journalistic organization”
      HAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHA!!!!

      Here is an idea, maybe the owner, Bezos, is tried of them making his company losing millions.

      1. Upstate – the lack of self-awareness is amazing. Reminds me of Steve Colbert talking to some CNN employee and when Colbert says CNN is objective and just reports the facts . . . even his reliably liberal audience had to laugh – much to his surprise:

    2. “[The] country is on the verge of electing someone who is running on a platform of retribution, fear and retaliation,” –Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post

      And how exactly that different than your own lawfare politics, Jenny?

  6. I would fire every single one of them and start new. The fired who want to return to real journalism are welcomed. The rest can go pound sand.

  7. However, the left has long created their own monsters by demanding absolute fealty or unleashing absolute cancel campaigns

    euphemism much?

    MPD, DC leaders making preparations for protest, ‘riots’ during and after election
    https://wjla.com/news/local/dc-police-preparing-protest-riot-elections-city-leaders-election-day-security-concerns-chief-pamela-smith-warning-arrests-charges-us-secret-service-donald-trump-kamala-harris-dmv

    MPD Chief Pamela Smith sent off a stern warning during a press conference Tuesday morning. “I want to be very clear: We will not tolerate any violence of any kind. We will not tolerate any riots. We will not tolerate the destruction of property. We will not tolerate any unlawful behavior. Offenders will be arrested and will be held accountable,” Smith said Tuesday.

    Such drivel. As an aside, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser (D), to paraphrase WaPo’s Jennifer Rubin, bent a knee to defund the police, and cut $15 M. More to Chief Smith’s saber rattling, DC today is one of the worst cities in America when it comes to violent crime, with Richmond, Norfolk, Baltimore and Phily not much better. Police are overwhelmed, understaffed, and impossibly hard to recruit. Come Trump election win, the Left will do what they do best: extreme violence.

    A D.C. Council source confirmed to 7News that a city official told councilmembers during a breakfast meeting on the same day of Smith’s press conference that they have talked through various scenarios, including what the city saw in 2016, 2020, and the January 6th riot, and that they are making all-encompassing preparations for “large scale riots and civil unrest.”

    January 6 riot was a non-event compared to the Leftist anarchy we saw from coast to coast starting on Trump’s January 20, 2017 inauguration day, and escalated thereafter to where we are now. Nellie Bowles documented all too well, in her new book the increase in violent crime that the Left instigated during Trump’s presidency, and has continued to this very day, per 2023 FBI data.

    I would not be surprised if Kamala Harris broke out a Che Guevara t-shirt, and directed her Leftist peers to “burn it all down”, with blessings and approval by Obama/Hillary/DNC/MSM

    The reaction to Jeff Bezos by the Left is a sign that only a blind fool would ignore: prepare for the worst.

    2. * DC is the crack capitol. It’s been that way for years. One of scariest places in the US

  8. Mr. Bezos wants to be like Mr. Musk, that’s clear. And he’s getting a better deal because Musk had to fire 1000s of twitter employees and pay severance in many cases. Mr. Bezos’s employees are firing themselves! And all the worst ones, at that. Go Jeff!

  9. The WashPo has been a loser for many years now. In 2023, they lost 100 million, and tried to lay off the dead wood with buyouts and threats. It didn’t work, so Bezo’s has no choice now and has simply figured out a slick way to make them want to leave. Hernán Cortés burned his ships on the shores of Veracruz, to motivate his men to want to stay and move inland to
    destroy Tenochtitlan and conquer the Aztec Empire. There’s more than one way to motivate people to move.

    What was lost in subscriptions to WashPo by not, as Bezo’s aptly pointed out, engaging in a useless undertaking of spouting off “I Like Ike”, as if that actually accomplishes anything, could be made up by twice or three times that number in subscribers, if not more, depending on whether Bezo’s can actually resurrect it into a respectable news outlet which of course necessitates an employee culture change from a bunch of Pravda style Marxists or brainwashed Gen Z ideological propagandists, to real and actual accomplished journalists. Most all of the leftist media outlets are losers with CNN, MSNBC, et., al., laying off massive numbers of their employees because no one is listening to them any longer. There is the competition issue. There is the digital versus print issue. But in the end run analysis, people have stopped depending upon the establishment media because they so patently lack even the remotest signs of credibility. The masses have begun to believe their lying eyes, and not the media’s lying print.

    Bezo’s has other concerns aside from WashPo, which seems to be something of his model railroad set in the basement. Otherwise, his biggest financial interest and rightfully so, is Blue Origin. The massive failure of the Boeing/NASA partnership, and the rise of SpaceX, has opened up new horizons for Bezo’s. So much so, that it benefits Bezo’s to put the WashPo through the rise cycle, and change it into an actual news outlet, albeit a rapidly becoming an obsolete print media.

    So no he hasn’t ruined the WashPo, it was ruined long before he bought it and has been bleeding profit loses year over year. He just might save it however, even if his biggest interest and potential money maker resides with Blue Origin.

  10. I wouldn’t trust a non-endorsement to mean anything if Bezos and Lewis don’t jettison the likes of Bump and Rubin. Bezos may be simply trying to reset WaPo’s perceived “objectivity” baseline without actually changing anything.

      1. OldManFromKS,
        Can you imagine the meltdown on the news floor the snowflakes will have if Bezos hires a conservative? I mean we all saw the meltdown at the NYT with Bari Weiss. She went on to form Common Sense which later became the highly successful The Free Press.

        1. Upstate, good article.

          At The New York Times, my friend Adam used to joke that the only people at the paper who voted for Trump were the delivery guys from Staten Island. Like all jokes, it was an oversimplification: There were also the plumbers, the electricians, and the porters at 620 Eighth Avenue.

          Charlie Kirk calls that the “muscular class.” In Las Vegas, despite its glitz and sin professions, the muscular class makes the city run. They are majority registered Dems but also majority supporting Trump this time around, at least according to Kirk. After pointing out that NPR’s newsroom is 100% registered Dems, and 0% registered GOP, and that the other legacy media newsrooms are about the same, she says:

          The people whose job it is to tell you about the world in all its complications and contradictions have the same view about almost every important issue in American life. . . . But half the country wants Donald Trump for another four years. Whether he wins or loses, half of America is voting for him. So isn’t it strange that the institutions that talk the most about diversity and inclusion can’t stomach those whose views align with half of Americans?

          Good point.

      3. oldman, I will never give any of them slack. That’s how we got where we are today. Hiring “conservative” writers means absolutely nothing until they prove they write objectively and truthfully.

  11. This is Jeff Bezos’s warped logic and why smarter people are not buying it.

    The way we’re supposed to resolve this public perception of journalistic independence is by having the owner of the paper step in and quash the independent judgment of the seasoned journalists on the editorial board.

    It seems Bezos is afraid of offending Trump in case he wins. Because if he does, he will be in an unfavorable position to benefit from government contracts or taxes.

    280,000 subscribers spoke their minds by leaving the paper and taking their money somewhere else. That’s all on Bezos.

    1. “280,000 subscribers spoke their minds by leaving the paper and taking their money somewhere else. That’s all on Bezos.”

      That amount of $ is a drop in the bucket to someone who is that rich. This isn’t about money.
      Kamala is a horrible candidate and VP. It’s a reflection of that. More would jump ship if they weren’t afraid of the backlash.

    2. Just because the left uses pay for play with the press doesn’t mean Trump will, and in fact you can’t prove otherwise.

      The reality you smart* people can’t accept is that your neo-lib/neo-con policies have caused many middle eastern and asian nations to look like futuristic wonderlands (or rubble), while the US as a nation appears more and more like the democrat run cities your policies have destroyed over the past 60 years.

      *’smart’ people with dunning-kruger and severe sociopathy

    3. If you think Bezos is doing so badly – put up the half a billion dollars it would take and buy the Washington Post.

      Then you get to make all the decisions if you want.

      Boycott the paper if you want.

      But I would suggest that may just lead Bezos to close it.

      It has been losing $200M/yr for a long time.

      Newspapers are not supposed to be welfare for left wing nuts.

    4. George – you do realize that For your claim regarding Bezos currying favor with Trump to be True – Bezos must beleive to a very high degree of probability that Trump will win. Otherwise he is pissing off Harris, and we KNOW that those on the left punish people who do not toe the line.

      Your ilk are already Boycotting WaPo for NOT endorsing anyone.

      You are free to do that, But there is a world of difference between boycotting something because it took a posisition,
      And boycotting something because it remained neutral.

    5. Like Trump gives a rats behind who has the endorsement of those rags.

      Do you ever say this stuff out loud first, or did you get your opinion from Gigi today?

  12. * Dylan Mullvaney and Buddlite parallel. It’s a measure of what the public will tolerate and a measure of the idea that the public is stupid and can be lead by the nose. Apparently they cannot be. Kudos citizenry.

    Bezos saw his Post failing and needed to save his investment. Musk showed him freedom from government tyranny. He followed and more to follow . Why lose money.

    The real heroes are the people who just said no. Musk must be a citizen too even with billions.

  13. Re: “The question is whether the targeting of Bezos could backfire in creating a major ally for the restoration of American journalism.” Until such a time, such advocacy will remain known as ‘jurinealism’.

  15. Oh no! Another billionaire stands up to cancel pressure! So what will happen, people will not read his paper? They are already doing that now. What nobody ever seems to understand that there is a section for opinion, it is called the editorial page.

    So imagine the idea of reporting the news and not a slant on the news with opinion. These newspapers are preaching to a smaller and smaller audience because nobody wants to listen to a daily diatribe.

    Good for Elon Musk and good for Jeff Bezos.

  16. It’s Bezo’s fault he’s losing subscribers. He made a stupid decision and smarter people noticed and understood why.

    1. What was his stupid decision? Deciding not to endorse a presidential candidate?

    2. He made that decision because WaPo has been hemoraging readers for some time.
      Turns out there are just not enough people that want to read left wing nut schlock.

      You are free to boycott or not.

      But I would suggest to you that it is really stupid to boycott one of the few remaining major papers.
      One that is losing money left and right, But still delivering the left wing content that you want,
      because it is trying to moderate its left wing nutism and appeal to more people to continue to stay in business.

      But if you want to bankrupt one of your own outlets – because it has not fallen completely off the far left edge of the world.

      I am fine with that.

      I think Bezos is sending a clear message.

      Welfare for lefties is OVER.

      WaPo needs to make a profit – or atleast hemorage less money,
      or it will be shuttered.

      Boycott if you will, It will shutter faster.

  17. Well maybe not enough people were resigning from the Wash Post staff after the new editor came in and this is simply a new means of inducing undesirable staff to quit. Might save on termination suits and unemployment insurance if some quit and you don’t have to fire them. Sort of what they did at the IRS when whistleblowers let congress know about the 1st son and his income tax escape plan. Now the whistle blowers are under pressure to quit.
    I don’t think the left hysteria is going to scare Mr Bezos at all or Mr Musk.
    In light of recent events in the space industry Mr Bezos may have an altered and freer Wash Post and Mr Musk continues to bring the X back to robust health, maybe for fun.
    They both seem to be on track to also be the Space Industry of the US as Boeing and Lockheed Martin are trying to sell their United Launch Alliance. Maybe a SpaceX-Blue Origin combo will soon be able to control and produce almost all US space launch capacity, in addition to giving us more freedom and thought in the US media.
    Who would have thought it. Billionaires to the Rescue.
    Unlike George I would be very reluctant to call Mr Musk or Mr Bezos idiots. They have both achieved more than what most of us could have achieved in multiple lifetimes.

    1. Just because they are billionaires does not mean they are immune from making stupid decisions. They didn’t get to where they are by never making bad decisions.

      1. Anonymous 9:23 AM
        Of course all of us make mistakes, even Billionaires. But we common people can make one bad mistake and we are wiped out and end up on the street somewhere and/or in a shelter. A billionaire can, of course, make a mistake get up, dust off, put the loss on his taxes and move on and make a lot more good decisions before he makes another bad one.
        It’s all a matter of degree. Best to take a stand in the office and say “I quit” when you already have a new job lined up than do it with no alternative plan for the day after “I quit”. It’s great to have passion and strong beliefs but it’s even better to have it with a bankroll and some planning.
        It’s great to be brave when you are 25 and live in an apartment by yourself but harder to be brave when you are 40 with spouse, children, mortgage, car payments and such.

    2. Who would have thought it. Billionaires to the Rescue.

      GEB – actually that’s exactly who we need to come to the rescue. The billionaire class has the money and power to do something positive and rescue civilization and freedom from the gathering darkness of the Left. A poor person “to the rescue” would likely be Marxist, leading to violent revolution and a much worse outcome. I don’t think we realize how fortunate we are to have in Musk a billionaire who actually cares about the rest of civilization and is willing to endure vicious criticism and risk over $50 billion on an idealistic notion of restoring free speech. In fact, the confluence of the unique personalities and abilities of Trump, Musk, RFK Jr., and Tulsi Gabbard is something that doesn’t happen more than once a century, and we are living it – an historic moment that I don’t think we appreciate how significant it is.

      Relatedly, your point about Musk and Bezos’s other business successes is a great insight. Such successes act as a bulwark against the concept that the billionaires are acting out of spite, and they strengthen Musk’s and Bezos’s hands all around.

      1. oldmanfromkansas,
        They are both involved with the MIC so maybe not such heroes riding in for the rescue?

    3. * Where there’s money and power there’s corruption. Regular people are better off with local news. The local newspapers and news are just like the regular people.

      As to the rich and powerful and feds, keep them small. Vote in fewer taxes people, less regulation with paperwork, less foreign involvement, more attention to self sufficient domestic economy.

      Congress has become too large. 500 people can get into a lot of trouble v. 100. Imagine seriously AOC, Greene , fire alarm guy etc working with trillions of dollars when they can’t even do algebra.

      Happy Halloween 🦇

  18. At a recent Elon Musk rally/town hall, someone asked him how he deals with his woke friends (presumably including Bezos). He replied that he has been red-pilling them and many are no longer woke. This could be an example (fingers crossed).

    1. OldManFromKS,
      Well, when faced with reality, many people see what the Democrat party has become and some are shocked, others knew but not how far they took it.
      Just read there is a trend on TicToc of Gen Z entering “Other” on ballots and entering memes rather than voting for a candidate. Supposedly Taylor Swift is trending.

      1. Upstate – the hopeful sign is that many people now are seeing the reality of what the Dem party has become. RFK, Jr. and Gabbard are just two examples, and Musk is a third example. But they are the tip of the iceberg: I’ve seen videos of people going around deep blue cities and talking to minorities, and they are saying that they see it too. Ironically it is the college-educated elite that are slowest to catch on, hence Harris’s support along the coasts.

  19. The reality is that the Washington Post has allegedly lost some fifty percent of its subscribers since 2020, at a loss of some seventy to eighty million a year. Consider that there are some one thousand journalists which collectively manage to generate or impart an annual negative twenty-five percent return on investment… and I don’t believe there are many who could sustain such losses indefinitely, but even if they could, why would they? Add that the real question is not one of advocacy or bias, but whether journalists can convincingly present rational assessment. Because the general public that purchases and subscribes does so in effort to rationally assess. Two questions: Can such bias generate enough appeal, attract sufficient audience, to sustain itself? I would argue that it cannot, anywhere in the United States, not even DC itself. (Does New York still have a Liberal Party? Have you ever wondered why it does not?) Secondly, what does this say about the quality of our journalists? Which, let’s face it, as writers have always been relegated second string? Again, the real question in my mind has been one of economy, can legacy media attract enough dollars to profit, even sustain itself, as propagandist, arm of the party? And if so, how do those dollars arrive? By what avenue? And, who receives them? Because clearly Jeff Bezos does not. Note also, that I did not turn to legacy media to acquire the above so-called “facts,” nor do I turn to media for assessment. I turn to the town hall, to public appeal, to democratic process via consensus, why? Because “rational” is an intellectual endeavor! And if we fail? What price to pay?

  20. Interesting premise, Bezos enters into the fight for real journalism. Like to see him do it, but not going to hold my breath.

    “It is a familiar pattern for many of us (on a smaller scale) who used to be associated with the left and faced cancel campaigns for questioning the orthodoxy in the media or academia.”
    Is that an indication the good professor is ditching the Democrat party and going Independent? It has been noted more people are ditching the Democrat party and either registering as Republican or Independent.

    1. @Upstate

      You beat me to it. Perhaps my cynicism about some generational dems is unfounded – I hope so. Wish things hadn’t had to get this awful for the change of minds, though.

      I trust Bezos about as far as I can throw him with one arm (ditto Zuckerburg et. al.). History shows him and his ilk to be opportunists and cowards. I suspect it might be simple butt-covering and bottom line protecting on his part, though I’m happy to be wrong about that, too.

      As for the worst of modern journalists: they can’t ever walk it back, it’s too late. People like Jen Rubin are simply unhinged and likely incapable of anything resembling honesty or ethics. They really are ignorant, elitist crybabies.

      1. James,
        I think it is to big to ignore, people want real, objective journalism. It is not just a one off thing. We see it in the losses the WaPo, NYT, NPR, CNN, in audience. They see it in the polls. Losses in revenue. He might be fed up with his own paper producing so little content worth reading. He likely sees how well alternative media is doing and is going to have to do the hard thing and bring back objectivity and a neutral newspaper. He might even be able to turn his paper around. But again, wait and see.

        1. @Upstate

          I think so too. But I think, particularly among the young that have no particular attachment to those institutions – they blew their hand, they made their own graves. I am NOT happy about this, but it is what it is. They could have been a light, they decided to do the opposite. If humanity is still a thing in 100 years, they will look back on the ‘millennial era’ as a second dark ages, IMO, and I’m not at all convinced humanity will survive that long. 🤷🏻‍♂️

          As ever with my own pessimism, I hope I’m wrong. The fact remains: our modern left are a global threat to the actual free thriving and evolution of the human race. I sure a course correction is coming, and with peace, not violence. The modern left does not inspire confidence in me in this regard, and it’s nice to see people like the Professor FINALLY acknowledging this. Hope it’s not too late.

          1. Just correcting my own post: I AM sure a course correction is coming. There will initially be a great deal of violence in reaction to it, just IMO, and we should all brace ourselves. I thank my lucky stars I no longer live in a big city.

            1. James,
              I agree about the correction. What will it look like is anyones guess. With all the crazy talk coming out of MSM, their unhinged rants, the deep state, what will that look like indeed.

              1. I AM sure a course correction is coming. There will initially be a great deal of violence in reaction to it, just IMO, and we should all brace ourselves.

                Good discussion you guys. Just remember, it took about 100 years for the American colonists to take action to correct course in 1776. My opinion is we had been living until 2016 under a Regime that resembled the period from 1763 to 1774. It would have continued had Clinton won. Once Trump won, the Regime has done their own form of the Intolerable Acts. The Regime has been fully exposed for the tyrants that they are. They are not going to give up quietly or peacefully.

                  1. Wow! I hadn’t seen that article Upstate. I agree with the entire piece and especially the last 3 paragraphs:

                    With the two recent attempts on Trump’s life, we’ve seen how the regime’s narratives simultaneously create the conditions for violence and explain it away. When Trump was shot at a rally in Butler, PA, Democratic Party officials and the media not only denied any connection between the shooting and their inflammatory rhetoric but even blamed Trump himself. After all, he and his aspiring assassin were cut from the same cloth: “The gunman and Trump, at their opposite ends of a bullet’s trajectory, are nonetheless joined together as common enemies of law and democracy,” wrote David Frum in, of all places, the Atlantic.

                    On this view, Trump has polarized the country so profoundly that he is ultimately responsible for the attempt on his own life. But that is another inversion of reality, tailored to suit the bloodlust of a dark regime. It is the logic of terror: It is only the violence of our victims that drove us to slaughter them.

                    This self-serving logic not only gets the Left off the hook for past depredations; it serves as the pretext for future violence against Trump, his aides, and his supporters. After November 5, this weaponized narrative could be expanded to justify violence on a mass scale designed to break the republic.

                    1. OLLY,
                      I found this line to be very concerning, “Disruption, destabilization, and violence are legitimized by a narrative driven by self-congratulatory mirror-imaging and projection in which the so-called defenders of democracy face down an authoritarian Trump.”
                      Here is the thing, will they spin anything Trump says or does if he wins into the “authoritarian” narrative? We have already seen them roll out the “Hitler” narrative. How many of these mindless leftist cultists will just accept what MSM feeds them, parrot MSM talking points and will any of them actually act on it? They have already shown they are ready and willing to get into a person’s face for wearing a MAGA hat or shirt. Will they take it upon themselves to act in real violence?

                    2. Here is the thing, will they spin anything Trump says or does if he wins into the “authoritarian” narrative?

                      Absolutely!!! The article was very clear on that point.

      2. I trust the people – billionaires and ordinary people respond to incentives.

        i.e. free markets work.

        WaPo has been losing money had over fist.

        Bezos is free to provide welfare for left wing nut journo’s if he wants.
        But I am guessing he is tiring of it.

        Regardless if you wish to defy the wishes of the markets – the people,
        You had better have an enormous amount of “FU” money.

        Bezos does, but my guess is he is tired of wasting it.

    2. It really does not matter what Bezos motivation is.

      Maybe he wants WaPo to be more balanced.
      Maybe he has been red pilled – he has always been libertarian.
      Maybe he is tired of losing $200M/yr.

      Maybe all of the above.
      Maybe something else.

      It is his paper, it is his money, it is his choice.

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