Bolton Unites Republicans and Democrats in Scorn Over Tell-All Book
Bolton's upcoming book can be reported from different angles.
1. New revelations from a high-ranking insider among those who were fired or resigned. Are the revelations true? Anyone notice a pattern of behavior among these folks whose accusations of Trumpian incompetence are quite consistent?
2. Bolton as the focus in terms of the significant role he played refusing to testify during the House impeachment inquiry without a court approval, but agreeing to testify in the trial if called by the Senate.
But the NYT favors reporting that presumes there are two sides (no more, no less), equal and opposite, always in contention. The way for a reporter to find out about what's new in politics is bounce back and forth between those two sides asking questions prompted by whatever one side or the other said. But as a reporter, you always look for some novelty. Therefore, in this case Republicans and Democrats are "united" in their scorn for Bolton. But for anyone who cares about meaning, that headline is a great normalizer of the current state of the federal government. Suppose the current administration is devastating the Department of Justice under Barr as it has the Department of State under Tillerson, then Pompeo? Are acting heads of the departments a problem? How about the recent criticisms from Mattis? The criticism from General Milley? House cleaning at the Voice of America this week. Is that a concern? The list is endless.
Yet in a series of weak examples in support of a dubious thesis ("dubious" a favorite Times descriptor, often applied to outright lies), the Times makes us question whether the conclusions came first, followed by the examples.
"But on Thursday, they found consensus on one thing.
Everyone, it seemed, was mad at John R. Bolton."
Sorry, but that's not really what constitutes consensus, in particular when we are talking about lawmakers. Democrats in Congress would have preferred that the Bolton evidence be submitted only a few months ago when the impeachment and trial were taking place. A sane NYT article on the subject would have noted that Trump has consistently taken extraordinary measures to keep useful witnesses from appearing before committees, but some have appeared anyway. Instead, the Times regards being able to tell a both sides are the same story as a resounding success. Or is it a safe place for these editors. Hard to tell. But they do go on.
"Republicans were mad that Mr. Bolton, whose book “The Room Where It Happened” described Mr. Trump’s presidency as a series of actions that amounted to “obstruction of justice as a way of life,” was daring to malign the president."
How does "daring to malign the president" explain or justify Trump's alleged 'obstruction of justice as a way of life." The NYT editors know full well if they started to ask Republican members of Congress directly about Bolton's accusations, they would be stonewalled or lashed out against as "fake news". Instead of confronting the Republican officeholders failure to address these issues in good faith with responses, the NYT editors and reporters accept Republicans' reactions as if they are rendered in good faith or just let them sit there without elaboration. But Democrats are not entitled to such generosity. Democrats suffer from "a certain institutional hostility to being told how to do their jobs." if they wanted Bolton to have testified before Congress. Yet Kevin McCarthy can assert without NYT challenge, and without apparent basis in fact "We’ve watched people before make lies about the president.” and suggest that Bolton is only doing this for the money. Is McCarthy claiming that Trump is actually competent?
"Still, at least some lawmakers who agonized over whether to allow Mr. Bolton and others to be subpoenaed as part of the impeachment trial — and ultimately decided to block the move — said they were not sorry.
“I made the decision that I made at the time that I made it,” said Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska. “And, you know, there’s no going back.”"
Where is the proof that Lisa Murkowski agonized? Maybe she just put on a good show. Her alleged mental processes are reported as fact - a typical NYT kidgloves treatment for Republicans in Congress. And there's no going back? Sorry, Trump could be impeached and convicted pretty quickly if Congress got together on it, but someone like Lisa Murkowski would have to take the next step to indicate her openness with "And you know, I would have voted differently - let's go back and fix this problem!"
Susan Collins, another Republican, gets a different free pass, running off and ducking questions with claims of ignorance -another Republican favorite avoidance tactic that NYT fails to point out even as John Cornyn makes the same claim.
Note the shoddy reporting. The assertion of Republican scorn for Bolton is supported by the Kevin McCarthy quote, but the quotes from Murkowski, Collins, and Cornyn do not express or imply scorn whatsoever. Neither does a vague reference to Rubio later in the piece seem to indicate scorn at all.
At the NYT, the federal government of the U.S. is treated as something permanent and unshakable. Nothing could ever destroy it. If democracy in the U.S. were completely destroyed, you can be sure NYT reporting on politics would look pretty much as it does now, centering new articles on "Republicans and Democrats" or, as they sometimes incongruously pose "Democrats and some Republicans".
But the big problem was clear at the very beginning of the article:
"On Capitol Hill, the release of the book appeared only to harden long-calcified views of the president and his conduct."
See what they did there? John Bolton, a very conservative life long Republican no longer in a government position, accuses the president of the U.S. of being completely incompetent, corrupt, and ignorant - only interested in personal advantage with no regard for U.S. policy except as it affects him personally. In other words, Bolton only makes accusations that any long time observer of the national scene already knows through accumulation of all evidence collected over these last three years. Bolton just adds evidence to the case. But the NYT sees all of that evidence and maps it onto the both sides frame - Democrats on Capitol Hill are not looking at the evidence and drawing proper conclusions; they are politicians with "long-calcified views". And Republicans in Congress are given a free pass. They are not politicians who have continued to support Trump and his corruption. They, too, are just politicians with "long-calcified" views. See both sides are the same. Aren't we good fair reporters? Or as the NYT's own Maggie Haberman might say, Whatta Town!
President celebrates people being unemployed. Whatta town. https://t.co/aBoHOG9UlK— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) May 27, 2020
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