Red Herring Journalism

Vincent J. Curtis

8 Oct 2016

The profession of journalism in America revealed its true self yesterday with the near simultaneous release of Hillary’s secret policy speeches to Wall Street and Donald Trump’s locker-room banter from eleven years ago.

Given a choice between substance and red-herring, the barking dogs of American journalism went for the herring.  Between salaciousness and importance, the barking dogs went for the salacious.

Hillary Clinton’s secret speeches to Wall Street between 2013 and 2015 were obtained by Wikileaks by the hacking of Hillary’s campaign guru and long-time associate John Podesta’s computer.  When Podesta complained of hacking by Russians in order to throw the election to Donald Trump, a complaint red-herring journalism dutifully reported the remarks.  After tossing out the Russian red herring to distract attention from the content of the speeches, Podesta then attempted to cast doubt on the authenticity of the speeches by saying that he had no time to review the material and confirm that they were actual.  Podesta was trying to imply that the Russians hacked material from his computer but that the material released was fake.  There was no follow up by the barking dogs of journalism - asking which part was true: that the Russians hacked his computer and obtained the real thing, but they released fakes; or that the Russians really didn’t hack his computer as he alleged, and that the material therefore is fake.  The possibility that it was not the Russians who hacked his computer was never disputed.

Meanwhile, an eleven-year old hot-mic tape of locker room banter between Donald Trump and “Access Hollywood” host Billy Bush is dominating the news cycle.  No one in the red herring media asked about the progeny of the material.  Who found this material?  (Could it be the Russians?)  When was it found?  If it was newsworthy when it was found, why was it being released now?  What is the releasers’ connection with the Hillary campaign?   Could this be an attempt to throw the election to Hillary Clinton?  The very questions John Podesta gave answers to without being asked were never asked in this case.  Red herring journalists were too busy barking and chasing after the Clinton campaign’s narrative of “totally unfit.”  Even Fox News fell for it, on the grounds that red-herrings are easier for their audience to grasp than recent and relevant convoluted deception on policy spouted by Hillary Clinton for Wall Street money.

The effect on the TV audience, if my wife is any example, was revulsion.  But not at Donald Trump.  At the media for putting this on.

When Bret Baier of Special Report opened the show with the report on Trump’s locker-room talk of eleven years ago, I turned him off and didn’t watch the rest of the show.  Same with On the Record by Brit Hume.  When the Kelly File led with it, my wife ordered the TV to be turned to baseball.

The normal world simply is not interested in old and irrelevant locker-room banter between men.  And it occurred to none of the red herring journalists that they can’t find a single woman who has accused Donald Trump of rape or sexual harassment.  Red Herring journalists can’t find any substance to the salacious talk.

At one time, journalists didn’t cover the many affairs that John F. Kennedy had.  They knew all about them, but kept quiet about it because they weren’t relevant to national politics.  The only person hurt by them was Jacqueline.  The evidence of Hillary’s lesbian relationships also is not covered in the main stream media, not because it isn’t salacious, but because it isn’t policy relevant.  Besides, the media like Hillary.  They despise Trump, and would do anything to bring him down.

And this whole Trump affair is one big media creation: The show on which Trump appeared with Billy Bush was a media vehicle covering Hollywood, and the exposé is one big media event.  And there is no relevance or substance to any of it.

What relevance has this locker-room banter to reviving the American economy, to strengthening national defense, to restoring law and order to America’s inner cities, to taking better care of America’s vets, to getting a grip on the immigration situation, to negotiating better trade deals?  As opposed to maintaining the status quo?  None of Trump’s policy aims are impaired by what Trump said eleven years ago.  However unsavory Trump may be to some, what is important to people generally is how America is doing, not what boys joke about in private.  But that doesn’t enter into the calculation of red-herring journalists.  Hillary's bare-faced lies to the American public about her emails is relevant because it goes to the heart of whether we can believe what she is telling us.  But the media largely has ignored the significance of that.

The most annoying part about America’s red-herring journalism is not that it chases the salacious before the substantive, but that it is so selective in the red herrings it chases.

But in this election cycle, the voters notice.

-30-