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Disorder in every direction |
A day that will end with President Trump's address to a joint session of Congress began with bruising headlines all around.
From Bloomberg – "Trump escalates global trade war, sparking tit-for-tat tariffs" – to CNN.com – "Target warns February sales were soft, adding to concerns about consumer health" – economic fears are paramount. One of the Wall Street Journal's editorials this morning is titled "Trump takes the dumbest tariff plunge." CNBC personalities are bracing for yet another selloff, with markets now back below Election Day levels.
Locally and regionally, print front pages are capturing the impacts of Trump's shock-and-awe strategy. Atop the Anchorage Daily News this morning: "Murkowski raises concern over impacts of federal workforce cuts." Atop the San Antonio Express-News: "Cuts by DOGE hitting S.A. hard." Elsewhere in Texas, the headlines are about government inaction as it relates to the worst measles outbreak in decades. The Houston Chronicle's lead this morning: "Officials slow to push measles shots."
Meantime, here's the Kyiv Independent's lead: "Even in a country grimly accustomed to negative news, the headlines that Ukraine woke up to on March 4 still came as a shock — the U.S. is freezing military aid." Atop The Guardian this morning: "US rift with Ukraine grows as Europe seeks ceasefire." The Drudge Report is blunter, pairing a photo of an approving Vladimir Putin with the headline "TRUMPSKI STOPS UKRAINE AID."
I don't know about your social media feed, but the algorithms are showing me a forceful statement from the American Bar Association about MAGA attacks on the courts; frightened reactions to looming cutbacks at "two pivotal centers for weather forecasting;" and outrage over JD Vance's comments to Sean Hannity.
For careful news consumers, the deluge can be disorienting. "The brickbats are meant to knock us senseless," Margaret Renkl writes in a guest essay for the NYT. "Blow after blow, they bludgeon us. Who could possibly keep them straight?" In response, Renkl is keeping a list of "truths to remember in a time of lies."
I'm left to wonder: How much of this information is reaching Americans who aren't news junkies? Does it feel like progress or chaos?
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How will Trump's speech rate? |
Honestly, you have to try really hard to overlook all the disorder and disarray. Never doubt that MAGA media can rise to that challenge, however. This morning Fox's home page led with an anodyne piece promoting Trump's address to Congress.
His prime time appearance on Capitol Hill "has the ingredients for an explosive event," the Washington Post's Naftali Bendavid writes. "Aides say Trump intends to... promote his objectives by crafting a series of viral moments that will outlive the speech itself," TIME's Eric Cortellessa adds.
At the White House, "they're promoting this as must-see TV," ABC's Mary Bruce said on today's "GMA." Nielsen estimated that 47.7 million Americans watched Trump's joint address in 2017. How much lower will that # be this year?
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👀 Three behind the scenes reads |
>> Stephen Miller "has taken over the Justice Department’s PR strategy," with sometimes embarrassing results, Hannah Rabinowitz and Paula Reid report. (CNN)
>> Politico's most-read story this morning: "Top HHS spokesperson quits after clashing with RFK Jr." Adam Cancryn says Thomas Corry resigned "over disagreements with the HHS secretary and his approach to the measles outbreak." (Politico)
>> "Shell-Shocked at CBS:" Oliver Darcy reports that incoming Paramount Global president Jeff Shell has privately told CBS News chief Wendy McMahon and "60 Minutes" boss Bill Owens "that they need to get on board" with a Trump settlement and an admission of wrongdoing — "a red line the pair will not cross." (Status)
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The AP's new legal filing |
Ahead of a March 20 hearing, The Associated Press has submitted an updated court filing in its White House access case.
The filing says the White House has "retaliated against the AP further by abandoning the time-tested press pool system for ensuring that the public stays informed about the president" and notes that "this matter is not only about the press pool, as the AP's journalists are also banned from larger events," including press conferences that are supposedly open to all credentialed journalists. Here is the PDF of the updated filing...
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Political media notes and quotes |
>> "One of the biggest dangers of the press pool takeover is that it brings the administration one step closer to convincing the public that an adversarial press is an obstacle to effective governance," Yona TR Golding writes. (CJR)
>> David Enrich is out with a sneak peek at his book "Murder the Truth," which comes out next week. This adaptation asks: "Can the media's right to pursue the powerful survive Trump's second term?" (NYT Mag)
>> Jon Stewart responded to the Trump-Zelensky meltdown with "his longest Daily Show monologue ever," Bill Carter writes. Here's the 24-minute video. (LateNighter)
>> Speaking of late-night stars, Stephen Colbert will be hosting a live "Late Show" to react to Trump's address. Pete Buttigieg will be there for his first TV interview since the inauguration.
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Today's Wash Post travails |
Don't deactivate your Washington Post subscriptions. That's what Post media critic Erik Wemple told readers during his regular Q&A yesterday, emphasizing the quality of the publication's reporting, even as Jeff Bezos introduces divisive opinion section changes. "It's certainly fair for people to ask questions and to become anxious based on our workplace memos and the like, but what matters, and what always has mattered, is the product," Wemple wrote.
>> Related: Writing for The Atlantic, Marty Baron says "it's been infuriating to observe the damage [Bezos] has inflicted" on the Post's reputation.
>> Katie Robertson says Will Lewis and Matt Murray skipped a special Sunday night screening of the new documentary about former Post publisher "Becoming Katharine Graham." The doc inspired Eugene Robinson to write this column about Graham's courage.
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Fox Corp "sees a potential market of 5 million subscribers for a new direct-to-consumer broadband outlet it hopes to launch in tandem with the next NFL season," Variety's Brian Steinberg reports, recapping Lachlan Murdoch's comments at Morgan Stanley's tech and media investor conference. Murdoch "also revealed" that the Fox Nation streaming service has "lured between 2 million and 2.5 million subscribers since its launch in 2018."
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Dominion slims down its OAN suit |
CNN's Marshall Cohen writes: Dominion Voting Systems has slimmed down its 2020-related defamation case against the fringe pro-Trump network One America News. Court filings indicate that Dominion recently dropped current and former OAN personalities Chanel Rion and Christina Bobb from the lawsuit. There's no indication of a settlement, and Dominion is still moving ahead with its case against OAN and its conservative owners, with a potential trial later this year. A Dominion spokesperson says the company is "focusing its case on OANN and those who control it."
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>> This morning MSNBC announced that The Washington Post's Jackie Alemany is coming aboard as a DC correspondent. She will also be a weekend morning co-host alongside Eugene Daniels and Jonathan Capehart. (Variety)
>> Daniels, whose MSNBC role was formalized yesterday, talked with the aforementioned Katie Robertson about his job changes and his unpaid role as this term's White House Correspondents' Association president. (NYT)
>> Andrew Cuomo's first interview stop after announcing his candidacy for New York City mayor? Stephen A. Smith's show. (YouTube)
>> E.W. Scripps "is laying off staff across multiple local news stations." (Axios)
>> Patrick Soon-Shiong rolled out some of his long-promised changes to the Los Angeles Times yesterday. Some opinion pieces "will now be published with an AI-generated rating of their political content, and an AI-generated list of alternative political views on that issue," Lois Beckett reports. (The Guardian)
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Today's new nonfiction releases |
CNN alum Alison Kosik is out today with "What's Up With Women and Money?: How To Do All the Financial Stuff You’ve Been Avoiding."
Three of today's other new releases are already in the top 10 on Amazon's new releases list: "The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage" by Father Richard Rohr; "Make Magic: The Book of Inspiration You Didn't Know You Needed" by Brad Meltzer, based on a "viral commencement speech" he gave; and legendary photographer Mary Ellen Matthews' "The Art of the SNL Portrait."
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>> "The Government Knows AGI is Coming:" Ben Buchanan, the top adviser on AI in the Biden White House, is the guest on an engrossing new episode of Ezra Klein's show. (NYT)
>> "Podcasting platform Podcastle launches a text-to-speech model with more than 450 AI voices." (TechCrunch)
>> YouTube is working on an overhaul of its TV app that will make the platform look more like Netflix. (The Information)
>> A newly unsealed lawsuit brought against TikTok shows projections for absolutely massive TikTok Live sales. (Bloomberg)
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"The Academy Awards drew 18 million viewers on Sunday... an 8 percent drop from the 19.5 million who watched last year," the NYT's John Koblin writes. "The audience decline ends a three-year streak when Oscar ratings had been on the rise." Still: That's a very strong #!
>> ABC hopes Conan O'Brien will return as Oscars host: "We would love to have him back, Disney exec Rob Mills told Variety.
>> Hulu has "apologized for tech glitches that affected users during its first Oscars livestream," per TheWrap.
>> Speaking of Hulu, Best Picture winner "Anora" will be streaming on the site starting March 17.
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Entertainment odds and ends |
>> Jay-Z has "filed a defamation lawsuit against an anonymous woman who earlier accused him of raping her when she was 13, alleging she was banking on 'false and malicious claims' for financial gain." (CNN)
>> Drake has "reached a private settlement with iHeartMedia after he sued the Texas-based radio company amid his ongoing claims that his record label Universal Music Group made 'covert payments' to promote airplay of Kendrick Lamar's diss track." (Rolling Stone)
>> Walt Disney Animation Studios has "officially pulled the plug on its 'Tiana' princess series as it abandons making original long-form content for streaming." Short-form, on the other hand, is wildly popular with streaming viewers. Personally, I'm thrilled every time my kids are willing to watch a feature-length film at home... (THR)
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