Kamala Harris Has Flipped The Media's Script

Kamala Harris has flipped the script on the media and they're mad, but they only have themselves to blame.

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The media is big mad at Vice President Kamala Harris because she isn’t letting them define her before she can define herself to the voters. She’s only been running for president for three weeks, so she’s been busy. Too busy to play obsequious with the media and they are not happy.

She’s flipping the script on them and they can’t handle it.

The media is used to calling the shots, to choosing the candidate who “wins” a debate. They are the gatekeepers and the referees. They have all of the power.

But not anymore.

VOTERS FIRST

When CNN’s Jim Acosta (who is not part of this larger press problem) asked Harris-Walz communications director Michael Tyler when they will commit to a press conference, Tyler said they were crisscrossing the country with rallies and the priority is engaging voters. He said Harris would sit down before the end of the month, but when pressed to commit to this week: "We will commit to directly engage with the voters. They're actually going to decide this election."

The Harris-Walz campaign just put the media in their place, letting them know that the campaign’s priority is speaking directly to the voters, not through an intermediary. And certainly not through a bad intermediary with an agenda. They will get to the media when they get to the media.

The media is not their priority; the voters are.

HOW IT WENT

No doubt Harris is well aware of how the media’s input tanked President Biden’s campaign against someone who has promised to undo democracy and be a dictator for a day. Trump coincidentally has a thick policy book on how to be a dictator forever, but we are to believe him when he says he won’t use it, because he is so trustworthy even if he is an adjudicated con artist, fraudster, and sexual assaulter.

The media elevated ex-president Donald Trump, whitewashed January 6th, and agreed to his debate and interview terms to such a degree that they routinely and continuously mislead voters and let his lies gaslight the nation, and yes, he is a convicted felon whose campaign they treat as if he is actually the better choice for the country.

WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF A PRESS CONFERENCE?

Six days ago, Donald Trump held an hour-long "press conference" in which he lied or misspoke 162 times. The media would very much like it if the Democrats had someone willing to do the same for them. Put on a show. Perform! Entertain! But only for them. Not for the voters, in rallies that they won’t cover, because the rallies aren’t about them.

The media wants a certain kind of press conference and interview. One they can pick apart and lord over. One that gives them their power back.

But if there is value in a press conference or a moral imperative to hold them, that obligation is two sided. The candidate holds a press conference to submit to a time-honored tradition of being asked questions by the media for the purpose of helping voters get to know the candidate for the greater purpose of democracy.

The media is supposed to be holding the powerful accountable and speaking for the voiceless and disenfranchised. Instead, we have a press corps that decided that THE ISSUE of 2024 wasn’t that Biden was running against a man convicted of 34 felonies with three more court cases to go, but rather President Biden’s age.

So they chased after Joe Biden with a level of hysteria that is quite simply inexplicable and unjustified. They finally managed to kick him to the curb and now they want a chance to kick Harris into submission by taking her apart while Donald Trump gets declared “the winner” for being a thug. This isn’t just about an agenda, but also sadly about a lack of comprehension on the media’s part. They aren’t particularly interested in women’s rights or minority’s rights or lives; they’re into Trump’s Thug Games.

MEDIA LANDSCAPE

The media landscape today is quite different from even ten years ago, let alone before news became a for-profit 24 hour a day cable enterprise. Our legacy media is comprised of the bitter billionaire and self-centric New York Times and the Murdoch-trained Washington Post.

Warner Brothers Discovery CEO David Zaslav (CNN) was asked who he supported for president, and he wouldn’t say but did say that he wanted a president who would do basically the opposite of what President Biden was doing; that is, Zaslav seeks MORE deregulation and MORE consolidation. Politico was bought by a German far-right tabloid owner who “has a decades-long record of bending journalistic ethics for right-wing causes.”

Much local media is owned by hedge-funds. Then there’s the actual Murdoch owned media destroying this country. These outlets not only don’t care about democracy, it’s actually an obstacle for them. So when they behave like they are pro-fascism, believe them.

The media has declined to do their job, for many years. Engaging with many of them has now become a pointless exercise that results in voters ceding power to political pundits whose own power depends on being the arbiter of candidates. This hasn’t worked out very well for actual voters.

Perhaps the media should be asking themselves: What is their purpose? Hint: It’s not to make a bigger profit than last quarter.

PROPAGANDA

Trump holds propaganda events that the media labels press conferences. This is what the media wants, accepts and even rewards — but only from him. Remember, Trump went 300 plus days without doing a press briefing as president. We are three plus years post his presidency, and the media is treating him like he’s the open book that Governor Tim Walz actually is.

Trump’s Mar-A-Lago “press conference” six days ago was set up so that The People couldn’t hear the media’s questions, only the Bloviator’s propaganda responses in which he lied or misspoke 162 times.

How informative was that? Even more to the point, whom did it help? It helped the media and Donald Trump. Ratings for the former and a clear runway for propaganda for the latter.

What is the point of a press conference if the media can’t be heard and won’t use follow up questions, but instead act as stenographers for a felon who incited a terrorist attack on this country? Seriously, what function are they serving in this capacity. They didn’t even ask about the $10 million Trump might have gotten from Egypt in 2016, either, which seems like it would be rather important when vetting a president as they claim they are doing.

On Wednesday, Trump gave a speech in which he attempted to discuss some policy instead of his usual Vintage Trump Grievance Re-Run, and the most he could manage was promising to reduce electricity prices by half without saying how or acknowledging that electricity is produced by private energy companies.

This is the kind of “policy” talk for which he media rewards the Republican candidate.