Forum: Was Trump's Confronting CNN Publicly A Positive Or A Negative?

Every week on Monday, the WoW! community and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question: Was Trump's Confronting CNN Publicly A Positive Or A Negative?



Don Surber: Answer: This is a positive.No one in America plays the press better than The Donald. Liz Smith -- the doyenne of the gossip queens of New York -- devoted an entire chapter to him in her autobiography. If you want to know The Donald, read it.

Attacking CNN works because 1.) CNN tried to frame him as a puppet of Putin putting out a quadruple bylined story without a reaction from his camp. If you cannot fight for yourself, you deserve to lose.

2) CNN is the least liked cable network with favorables below Trump's.

3.) He did not use the incident to evade answering the question, but rather to punctuate his response. He denied it and then banned (without removing) said reporter.

4.) He relished putting Jim Acosta down.

Eventually the press may catch on. The incessant attacks on his person will not work. No one in the press has the credibility with Trump's supporters needed to bring him down. I suggest they give him a honeymoon and see what happens.


Stately McDaniel Manor: President-Elect Trump’s public confrontation of CNN was exactly the right thing to do. The Lamestream Media, the Democrat Party, the academy and the other usual suspects are engaged in an unprecedented war against Mr. Trump, and if allowed free reign, their irrational hatred and rage will go far beyond damaging Mr. Trump and will do serious damage to America.

Mr. Trump was right in calling out CNN reporter Jim Acosta (talk about an ironically appropriate name), and should have had him thrown out. Acosta should be permanently banned from any Trump event and from the White House. Even if Acosta does not respect Mr. Trump--and it’s clear that’s the case, or he was raised by wolves--he and every reporter must give due deference to the office Mr. Trump holds. There is no excuse to do otherwise.

Whenever any reporter behaves inappropriately, give them the boot and ban them, period, no exceptions, no reprieves, no apologies accepted. These are people who have declared war on Mr. Trump. They don’t get to decide who is president or how to treat the person holding the office. They are beyond the pale and deserve no consideration. CNN too should have no consideration, and should be banned from all Trump events and the White House.

It’s important that Mr. Trump set the ground rules even before he takes the oath of office. The thinking, civilized public is on his side and very much against the lies and excesses of the media. If Mr. Trump stands firm, the media will have the choice of becoming more and more marginalized, or of working to regain a modicum of the public’s trust. In any case, Twitter is Mr. Trump’s, and the American people’s best friend, and he should use it, carefully, to bypass the media. Mr. Trump has a unique opportunity to strike a blow for all Americans against an arrogant, corrupt, and Leftist media. He should take careful, measured advantage of it.

Mr. Trump should also sue Buzzfeed and CNN for their libelous conduct. Normally, it’s difficult for public figures to recover damages in such cases, but when actual malice is involved--as it surely is--and when Buzzfeed and CNN knew the material they were publishing to be false, that’s another story. Mr. Trump should sue them into oblivion and give the money to Fox News, or to an appropriate non-profit like FIRE that works to uphold the First Amendment and that behaves honorably.

If Mr. Trump does as I suggest, the media will wail, gnash their teeth and rend their garments. They’ll claim Mr. Trump is destroying the First Amendment and Democracy! They’ll call him a Nazi! They’ll…what’s that you say? They’re already doing all of that? They’ve been doing it for more than a year? Why, so they have!

I guess Mr. Trump really doesn’t have anything to lose, does he?

  JoshuaPundit: Ah well, I guess everyone enjoyed seeing a smarmy CNN reporter put in his place. I heard several  people refer to it as another Christmas present.It worked for several reasons. Acosta was being rude, attempting to shout over another reporter's question,the Donald warned him twice and then told him he wasn't going to give him a question saying, "You are fake news" to wild applause. Which of course, they are. Trump merely underlined it.

There are a couple of interesting things I noticed though. First that PEOTUS Trump also went out of his way to throw the rest of the media a bone. In his remarks, he thanked them for their professionalism in not publishing an obviously fake story that had no proof whatsoever behind it including, in Trump's words, "those of you who haven't been so fair to me in the past. You've all risen a bit in my estimation."

This was quite important. Trump was letting the media know that if they're reasonably fair to him, he'll help them get their jobs done. If they act like CNN, they'll be treated like CNN because he isn't afraid of them. He was, in effect, setting rules and guidelines. Call it puppy training, courtesy of The Donald.




One interesting response on the media's part is that the whole meme Obama and his sycophants came up with, 'fake news' is now being dropped by many of them like a hot potato. They realize that media on the Right simply turned the tables on them..partly because most of the American people no longer trust the main stream outlets' credibility any more, especially after watching CNN wind up with egg on its face.They realize that 'fake news' can just as easily be applied to them.

This may turn out, believe it or not, to be the start of something positive.


Puma By Design : I view president-elect, Trump’s take down of CNN as a positive. For decades, the mainstream media has shamefully lambasted Republicans while giving Progressives a pass.

Even when I was still a Democrat, I found myself wondering, “What is wrong with the Republican Party? Why do they take that kind of treatment? Stand up for yourselves! Fight back, dummies!”

Up until the Tea Party, many of the old-school Republicans who did respond failed miserably. Adding to that, the mainstream media over the past eight years, gushed shamelessly over Barack Obama like a smitten 14-year-old school girl (no offense to school girls).

Enter 2015/2016 and Donald Trump: Throughout the presidential campaign, media sock puppets gave Hillary Clinton who campaigned on a part-time basis and took weekends off a pass. I don’t recall one news outlet reporting that Clinton who rarely took interviews was playing to empty halls. It was frustrating to watch them fawn over an illusion while declaring Crooked Hillary the victor long before the election.

Throughout Trump and his supporters came under attack while Clinton was given high praise for labeling Trump supporters the alt-right and a basket of deplorables.

CNN until this day has failed to give the victor aka our president-elect the respect Trump has justifiably earned and deserves.

To Trump’s credit, it’s rather refreshing to see a Republican, finally, stand up to the mainstream media and not feel guilty about doing so.

CNN, peers and the grievance industry has been allowed to pedal their filthy propaganda to silence Republicans and other voices of opposition for far too long. They are creatures of habit which is why I suspect that they believe Trump’s take down of Jim Acosta was an anomaly. What fools they are.

Laura Rambeau Lee, Right Reason : Trump’s calling out CNN reporter Jim Acosta during a press conference was a wakeup call to those in the mainstream media. Those of us who have followed the media are painfully aware of the bias in their reporting. It’s the reason we have taken to social media to report on the news and cover the stories they either refuse to report at all or report through a liberal lens.

 This recent report was offered up by journalists knowing full well it was a false story, but the content so salacious they couldn’t resist putting it out there for their readers to believe of our president elect. It shows desperation and reveals how upset they are that all of their hard work to boost their chosen candidate did not succeed in delivering her into the Oval Office. They believed themselves to be the king or queen makers and they can’t believe they failed.

 They have commanded the airwaves and have been in the pockets of the powerful leftist elites for far too long. They have had free rein to spew outright lies and innuendo about political opponents and cover up and hide any negative reports about their chosen candidates. They have been able to do this because no one will call them out on what they are doing… until Donald Trump. To them a free press means no responsibility or repercussions for their reporting no matter how fallacious or outrageous. The media has become a weapon and a tool to advance a progressive agenda. We are hearing many of our elected officials outraged with disinformation coming from foreign countries, yet they seem okay with disinformation from our own complicit media as long as it supports their cause and keeps them in office.

It makes one wonder if the founders foresaw such a time when the press would become a tool for subversion and destruction of our republic. Of course in those days a man’s word and honor were to be preserved above everything. Reputation mattered and society dealt with liars and thieves quickly and harshly.

In spite of the media bias, the First Amendment must stand. Perhaps PEOTUS Donald Trump has started a dialogue where the media will be held up to the cleansing light of truth and be held accountable for their reporting. But we must acknowledge there will always be fake news. The progressives and their agenda will not go away. They are licking their wounds but they will continue in their goal to destroy America. It is up to We the People to do our due diligence and determine the truth, share it, and expose the liars and their agenda.


Well, there it is!

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