Who Needs A Free Press?


Republican Logo (Shutterstock).

Republican Logo (Shutterstock).

President Donald Trump has made a habit of criticizing the media, calling both stories and news outlets he doesn’t like “fake news” and declaring the press the “enemy of the people.” While some bristle at the idea of the president of the United States attacking the fourth estate, it would appear that Trump’s base doesn’t actually think a free press is all that necessary.

In a new poll, only 49 percent of Republicans and people who lean Republican said it was very important for American democracy that “news organizations are free to criticize political leaders.” The poll, which was published Thursday by the Pew Research Center, found that 76 percent of Democrats and Democrat-leaning respondents said the free press was an important part of maintaining a strong democracy.

That’s a whole lot of people who think an independent press is simply not necessary, and in an age where ignorant celebrities can waltz into the highest office in the land, that’s disturbing. It’s an indicator of just how many people are openly willing to embrace a dictatorship.

Full story here.

Comments

  1. Ice Swimmer says

    A significant number of people doesn’t seem to believe in freedom and having rights.

  2. Kengi says

    A quarter of Dems thinking the same thing is also scary. I wonder what that number would have been while Obama was still president during a period when he was being bashed by the press. Far too many D’s and R’s simply switch scripts when the leadership changes.

    I used to think quality education was the only think that could stop scary things like this. I guess I still do, but I’ve given up hope for quality education in this nation.

  3. oualawouzou says

    @Kengi, #2

    I was wondering the same thing. Republicans have complained for years that the press never challenges Obama. A gross lie, assuredly… but now many Republicans are saying the press *shouldn’t* have been allowed to criticize Obama? Something does not compute.

  4. Pierce R. Butler says

    I wanted to point out that the “Republican logo” shown above does not match the standard version (in which the stars are inverted to create de facto pentagrams), but it seems the TrumParty has switched to just a red rectangle with white letters reading “GOP” with a teeny sketch of their old elephantoid icon, and no blue, no blue at all.

    And, yes, MAGA fans, the space given to “Shop now at the Official Donald J. Trump Store!” (linking to donaldjtrump.com) is much bigger and more prominent than that for the mere gop.com/store link.

  5. Pierce R. Butler says

    Caine @ # 5: The captioner(s) apparently got a little creative there. Can’t blame them (much), since the Trumpublicans seem to be going through a lot of devolutionary leaps these days.

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