In a perfect – and sane – world, what could/should the corporate establishment media be talking about in regards to the 2024 election?
If you’ve seen the news recently you’ve no doubt realized that practically every opening segment for TV cable (and network) news has included some form of reporting on Donald Trump’s legal struggles against the leftist powers who seek to “bring him to justice” in New York or Florida or Georgia or Washington DC, purportedly for crimes that any “normal” person would’ve been sanctioned for long ago. No way.
I can’t speak for everyone, but who, besides those in the reporting industry, is paying close attention to the daily dealings from all these places? Trump’s name and face are prevalent as it is, and seeing him making statements outside of courthouses is noteworthy to say the least – but what do his enemies hope to accomplish by ensuring that the former president’s 99 percent fame rate creeps ever closer to universal name recognition?
Political surveys usually include a “no opinion” option for politicians or issues of general concern. How many people have no thoughts on what they think of Donald Trump? Are the journalists, by devoting another x number of minutes to Trump, merely experiencing diminishing marginal returns by securing video and offering repetitive commentary for the thousandth time?
If it could be said that torturing a condemned felon beyond death can’t add any additional pain to his blighted soul, what good does it do for the media talkers to produce another hour of negativity towards Trump? Could it be that, in doing so, they’re actually turning Trump into a sympathetic character, causing viewers and readers to question whether their own feelings are sufficiently objective to judge the former president as a human being?
Or, could it be that Democrats are stirring up a, “why aren’t they talking about the issues” type of boomerang effect among their own supporters? In a post titled “ESPN Host Had an Interesting Take on the 'Jail Trump Now' Crowd”, Matt Vespa reported at Townhall recently:
“ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith isn’t a conservative or a Trump fan. However, he is friends with Fox News’ Sean Hannity. His beat isn’t politics, but the First Take co-host has dabbled in some political commentaries. While he will support Joe Biden in 2024, he has lobbed some biting criticism at the president and his supporters.
“Recently, Smith called out the ‘Jail Trump now’ crowd, hoping that one or all the legal issues facing the former president would land him in jail. The ESPN host said that all the jubilation and antics over these cases only show that the Left fears the former president. They can’t beat him on the issues—that’s all this proves to him...
“In March, Smith said that Biden’s State of the Union address was a trainwreck, saying that if anyone felt the president dispelled questions about his mental functions, ‘you smoking crack.’ Even liberal sports journalists can see through the circus here concerning the Trump legal drama, and my guess is most Americans will be able to do the same.”
I’ve thought this for a long time, but perhaps it took someone like Stephen A. Smith for the totality of the get-Trump nonsense to finally sink in. As Vespa pointed out, for those unfamiliar with “Stephen A.” as he’s more widely known, the host is a loud-talking, straight bluster shooting commentator who’s paid to say provocative things and tends to hang out towards the “woke” side of the gamut.
What else would you expect from ESPN, which as once viewed as a fairly culturally neutral sports channel which has, since its inception and wide acceptance by fans of every sport, been bought by Disney and now lends itself much more towards the LeBron James end of the values spectrum. I personally don’t watch Stephen A. all that often because his in-your-face opinions on sports figures – well, does it really matter that much?
But Smith’s surprisingly honest view on the Democrats and their inane legal witch hunts is welcome indeed. Courtroom drama may have worked in the OJ trial, and it made Rodney King a cult hero among the burn-it-all-down cultural left in the early 1990’s, but attempting to make a dent in Trump’s same-day MAGA train armor by having judges and prosecutors brand him as a threat to the world at large – well that’s a little overboard, even for honest liberals.
It's almost as though they need someone like former Trump Attorney General William Barr (who recently said Trump is less of a threat to the country than senile Joe Biden) to set them straight on the way most semi-objective American voters are looking at the 2024 election. Not everyone is ready to come out and admit “Trump is a better choice” yet, but even some of the doubters aren’t keen on the game that Democrats are playing out in public.
Video of Trump entering a courtroom or scrutinizing an artist’s rendition of the accused and his lawyers isn’t occupying the greater part of people’s daily mental energy. What would folks with common sense rather see? It could be what they’re noticing in their everyday experiences, such as:
Real economic pain. You see it on the faces of some people as they shop at the grocery store, the individuals trying to set a budget that will work for them as they witness their bank account dwindling and the realities of inflation and rising prices limiting what they themselves can purchase.
I don’t recall where I read it, but something like nearly fifty percent of Americans responded to a question that a major expense – such as a car or home repair bill – of a thousand dollars would set them back severely or, even worse, force them to run a balance on their credit cards. This country’s savings rate, which has been abysmal for decades, has reached a near-crisis situation in Joe Biden’s America. Political elites haggle over more billions for foreign aid or this and that program to combat “climate change”, but the average person out there simply desires to have enough to afford the next month’s rent or mortgage without needing to worry about closing their kids’ college set-asides or liquidating their once promising retirement savings dream.
The government’s promises – specifically those of the current broken-down president – would seem to guarantee that there’s a government check waiting to cover any emergency situation, but when the time comes to pay for that unanticipated happenstance, Biden isn’t waiting nearby to supply the funds.
And who would be putting up the cash, anyway? Democrats, despite being far wealthier on average than Republicans, demonize the “rich” and successful, slandering them for “not paying their fair share”. It’s easy and rather convenient to pick on “victims” without faces, but if this is really as Democrats claim, why isn’t Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos just signing over their wealth to the federal government? Has George Soros ever done anything good in his entire life?
What would the “real” people like to hear? Ever notice that Democrats, and Biden especially, never ask what people would really prefer them to say to ease their concerns?
How about, “We Democrats – and the Washington DC swamp establishment, which includes most of the leadership of both parties – acknowledge that our incessant meddling and vote pandering has worsened your lives. We’re sorry for that, but beyond this, we promise we’re going to start rolling back the bloated spending and excessive regulation that has ruined the markets and caused everyone to make uncomfortable choices that they otherwise wouldn’t have to.
“Further, we’re no longer going to propose to pay off (or forgive) the student loans of people who signed on to borrowing the money under certain conditions and thus alleviate the anger of those who chose not to go to college in the first place or simply felt that life’s ‘school of hard knocks’ was a better location to truly learn about culture and a traditional work ethic than a campus full of pampered brats.
“Moreover, we’re going to stop covering the rear ends of corrupted incompetents like Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and let him account for the damage he’s done to this nation simply by opting to not enforce immigration law. The already awful situation America was confronted with years ago has been made that much worse by the federal government looking the other way as illegal aliens have taken over large swatches of our cities and towns.
"Enough is enough.”
Good luck receiving such naked contrition from the political class. Stephen A. Smith sees the Trump trials as a farce and an excuse for Democrats to talk about anything else other than senile Joe Biden’s age, vice president, policies and past associations, but there are enough Democrats in Congress to more than make up for having to admit to something substantive and real.
The facts and figures from government reports from various aspects of the economy – unemployment rate, “misery” index, inflation, the FED’s rate increases – become real life for each person who has to live with what’s going on “out there” where citizens actually live. What’s government going to do to try and improve the living conditions of the forgotten Americans? Is throwing Donald Trump in jail really going to make your life better?
Here’s thinking more and more people are seeing things the way that ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith does, and as time goes on and the election draws closer, the number of “famous” people speaking out will only get larger and larger irrespective of what Donald Trump’s legal fate might be.
Democrats understand that they can’t win an issue-by-issue election fight with Donald Trump and the Republicans. Trump remains a hot-button topic in the upcoming campaign mostly because Democrats aren’t willing to let go of their personal animus and allow voters to decide for themselves. Conservatives and Republicans are more than content with letting citizens assess Joe Biden on their own. Why the difference?
Joe Biden economy
inflation
Biden cognitive decline
gas prices,
Nancy Pelosi
Biden senile
January 6 Committee
Liz Cheney
Build Back Better
Joe Manchin
RINOs
Marjorie Taylor Green
Kevin McCarthy
Mitch McConnell
2022 elections
Donald Trump
2024 presidential election