Headlines are an odd art. You must summarize the story in a few words — in print, that is. With search engine optimization, online headlines tend to be these long, triple deck affairs redolent of an elaborate, almost Victorian complexity. Where once “Asteroid to hit earth?” would suffice, now we see, “Hurtling space asteroid on possible collision course, could destroy earth and all life upon it, including Taylor Swift.”
Otherwise, brevity is still valued. Wit too. The Sun-Times is famous for both, often in the same headline: “DA POPE!” comes to mind, celebrating the joyful Chicago roots of the current vicar of Christ.
Long or short, the goal of any headline is to draw readers into a story. Plus accurately reflect both the story and reality. An article on Holocaust deniers should not be headlined, “Holocaust a hoax.”
Though sometimes, fidelity to truth gets lost.
Such as the headline on page A5 of The New York Times Monday: “Trump Has Moved the Boundaries of What Is Ethical.”
He has?! That is news. Because while the president’s second term has been noteworthy for ramping up the deceit, self-dealing, corruption and institution-shredding of his first administration, I have not gotten the memo that these things are now acceptable.
The article, by Peter Baker, the Times’ veteran chief White House correspondent, begins by recounting how, seven years ago, when Trump tried to host the G7 summit at his own golf club, Trump National Doral Miami, “It incited an uproar among fellow Republicans, forcing him to scrap the idea.”
No such trouble in 2026. Now his club is hosting the summit with “practically no protest.” Which is true. The Republicans, whether active co-conspirators, or dazed hostages agreeing with their captor’s every demand, are docile as sheep, with only the occasional soft bleat of anything that could, perhaps, be considered dissent.
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Your last paragraph says it all.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great piece! Thank you! I'm a regular reader of NYTimes, as well as EGD. With headlines and articles like this one you site, the NYTimes and other media are really advancing our progression towards autocracy.
ReplyDeleteI'm tempted to forward your piece to Mr. Baker and his editors. No doubt NYTimes is open to criticism, right?
Thanks. You can go ahead, but myself, I wouldn't bother, as I've found the Times fairly deaf to their own flaws (which is how those flaws persist). I've notified them of factual errors on several occasions and never heard back.
Delete“The Times Has Moved the Boundaries of Journalistic Integrity”
DeleteIt has been pointed out to me for years, and I refrain from acting on it, but it is true.
DeleteThe New York Times is anti-Semitic, less left leaning then it claims to be, and responsible in no small part to the chaos and troubles of our time.
I read mr. bakers piece through to the end where I feel he buried the lede:
DeleteBut Mr. Rosenzweig said that Mr. Trump’s willingness to push boundaries more than his predecessors has changed the rules of the office, proving that the limits were generally voluntary and not mandatory. Past presidents did not mix business and government in the way that Mr. Trump has because it was thought to be inappropriate or politically risky. And so now new precedents are being set.
“He has succeeded, by his own terms, in demonstrating that almost everything about America was not law-based but norm-based,” said Mr. Rosenzweig. “And by breaching the norms without fear of consequence, he has redefined the norms.”
he is without a doubt, the single most corrupt person in the history of this country, the biggest crook of all time, he makes Al Capone, Charles Ponzi, Bernie Madoff, Elizabeth Holmes look like two bit crooks who rob a candy store of a single candy bar!
ReplyDeleteAnd his children are just as rotten as he is!
There isn't a day that I don't shout out loud at inane mainstream media headlines (and, often, story content) as journalists and editors try so hard to find fairness and neutraility in this administration's clear and openly documented march to destroy democracy and laws that promote social and economic equality and/or equity. I, too, saw this and similar headlines yesterday and thought, No, Trump hasn't moved anything. He's been allowed to get away with so much, too much, due to (I love the labels) the co-conspirators and dazed hostages.
ReplyDeleteI and the people most directly in my life haven't forgotten what is moral and ethical and legal, and I am buoyed by the blogs and substacks that relay information in the bigger picture of context and consequence. A couple of weeks ago, during the height of Trump's ban of news organizations and journalists, Peter Baker was interviewed - as a source in a story - and quoted with some strong, honest, straightforward words from his personal perspective as a journalist affected by a ban that prevented gathering and reporting information to the public. I wonder if his (and so many other reporters') wish would be to relay more of that straightforward tone in all of his own stories but is checked internally by editors and headline writers toeing the billionaire and hedge-fund owners' corporate line.
I hope we can get ourselves out of this mess. Be informed via quality sources. Vote.
Thanks Neil. If we don't shape up fast, the history of these times will be written by Chinese historians, because history is written by the winners. America risks becoming another one of history's failed empires.
ReplyDeleteConsider all the empires mankind has witnessed. Persia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Aztecs, the Incas, Spain, France, Great Britain..all lasted for centuries. Then there was Germany (the blink of an eye), Japan, (the blink of the other eye), and finally the USSR (less than 75 years). So 250 years is not a bad run, as empires go.
DeleteWe are already going the way of Greece and Rome. This century will be the Chinese century, after they and what's left of Russia, and maybe the Muslims, fight over what remains of the crumbling Untied Snakes...like feral dogs fighting over a few discarded bones.
If we're lucky, most of us won't be around to see it.
If we're unlucky...or just young enough...we will.
Good luck with that noise. And it will be quite noisy.
I remember the speech that Mitch McConnell delivered during the impeachment process that followed January 6th. He laid it all out all of the traitorous behavior that Trump had engaged in.
ReplyDeleteAnd then still voted against impeachment. The maga Congress has taken the attitude yeah he's a crook but he's our crook.
So long as they can get their snoots in the trough and get a share of the loot they're not going to exercise the only device to stop this behavior which is impeachment.
Turns out our foundational documents are seriously flawed and the systems of checks and balances in place leave only the Congress to curtail this maniac.
Even with the anticipated Blue Wave on the horizon for the midterms there won't be enough votes to bring him down.
Hopefully we'll be able to gain control of one of the houses and thwart the administration's actions.
My concern is that this won't materialize and that Democrats will fail us once again.
The voters have a chance right now if not to get their hands on the wheel to at least put their foot on the brakes. Will they come out in numbers big enough to gain the seats? We will find out soon enough.
Nothing is going to change the damage that's already done that will take years
I remember when the radical queer left tried to silence President Donald J. TRUMP in Pa.
ReplyDeleteThen Trump won another election.
Sorry Neil has sour grapes.
Big JB can be Neil's sponsor.
That gas-bag is a tax cheat and unplugged his Chicago toilets. Have you no shame? Black kids didn't get a free lunch and JB ate them all. Even the Mexican illegals said JB is no Bueno.
A troll. A loser. A deplorable. Worthless.
DeleteI could call you any of those things, and it would be true.
But I won't. Because you aren't worth it.
So many Hoosiers, Iowans, Show-Me-Trump staters, Ohioans and the great American majority love and keep voting TRUMP.
ReplyDeleteMaking America Great Again: Donald J. TRUMPS you butt good !!!!
Trump is eligible in 2028 we hear the Supreme Court says.
Our hero, the man who beat two old hag women, Donald John Trump, his Excellency and President of USA !!!!
Oh my . Did you read the part about how he's a thief who steals?
DeleteBillions, billions. And what did you get out of it ?rampant inflation?
good lord... I tend to think that AI is a problem, but maybe you should put your comments in there before you post them, Anonymous at 9:33 am.
DeleteWe are still a developing nation in terms of morality.
ReplyDeleteLately I've been turning to Rebecca Solnit's Hope in the Dark, written at the start of the Iraq War. She sees hope as neither optimism nor pessimism — both are certainties that let us off the hook. Hope admits the future has yet to be written. Our vast uncertainties are the opening in which our voices and actions matter.
So even when we are ignored or dismissed, we can keep defending the ideals we cherish. The fact that we still bother is evidence we haven't given up.
Marge Piercy's "The Seven of Pentacles" reminds us that what we tend grows slowly, often underground, where we can't see it. Our smallest efforts may be exactly that. They may seem as nothing to us but they represent what others have called the soul of our nation.
We don't know how this ends. That isn't bad news; it's the room we still have to work in.
I don't know if I agree with you here, Anonymous.
DeleteThe morality of the founding father's was pretty clear.
Lincoln helped clarify our morals further with his correct argument regarding slaves.
The right as it exists today is the same rot our country has lived with since the civil war. It has always been morally repugnant and amoral. They are, and have always been, the loudest voices. They don't represent most Americans, and yet... they are.
And besides, what is moral hasn't changed. How we uphold it has.
The founding fathers claimed a fine Christian-based morality that, at the time, allowed for ownership of slaves. They were quite flawed in fact: consider the displacements and violence imposed upon indigenous people; the exclusion of women and torments imposed upon marginalised people including homosexual and mentally disabled individuals.
DeleteA quick survey of the literature examining the expressed moral code of the founding fathers turned this up: “To build a consensus among Southern and Northern states, the founders repeatedly traded fundamental human rights for political and economic expediency, leaving the moral crisis of slavery to fester for generations.”
This in turn permitted the free formation of nationalist groups like the KKK that exist today. Heck, I marched with Holocaust survivors in Skokie commemorating D-Day in the 90’s, remembering also the time the KKK marched in Skokie as a unique, knife-twisting expression of their own liberty to mentally torment Holocaust survivors.
They considerd that (along with the right to bear arms and develop subversive weaponry) covered by the rights granted by our Founding Fathers.
There's more readily available info on such topics, and more. Each of the men involved grappled in their own way but the US has never known the blanket security of a solid morality under the God by which it claimed to be organized.
Ethics, morality: never really a one and done deal, but an iterative, living process. Freedom is supposed to ring like a bell, not gutpunch like a fist.
Morality: more vital than words or paper or screen can convey. “To be on the side of the victim is to be on the side of life which is what morality in practice boils down to.” (Des Pres)
When did the Klan march in Skokie? It was mini-Fuhrer Frank Collin and his home-grown NAZIS who tried to march in Skokie in '77. They were turned back at the Edens off-ramp. I was waiting for them at City Hall, along with the Holocaust survivors. Who had the baseball bats. And the numbers on their arms.
DeleteThe Nasties were legally barred from Skokie in the summer of '78, as well. So they staged a rally and march downtown, at the Picasso, which turned into a nice little riot. Their plywood shields came in handy. All sorts of things were hurled at them, including equine byproducts from the horses of Chicago's Finest. Had to assist a woman from the Los Angeles Times, whose cabeza got in the way of a rock.
Left town for good in '92. So when did the fascists actually march in Skokie?
Anonymous @ 3:04. You're wrong here. In fact your arguments speak to the people, not the country. The argument you initially claimed was that the United States of American has never been moral.
DeleteYou seem to be heavily entrenched in reconstruction, the very arguments you make are those the southern slavers and oligarchy made -- in bad faith no less -- to force the masses. It was undemocratic then, just as it is undemocratic now. You also ignore the many found fathers who believed in and practiced Theistic Rationalism and Deism.
Lastly, while it doesn't matter, the founding fathers did not reference god. Under god was added much later, and i hope some time soon is removed. Being moral is not possible when swearing to god. Being moral is only possible when based on laws.
But perhaps our disagreement here lies within the difference between the ideal and the people. Can the idea be moral and the people be amoral? Can the flaws in Christianity (or at least how they are argued) be ignored? What about those in Judaism or Islam? Isn't the constitution created to continue to create a just and moral country? In such is it not the most moral one can be?
Grizz you are right - just as you described, late 70’s, before my time as an activist. When I wrote “remembering” it was about the plan you describe, and the ensuing fight to keep them out of Skokie - correct, it was not permitted to become an actual happening.
DeleteWhen I was there in the 90’s as a volunteer, the D-Day March was a broadly interspiritual and local governmental effort to specifically mark the Victory itself, and also to remember Collins’ efforts to intimidate survivors of the unthinkable, yet again. Surviving members of the Nisei Unit who liberated Dachau (while their own families were interned in US camps) shared their stories. Many survivors shared stories too, expressing fears that “it” could happen again - the thought that Nazis were near enough to be a threat was perceived a continuing assault, a prolonged reminder. I have a photo of the speakers that participated after the march in the Library auditorium. It was quite an important day for the community and HMF-IL. Sharp contrast with many public discussions today.
Now, Double B, I suspect if I was sitting across the table from one another we’d basically agree on a lot, and I appreciate the conversation and your reply. That said:
The Declaration of Independence refers to "Nature's God," a "Creator," the "Supreme Judge of the world," and "divine Providence." Many founders addressed God often, though some (Jefferson and Franklin) held deist or unorthodox views. So, I have learned from you that they deliberately kept religion out of the government's founding structure, as the First Amendment shows. But-
"Morality is only possible when based on laws" doesn't hold up as I see it. Law and morality overlap, but they aren't the same thing. Slavery was legal under the original Constitution, through the three-fifths clause and the fugitive slave clause. People who broke the law to resist it, like Underground Railroad conductors, were acting morally. Other moral frameworks, religious and secular, ground ethics in something other than law.
I don’t see why swearing to God would make morality impossible. That's quite a strong claim.
"The Constitution is the most moral one can be" is contestable for the same reason. The Preamble aims to "establish Justice." But the document's own amendment process admits it was imperfect and meant to be improved, and the 13th, 14th, and 19th Amendments are examples.
What stands up well to me is the question about whether an ideal can be good while its followers fall short.
That applies equally to religions and to the Constitution, which undercuts the conclusion that the latter is superior.
I appreciate your responses to me. Best, most thoughtful and personally educational conversation I've had in awhile. Stopping to really think once in awhile is a good thing.
I will say, headlines -- and really articles -- like the referenced one, are great examples of how "the main stream media" or "legacy media" fail us all.
ReplyDeleteYou end perfectly the piece perfectly, Neil; "What has happened is, they have been abused and ignored so successfully for so long that some people apparently have forgotten what they are, or can’t imagine their return. I can."
I lament our societies lack of sophistication or education as a whole. Morality is dead, at least in every republican. The words, statements, and bills released by mike johnson and the republicans are proof enough. I would venture a bet that a vast majority of the American public would get the answer wrong when watching "Aesop & Son." Goofus would undoubtedly be hailed as the idea alpha mail when people read Goofus and Gallant from highlights.
Yes, I repeat myself. Yes, I scream into the void.
But i like to think that by reading your pieces (and other's) Neil, that I'm more well read and a touch more enlightened then the average bear. Hell, I'm no Yogi, but I'm no Boo-Boo either.
I agree that Trump is the most frightenly open corrupt president along with his colluders, enablers, protectors, followers, ad nauseum, and we Americans of all parties shoukd have shut him down decades before he got into office and certainly after.
ReplyDeleteI understand the rant, but I went back and re-read the piece waxing about the pureness of Illinois and the Midwest...I've lived in MN, IN, OH and MI. Served in government, churches, education and more. Where is this land of corruption free, true blue, pure citizens and officials? The Midwest? [Insert incredulous laugh here].
You're right. Sometimes, fidelity to truth gets lost.
Yes, several readers pointed out that I seemed to have gotten carried away at the end, entering into my paeon to Midwest goodness. In my defense, our current governor is to rich to have to steal, and three of the four governors who went to prison did so for crimes unrelated to the governor's office.
DeleteI'm a lifelong resident of IL, for better or worse. One sib is a longterm resident in a red state and another in a swing state. Both found happiness in their new zipcodes long ago, yet BOTH wish they were in IL for the remainder of Trump's term. Red State Sib feels tense and "on guard" every time she's out in public, and Swing State Sib can no longer watch TV or listen to the radio. Talking to them reminds me to be appreciative because, despite the daily onslaught, it still could be worse.
DeleteJust began my 35th year in Ohio. Love Ohio. It's the Ohioans that I can't stand.
DeleteHave watched it go from bluish-purple to purple to red to deep red, since 1992.
Went from Clinton (twice), to Bush 43 (twice), to Obama (twice).
To Agolf Twitler. THREE times.
Joe won without the help of my adopted state of North Missitucky.
Only FDR ('44) and JFK ('60) ever did that.
The NYT is a trash rag that I scrapped long ago because the story you reference in this blog is their, and most of the corporate media's, MO: carefully sanewashing and normalizing the daily corruption, theft, criminal, unethical, and immoral conduct of the organized crime mob currently in charge of the country. The writer starts from the assumption that everyone is OK with what's going on, and that is simply false. No evidence is presented to back it up, so that means we're all fine with it? Rubbish. It's such poorly executed reporting that it passes incompetence and ends up as collaboration. Without a moment of critical thought, the reader can assume that the Gray Lady must be right about that position. The corporate owned press is a propaganda machine for the regime, and anyone that writes crap like that column is smart enough to know better and complicit in the mess were in as a nation.
ReplyDeleteThe majority of journalism which once was reporting of verified and vetted information, seems now to be a circumstance where the writers answer the question : what do YOU think about this?
ReplyDeleteIt will never cease to amaze me how the members of the "Law and Order" Party that were so sanctimonious about their ethics and religiosity for my entire lifetime have just rolled over for this amoral, unbelievably corrupt, incompetent carnival barker.
ReplyDeleteTo the extent of readily accepting that he pardoned many felons who attacked officers of the law on Jan. 6. He's a mob boss and they much more exemplify the ethics of mob members than Christians or upstanding citizens of any faith.
Here in the Midwest, however, breathing the free air of deep blue Illinois, we know the score. And we know what America stands for — the rule of law. Leaders who feel a responsibility to their constituents, whether a school district or an entire nation. Who try to do their jobs for the betterment of those constituents, for the people, and not line their pockets and turn the government into one vast chorus of self-praise. It’s wrong. It was wrong last year and the year before and the year before that. I had to laugh at this
ReplyDelete