As of writing this article, Donald Trump has passed a total of 35 executive orders so far during his presidency which has lasted less than two weeks. That’s an average of over two executive orders per day. The sheer rate at which Trump has been producing executive orders is impressive, regardless of their efficacy or value. But, contrary to what it seems in the coverage of his presidency, for all intents and purposes, these orders have been mostly failures.
For instance, let’s look at the recent freezing of federal loans. This is, of course, a terrible decision that incited panic and confusion across the country, but on top of that, it lasted less than two days. The order was deemed illegal and cancelled thusly. But of course the media coverage of the rescinding of the order was significantly smaller than when it was originally signed.
This unbalanced media coverage is an insidious issue that I think more people need to be aware of. So I want to look at the way the media is covering the Trump presidency, and why it’s very badly done. I think since this aspect of the media is not going to change due to the incentives of large news organizations, we all sort of need to rethink how we interact with the news.
The media in the United States is fundamentally unable to cover Trump and, more broadly, right-wing extremism in the same way that it covers other news. The entire strategy of the party is to capture the media in a constant state of rapt attention, so by the time people are able to organize themselves around something, there’s a new executive order or secretary appointee to be infuriated about. And the media falls for it every time.
However, I don’t actually think “falls for it” is necessarily the right terminology because it implies that the news is being deceived in some way. This is not the case. However much antagonism right-wing political figures show towards “the liberal media,” it’s still on their side.
Dear reader, you might be scoffing at this, in disbelief that supposedly “left-leaning” news outlets are siding with the enemy. But it’s true! The newspapers are not your friend. Far too many people have formed parasocial relationships with the New York Times through the Wordle and Connections. It’s time to end that.
The media as whole is predisposed to favoring the establishment, no matter what form it takes. This concept is detailed by Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman in Manufacturing Consent, where they propose “The Propaganda Model,” a series of filters that the mass-media goes through that effectively turns whatever they cover into biased drivel.
I believe that two of these filters are particularly applicable to the state of the media in the United States, and I want to cover them briefly. First, is the profit incentive.
Essentially, the monopolization of the news into just a few owners has resulted in a need to generate profit on an infeasible scale. The news is privatized and run like a business that requires constant financial success and growth. This is fundamentally irreconcilable with the responsibility of accurate and unbiased reporting because now the media must maximize its profits. This is done through sensationalist, rapid, and shallow reporting that attracts the largest amount of attention.
This is why the news tends to focus on the horrible things that Trump’s administration is doing, without proper coverage of the pushback against it. People want to see things happening – executive orders being blocked, bills dying in the senate, and tariffs falling apart just don’t get the same attention. And when attention means profit, these stories fall away.
The second filter is the sourcing of the news and information from agents of power. The majority of information about politics covered by the mass media comes from the White House itself. This means the administration has total control over what is shared and what is not. Effectively, the government is able to decide what gets published in the news because it’s the primary source of information for the media.
This manifested recently with Trump’s spat about deportation with Colombian president Gustavo Petro. Petro asked for greater dignity in the deportation of Colombian immigrants from the United States, and in response, Trump threatened to place tariffs on Colombia. Petro fired back that Colombia would do the same to the United States in retaliation. And then the next thing we hear from the news is that Colombia has suddenly agreed to take the deportees like Trump wanted and it’s another victory for Trump’s foolproof tariff-based diplomacy. I am not being hyperbolic when I say this was the narrative spread by every media outlet in the country.
But that’s not really what happened.
Sure, the White House told the news organizations that Colombia had acquiesced to Trump’s terms, but according to the official statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Colombia itself, the United States agreed to the greater amount of dignity in deportation requested by Colombia. The deportees were not transported by US military vehicles and were not treated like prisoners, which were the exact original terms of Petro.
For all intents and purposes, this is an absolute failure for the Trump administration. They tried to strong-arm a country that is significantly weaker than the US in terms of geopolitical and economic power, and still lost. Instead, it’s another big win for Trump.
And again, this was the perspective taken from the BBC to the New York Times to Fox News. It doesn’t matter what the network is – they all participate in the same forms of propaganda. Some of them just trick you into thinking they’re on your side. The axiom that you should follow all sides of the media and form your opinions based on each perspective isn’t really appropriate when every side is different flavors of the same pro-institution, nationalist, and capitalist media.
Now you may be thinking something along the lines of: “So then what? If all of the mass-media is trying to deceive you and it’s all just propaganda, what should we do?”
These are excellent questions that bring me to the most important part of this article. Thank you for being such a helpful reader.
Ultimately, what this propaganda model does is further enforce the power of the morally corrupt oligarchs in the US government by legitimizing their actions. It’s important to pay attention to what politicians are doing, but jumping from one crisis to the next gives them undue power. Trump has the immense power derived from commanding the attention of the entire country, and even the rest of the world.
What you need to do as a consumer of media and a citizen with a responsibility to be informed is to look past the spectacle. Assess what is important to you and most importantly – your community. There’s not a lot you can do about Trump imposing tariffs on Canada that are going to destroy the New England area power grid, but you could ensure the immigrants in your community are safe from ICE and hate crimes. Even if you’re not located in the US (which you probably aren’t if you’re reading this article), you can apply the same tactics to the way you consume media in Spain. These sorts of models of propaganda are everywhere, and you have a responsibility as a citizen to be informed and ensure your actions are in accordance with your values.
Follow smaller newspapers, too! A lot of the issues with the mass media are caused by the sale and monopolization of the industry. There are still thousands of independent journalists and papers that are free from the narratives constructed by the mainstream outlets. Look for your local newspaper, and stay informed about the events that most directly affect your community.
It’s impossible to accomplish anything in a constant state of panic – that’s exactly why politicians and the media do this. If you really want to make change, you’ve got to move past the outrage and spectacle and focus on the material things that matter.