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How CNN's Jeff Zucker and His Cronies Manipulated the News
- TrispusAttucks 5y agoIt's a shame what became of CNN. It used to be my most trusted news. I believed everything they told me. Their credibility allowed them to be carried into very dark territory and they took me with them. Once the cracks started to show through I started looking into other sources and slowly became totally disillusioned. They are a political mouthpiece more than a news organization. They sowed so much division in the country and created false narratives at the beck and call of their political benefactors. The Russia-gate scandal was a total fabrication that they reported on long after the facts and government investigations showed it was all bullshit and continued to spread misinformation and strife among the citizenry. They don't inform their viewers, they weaponize them.
- rnd0 5y ago>They don't inform their viewers, they weaponize them. Just the same as Fox, just the same as OAN, just the same as RT, just the same as MSNBC, just the same as ...
- nickpp 5y agoLet's not change the subject with some whatabout-ism. We are talking about CNN.
- rnd0 5y agoIt isn't "whataboutyou" ism to point out that essentially the entire news industry has become little more than fear-mongering clickbait (on one hand) or propaganda for one of the two political parties of the U.S (on the other hand). CNN is just a symptom of a much larger problem and it's that much larger problem which needs to be addressed -which will continue until it is addressed.
- gman83 5y agoSome of these are way worse than others, they're not at all comparable.
- akvadrako 5y agoI read all of these occasionally except OAN and I have no idea which one you are talking about. They are all garbage and you can't believe what they write, though they may be useful sources.
- RobertMiller 5y agoThey're comparable, but not equivalent.
- seanmcdirmid 5y agoI’m just surprised that so many people on HN seem to have cable at all. If you asked me what I thought of any of the news networks on cable, I’d give you a blank stare, they haven’t been relevant to most techies for more than a decade now. The only reason FoxNews is winning the ratings battle is that older (and more conservative) people have been cutting the cord much slower than younger people. The polarization and desperate rating grabs are merely a death throw of an industry that has lost relevance.
- larrymcp 5y agoYeah, you don't need TV news. TV news is mostly commentary these days Just check the AP & Reuters feeds each day. You'll get straight news, and you'll also save a lot of time.
- forgingahead 5y agoReally disappointing what CNN became under Zucker. I'm of the generation where CNN was our window to the world - pre-mass Internet connectivity, if you had cable, or were passing through an airport, or in a hotel with it, you had access to a whole world of people and places that could plug into. Really shameful what they did - from turning into a political mouthpiece, to finding new ways to heighten the temperature in society and divide people into ever more atomised units, CNN in recent history has been an absolute stain on society. The liars they have hired to stare into the camera day after day, solemnly declaring what is and is not "good" for you, while completing ignoring the issues that affect regular working-class people, are the true sociopaths to keep doing this daily without any self-reflection.
- ardit33 5y agoyep, turned from a good news source, to a 'tv version of a tabloid' Sad to watch. MSNBC is similar (trying to copy Fox's model, of being highly partisan and very exaggerating everything)
- Kina 5y agoZucker's success in the media/entertainment industry is baffling because his reputation is basically as a wrecking ball. I have not seen any praise of his stewardship of NBC which made his selection as the person to run CNN bewildering. One can only speculate about how he landed the position, but none of it seems to be based on observable successes at what he was paid to do.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- meatsauce 5y agoLosing 90% of your audience is only a success for someone who is selling the dimmest bulbs of society a cold plate of sloppy propaganda.
- MrPatan 5y agoHow can we know it wasn't always partisan drivel, only now you can tell?
- daenz 5y agoIt's become very clear to me that the people who call themselves leaders are as flawed, weak, and corruptible as anyone else. Arguably moreso. They're not especially moral and strong. So when they're put in (or ascend to) these expansive positions of power, we all feel their flaws, weakness, and corruption. Their problems become all of our problems, because their problems flow outwards, throughout everything that they influence.
- treeman79 5y agoThis is why some people like limited government. Just enough not to have chaos and no more. Limits damage evil/greedy/well meaning idiots can do.
- hackerfromthefu 5y agoAnd limited data collection about everything, its the same problem really.
- greatpostman 5y agoThe Russia investigation coverage changed my view on the limits and possibilities of propaganda. Have never been more cynical of humanity, or rather, people running the show commonly have the same abilities as the school teacher at the local public school
- MrMan 5y ago
- hericium 5y agoIf you can buy elected US president to advertise your canned food from the Oval Office, why wouldn't you be able to buy ads, presenters and silent control over media?
- fragmede 5y agoBecause the conceit is, that only idiots believe propaganda, and of course, I'm no idiot. Unfortunately the reverse it true - that the smarter someone believes they are, the more they buy into some crazy theory, and then dig their heels in. Only people that know how smart they aren't can be humble enough to question everything, especially a narrative that the media has formed, and believe the truth contained within.
- roenxi 5y agoThere is an unlikely but uncomfortably high chance that US-Russian relations are about to spill over into an apocalyptic nuclear war and the US government have gone cold-war mode and are attempting to remove Russia from the global economy. What exactly do you think Russia's goals here are? Because it doesn't look like they have been achieved. Or made serious progress in them. Presumably those goals involve survival.
- jacquesm 5y ago
- melling 5y agoI sort of lost hope for CNN after they asked if a jet could have disappeared in a black hole. https://www.thewrap.com/cnns-don-lemon-asks-black-hole-couldve-swallowed-missing-plane/amp/ https://www.thewrap.com/cnns-don-lemon-asks-black-hole-could...
- alphabettsy 5y agoI’m surprised this is what did it for you. The entire purpose of inviting guests to a show of this format is to ask the guest questions and have an interesting dialog. It would be more problematic in my opinion if the hosts offered their own answers to the questions without any qualifications, but that’s what often happens along with the rhetoric and logical fallacies. Is it a stupid and ignorant question, yea. Did someone in the audience find it interesting, extremely likely.
- melling 5y agoThe news is not supposed to be In Search of… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of..._(TV_series) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of..._(TV_series) But I suppose there’s more money in that. What could go wrong with that attitude?
- HWR_14 5y ago
- gman83 5y agoYeah people act like the media is a wing of the Democratic party, but there's no way Trump is getting elected in 2016 without their free wall-to-wall coverage of him.
- bogantech 5y agoTrump was a pied piper candidate. They all thought there was no way he would win the Election - he was supposed to make people not vote republican
- HWR_14 5y ago
- RobertMiller 5y ago> And if he was supposed to make people not vote republican, why did the republicans nominate him? The RNC did a poor job of rigging their own primary, and accidentally let the populist win? The DNC evidently had their act together in this regard, but I think it probably cost them the election.
- ComradePhil 5y agoSomehow people seem to believe that media became worse over time. No, that didn't happen. It's just that people found out exactly how the media works because they had access to the source material. I remember the Trump election cycle when they kept coming up with "the beginning of the end" for Trump by mis-reporting what he said in rallies, debates, speeches... only to find out that the supporters kept growing... because turns out, considerable number of people actually looked for the source video (out of curiosity than suspicion, I imagine) and found that the media were either manipulating the videos or clipping out the context to misrepresent what he was talking about. They have always been doing this but the masses didn't have access to the source material so they could report anything and get away with it. What has changed is that a lots of people can now see things for themselves (lots of people still choose not to, but I think it is out of habit than anything). The post-internet media has to take this into consideration and only lie about things that is difficult to document in video. Had they considered this during the campaign, "news" like "Russiagate" would have been much more effective. https://youtu.be/YZ46I3kMOr0 https://youtu.be/YZ46I3kMOr0
- StreamBright 5y agoI think both of these are true. People figured out that the media is lying by checking the source. Media become worse and worse over time.
- somenameforme 5y ago"To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be conducted so as to be most useful, I should answer ‘by restraining it to true facts & sound principles only.’ yet I fear such a paper would find few subscribers. it is a melancholy truth that a suppression of the press could not more compleatly deprive the nation of it’s benefits, than is done by it’s abandoned prostitution to falsehood. nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. the real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knolege with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live & die in the belief that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time: whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present, except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables. general facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has subjected a great portion of Europe to his will &c &c. but no details can be relied on. I will add that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. he who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false." - Thomas Jefferson, 1807 [1] ------ His words may correspond to your own, but the fact that such views were generally widespread contradicts them. I think what has happened is modern times is not that the media becoming worse than ever, but rather that for some very brief window in time we actually had a media with integrity and ethics, even if completely serendipitously. So all we're doing is, seemingly like many things in modern society, is simply returning to how things were for nearly all of society's existence. [1] - https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/99-01-02-5737 https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/99-01-02-5...
- RobertMiller 5y agoCable news is a waste. Anything worth hearing about will be written up by a newspaper. And with newspapers now having websites, cable news doesn't even have an immediacy advantage. The only thing cable news can do better than newspapers is show you live footage of something happening, but that's good for little but gawking at. And if you really must get CNN's take on things, https://lite.cnn.com/en https://lite.cnn.com/en is much better than their cable channel. No filler, rambling talking heads, flashy hypnotic animations and music, or commercial breaks.
- specialist 5y ago> Anything worth hearing about will be written up by a newspaper. True. Old complaint. TV news has always been a parasite on newspaper news rooms. With some rare exceptions. I did student broadcasting (radio, public access cable, job shadowing) in the 80s. Learned about the history, the players, "journalism", etc. I loved the gear, working in the studio. (At least as much as I love programming computers.) Corporate media has always been as bad as everyone imagines. Completely walked away from the industry after some interning. Once I got a peek behind the curtain, I simply loathe the entirety of it. I even refuse to own a TV, watch the news, etc.
- choko 5y agoLocal news isn't much better. Most of the outlets are owned by the same people.
- RobertMiller 5y agoLocal news at least has one advantage over cable news; it only runs for a few hours a day so they aren't trying to stretch everything out to fill a full 24/7 schedule. But even so it's still crap, I don't watch local TV news either. The only TV news I've ever considered to be worth a damn was News Hour with Jim Lehrer, which was only an hour a day. Even in that case, I might just have rose-tinted glasses on.
- DoctorOW 5y agoIt really depends who owns the station. I've seen great work from Nexstar stations. So far, the stories I've seen from their approach to cable news, NewsNation aren't bad. They might get more CNN like as they approach 24 hour coverage. Edit: I work for a competitor to Nexstar who overall does very good work but I wouldn't recommend to avoid a conflict of interest.
- lazyeye 5y agoI remember watching recently a discussion on CNN about how Virginia voters were white supremacists because the CNN-preferred candidate had lost the state election. Note: These would be the same voters that voted for Obama in previous elections. The media is garbage, pure and simple.
- th0ma5 5y agoIf the winning candidate is a white supremacist, then it is perfectly reasonable to prefer a different candidate, and wonder if those votes may also be white supremacists as an election is a reflection of the population, and often people that agree with these ideas were also voters for Obama, yes.
- lazyeye 5y agoWas the winning candidate a white supremacist?
- th0ma5 5y ago
- Lascaille 5y ago>Good question! Yes, it is, so let's stick with it: Was the winning candidate a white supremacist?
- HWR_14 5y ago
- bavell 5y agoIn regards to the governor, only questions have been asked in this thread - no claims have been made. Are you confused and meant to post in a different thread? The talking points about white supremacists supporting this person or that person are all just an excuse for why they lost. Just partisan hacks who are bitter they lost so they point the finger at the other side and say mean things. They can't accept any blame on themselves so they desperately make up Boogeymen. Pretty childish imo. Note that this general behavior isn't limited to the left, the right is guilty too (e.g. it was antifa!).
- hvl 5y agoIsn't the problem simply that democrat-leaning media have fallen prey to partisan division , as a reaction to the same thing happening to republican-leaning media? Media on the right are protecting themselves by creating a bubble around their audience, and the other side responds by doing the same? EDIT: replaced left and right with democrat/republican.
- delusional 5y agoThis article doesn't seems to describe any sort of "left-wing bubble" to me, but rather in dealing between politicians and news sources. Coupled with sexual harassment. I don't think this article draws a picture of a news org that will do anything to defend their party, but rather a news org that will do anything for power. Which it then uses to reward the loyalists. It will gladly play into trump if he gives good ratings, just like it will happily shit on trump if there's ratings in that. It'll create conflicts of interest when it asks a journalist to interview his own brother, as long as there's ratings in it. It'll even cover for sexual misconduct, if the abusers are loyal and produce ratings. Basically, there's no political party in this story. Only power hungry amoral people.
- jasonvorhe 5y agoCNN has you thinking of left wing media?
- hvl 5y agoWell the problem is indeed that conservatives would definitely think of CNN as left, or liberal, even if CNN should not or is not thinking of itself that way. The behavior at CNN is reminiscent of Sean Hannity on Fox during the insurrection, i.e., both media's are trying to support their respective favorite politician. I'm not trying to justify it, but I think it's more driven by bi-partisan divide and loyalty to a particular politician, than it is by a hunger for ratings.
- travisgriggs 5y agoI’ve been taking a note from the open source world. I like software free as in speech and free as in press. The only thing free about our press anymore is that they’re free to make money using whatever hyper optimized feedback loop gives the best profit margin. I no longer call it a free press, but instead a profit press. I reserve the term “free press” for news organizations that in practice or legal constitution are non profit.
- sschueller 5y agoI like that term "profit press". Someone should do a fo protest with signs that say "protect profit press".
- a257 5y agoIs a non-profit-based press necessarily a better thing? I'm not entirely convinced that FOSS-like press is the better alternative -- open source has its own fair share of problems. When it comes to low-quality journalism today, I notice that most (if not all) of the notorious cases follow a pattern where the shttier the news the cheaper it is. Could it be that journalistic quality is proportional to the costs the reader has to pay? If so, rather than seeking a news source untainted by monetary interests, wouldn't it be more productive to seek costly news sources with individual interests you are clearly aware of?
- travisgriggs 5y agoTo be honest, I don’t know. I’m not looking for “free as in beer” press. Journalism takes effort that is real and should be remunerated. Without that, all you get is people who have an incentive to broadcast their version of the truth based on some other feedback that usually boils down to propaganda/proselyting/evangelism. What I’m looking for is to have the profit motive detached from the news. I was intrigued when Jon Huntsman bought the Salt Like Tribune and changed it to a non profit organization a couple of years ago. I’m not a regular reader of the Trib, since I live up in Washington state these days, so I don’t know if it’s made a real difference. I read the occasional article from it, and it seems less click baity and sensationalistic, but I couldn’t say that with any depth. But I do think there is an irreconcilable conflict of interest when you want to publicize information AND make a profit from it. It’s been there for a long time, but the precision of analytics feedback has moved that conflict up a whole notch in the digital age.
- GlassKingdom 5y agoSome of the opinion pieces on CNN and MSNBC (Maddow etc) are basically left-wing version of Qanon. Whilst FoxNews gets rightly criticized when voicing such nonsense, the more liberal channels get a free pass. It’s wildly divisive and has severely damaged society over the last 5 years. But CNN and MSNBC got their ad-clicks, which I guess is the important thing.
- Cederfjard 5y agoI would love to see examples of anything on CNN or MSNBC that approaches QAnon-levels of derangement.
- pauldenton 5y agoWell there's the Russians under every bed paranoia Look how they treated Trump from the start. 2020 was the most secure election in American history. 2016 was stolen by secret Russian collusion, that even a multi year long Mueller probe was unable to find any connections or collusion. You can also find the limits on information through polling. Over half of fox News viewers believe that the US government found WMDs in Iraq in 2003. Over half of Democrats believe Russians hacked vote tallies and compromised voting machines in 2016
- xkbarkar 5y agoThe coverage on the BLM protests also. The hypocracy of liberal media . Nurses with “see you next week” signs during Trump ralleys and then one week later full 100% support for rallying. Just ad long as the cause is considered politically correct. There was an article ( oped ) in Nature magazine on these protests that claimef the only covid spread that happening during BLM protests was because some people brought their unmasked children. Nature magazine wrote that. Ill try to dig up a link I personally feel it is healthy to have your eyes opened to your own political sides hypocracy. I will never trust journalists again.
- Cederfjard 5y agoThe Mueller investigation did however find evidence of obstruction of justice. There was also undisputably communication between the Trump campaign and the Russians. A reasonable person can still believe that it’s within the realm of possibility that something illegal went down there, although I concede it has not been proven. Contrast that with what I asked for, claims as deranged as what QAnon put forth. Are you telling me that you think that what you mentioned is on par with stories about a cabal of satanic cannibal pedophiles secretly controlling the entire US government, with Trump being the only one in power fighting back (also in silence, by the way)?
- tus666 5y agoIsn't rollingstone part of the same "progressive" cabal? What made them eat their own today?
- busterarm 5y agoEating their own is an intrinsic behavior. It's more like "What made them target CNN?" It looks like assigning responsibility for Trump and the fact that some women were victimized.
- dc-programmer 5y agoMaybe progressives aren’t willing to support their “own” unconditionally? These aren’t sports teams. Bad behavior hurts us all and should be called out regardless of it’s on your side or not
- busterarm 5y agoSure, but "eating your own" is a reference to both the coordination and the viciousness of the attack. That and the need to do so for sustenance. That's a problem with any causehead. Even where you're winning, you have to be fighting something to stay relevant.
- RickJWagner 5y agoExactly! I think it's because CNN is supposed to be dialing more towards 'center' in an effort to pump up dismal ratings. Maybe Rolling Stone is 'punishing' them for the betrayal. P.S. Could ESPN/ABC/NBC/PBS/etc be far behind?
- rectang 5y agoThe alternative, popular in many circles, is treasuring loyalty over principle.
- snarkyturtle 5y agoIt's almost like every media company is competing against each other like any other business who would've thought
- KoftaBob 5y agoMore than 95% of what news sites/tv "report" on isn't remotely actionable or relevant for the average viewer. It's basically something that scratches the itch of human curiosity, but with manipulative and lowest common denominator garbage. We'd all be better off if we scratched that curiosity itch by reading about things we're interested in, rather than current events.
- aww_dang 5y agoPot, meet kettle. https://www.mediaite.com/online/rolling-stone-blasted-over-false-story-on-oklahoma-hospitals-turning-away-gunshot-victims-for-patients-who-took-ivermectin/ https://www.mediaite.com/online/rolling-stone-blasted-over-f... >Rolling Stone has come under fire for sharing a dubious story about rural hospitals in Oklahoma being overwhelmed by those taking the veterinary medicine ivermectin to treat Covid-19 – an unproven treatment. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/rolling-stones-ivermectin-fiction-shows-why-republicans-dont-trust-media https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/rolling-stones-iv... >If you want to know why Republicans have no faith in news organizations, look no further than the Rolling Stone story shared liberally across Twitter this weekend claiming that Oklahoma hospitals were turning away gunshot victims because they were overwhelmed by “horse dewormer overdoses.” >Headlined “Gunshot Victims Left Waiting as Horse Dewormer Overdoses Overwhelm Oklahoma Hospitals, Doctor Says,” the Rolling Stone story, written by Peter Wade, quoted a Dr. Jason McElyea who claimed, “The ERs are so backed up that gunshot victims were having hard times getting to facilities where they can get definitive care and be treated.”
- somenameforme 5y agoThis [1] an interesting and possibly relevant video. The video is going to be from somewhere around late 1992, long before Jeff Zucker had even joined CNN. It's a hot mic moment between Bill Clinton just before taking the presidency, and the iconic Larry King who was the biggest voice on CNN at the time : --- King: "It's crazy - [CNN owner] Ted Turner changed the world. He's a a big fan of yours. Clinton: Is he? King: He would, uh, serve you. You know what I mean? Clinton: You're kidding? King: Oh you'd be surprised. He's ready, what's he got left in life to gain? I'd call him after you're elected. Think about it. No dope. Clinton: That's for sure. King: Great guy to work for too. --- I have no clue what King was suggesting. Clinton seemed literally less than interested, or at least more cautious about saying things you don't want heard around mics. But I also don't think it's likely that Larry was just randomly mouthing off, so it does make this quite relevant. As does the fact that it wasn't especially long after this, relatively speaking at least, that news started its rapid transition to what it's turned into now a days. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCUIlV-AKY4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCUIlV-AKY4
- djkivi 5y agoSpin is a documentary capturing a number of similar conversations captured from satellite feeds before/after the actual "show". - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin_(1995_film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin_(1995_film) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uock08dy19s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uock08dy19s
- ravenstine 5y agoI'm not sure how I feel reading this from the magazine that put the Boston bomber on its cover like he was a rock star.