OPINION:
One of the editors for The New York Times, Deputy Managing Editor Rebecca Blumenstein, said at a FT Future of News event — the FT for its sponsor, the Financial Times — that no way, no how is her Gray Lady paper unfairly biased against President Donald Trump.
Delusional? Methinks so.
She reportedly made the remark, according to various Twitter citations, while speaking among a panel of other Not Anti-Trump notables such as Don Lemon from CNN.
“’We are in no way anti-Trump’. NYT Deputy Managing Editor @RBlumenstein on the panel at #FTFutureNews,” tweeted journalist Charlotte Willis, apparently from the scene of the event.
It’s good of Blumenstein to clarify.
Because otherwise, one would wonder.
For instance, there was the time just this past January when former New York Times Editor Jill Abramson tore into her own paper — on which she served as its only female executive editor from 2011 to 2014 — as decidedly “anti-Trump.” In her book, “Merchants of Truth: The Business of News and the Fight for Facts,” she wrote, Fox News reported: “Though [my replacement, executive editor Dean Baquet] said publicly he didn’t want the Times to be the opposition party, his news pages were unmistakably anti-Trump. Some headlines contained raw opinion, as did some of the stories that were labeled as news analysis.”
Abramson also warned that “the more ’woke’ staff [of The New York Times] thought that urgent times called for urgent measures” and that “the dangers of Trump’s presidency obviated the old [journalistic] standards.”
Interesting.
And let’s not forget this, from the mouths of the publisher and executive editor of The New York Times in November 2016, right after Trump’s White House win. In a “To Our Readers” letter, they wrote: “Did Donald Trump’s sheer unconventionality lead us and other news outlets to underestimate his support among American voters?”
Ya think?
Anyhow, the execs go on to promise that “we aim to rededicate ourselves to the fundamental mission of Times journalism. That is to report America and the world honestly, without fear or favor, striving always to understand and reflect all political perspectives and life experiences in the stories that we bring to you.”
Promises, schomises.
Then there was the time in 2017 when Project Veritas outed an editor at The Times — the audience strategist, Nicholas Dudich — as saying he “always” made sure to notably post anti-Trump pieces.
“I’d target his business, his dumb f— son of a son Don Jr. and Eric, so they’re running Trump, like, the Trump business — target that. Get people to boycott his hotels,” Dudich said in the undercover video, Breitbart reported.
That doesn’t even get into the list of misleading, out-of-context, curiously placed, curiously omitting, subtly biased headlines and stories The Times has been dinged for and has defended in recent months. Just check Trump’s own Twitter feed for the collection. Most notably, on Russia collusion.
But nothing to see here, no anti-Trump bias, go home?
It’s not the bias that makes people angry so much as the denial of bias.
If The New York Times would just admit that its pages lean left, then even conservatives could respect its reporting. Even Trump might let up on the critical tweets.
It’s the eye-rolling deception that disgusts.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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