This is a step backward for the free press.
The leaders of ABC News, in an apparent move to make nice with the soon to be American Chief Executive Duce, settled a defamation suit with Donald Trump over his allegations that George Stephanopoulos defamed him by calling his sexual assault of E Jean Carroll rape on the March 10, 2024 This Week Program.
Days before Trump and Stephanopoulos were supposed to give depositions to the courts on the suit, ABC News issued an apology to Mr. Trump for their journalists labeling the jury found sexual assault rape and agreed to contribute $15 million toward Trump’s future Presidential Library and one million for his legal bills.
What the hell were the leaders at ABC News thinking?
First the facts please.
Donald Trump was found by a jury of sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll and ordered him to pay five million dollars.
Trump went on a rant against Carrol and another jury found him liable for defamation and ordered to pay $83 million.
Trump is appealing both judgements.
The Judge in both cases, Lewis Kaplan, said that because New York State’s criteria for what constitutes rape is narrower than in other states, the jury was forced to find that what Trump did was sexual abuse.
However, the judge also said, ‘the verdict did not mean that Carroll “failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’ Indeed … the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that.”
So why did ABC News settle when the facts seemed to be on their side?
It would have been better to use that $16 million to fight Trump Administration efforts to try and take their license away than throw Stephanopoulos and their other journalists under the bus.
The nation can not fight the MAGA effort to convert this nation to autocracy if wimpy News Executives bend the knee at the first sign of trouble and compromise their First Amendment freedoms.
People like those at ABC News and other outlets that are making nice with the incoming MAGA Administration need to show some strength like they did during Trump’s first four years.
This cover from Vanity Fair should be a model for how all news organizations should treat Mr. Trump.
The Press Corp needs to do what it is designed for.
Report the news and not coddle the Fascist bully.
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Could be wrong but I seem to recall that the original Mickey Mouse took on and vanquished bullies. How sad Disney seems to have forgotten that.
I’m reminded of Kent Brockman welcoming “our new insect overlords”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lcUHQYhPTE&ab_channel=OrRent
They were thinking they should follow the advice of their world-renowned law form –
Arnold, Chamberlain, and Quisling.
I will not watch a sporting event on ABC.
I’ll live without Disney.
Washington Post delete
Amazon Delete
“The Press Corp needs to do what it is designed for.”
They are doing exactly that and that’s the problem.
MSM isn’t in the business of giving us useful information, they’re in the ad selling business.
MSM consumers are getting older, older people lean right. MSM wants viewers, truth is not a primary concern.
They’ve been moving right for decades.
Its’ pretty tough to report on late stage capitalism and corporate crime when your paycheck depends on corporate criminals buying ad time.
WaPo and the LA Times caved to money this election. The New York Times is unreadable trash.
See Bret Stephens for more.
Or try to get through a Bill Maher monologue without gagging.
Such a lefty! And the people he platforms, FFS, he makes Joe Rogan look like a piker.
Even NPR allows R’s on the air to lie unchallenged, and contrary to the BS we hear from the right, NPR hosts more R’s than D’s, giving them more time to lie unchallenged.
Corporate and billionaire owned MSM won’t save America because there’s no money in it, and those corporations and billionaires are the ones giving R’s and Don-old the convicted rapist and felon money.
They expect a ROI, they don’t care about America.
The MSM caves to the right almost as much as the Dems.