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  2. February 2017

February 2017

Trump Accuses Media of 'Blind Hatred'

President Donald Trump is doubling down on his attacks on the media (except for Fox News) and the intelligence community as the media report on the resignation/firing of Trump's National Security Advisor Michael Flynn over contacts with Russia before the election, with some help with leaks from the latter. It also comes amid some bipartisan support for a continuing Hill investigation into Russian influence on the election.

The President fired off a series of tweets early Feb 15 beginning with: "The fake news media is going crazy with their conspiracy theories and blind hatred. @MSNBC & @CNN are unwatchable. @foxandfriends is great!" That was followed by "This Russian connection non-sense is merely an attempt to cover-up the many mistakes made in Hillary Clinton's losing campaign," and "Information is being illegally given to the failing @nytimes & @washingtonpost by the intelligence community (NSA and FBI?). Just like Russia." Trump then tweeted "The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by 'intelligence' like candy. Very un-American!"

Who Says Journalism Is A Dead-End Major?

[Commentary] Journalism models are changing rapidly. But don’t make the mistake of thinking the craft is dying. At J-schools, students demonstrate the “desire to find out what’s really going on,” and the fact they are anxious “to communicate that through vivid language and strong images, gives me hope for their future, and the future of journalism.”
[Mark Effron, a veteran media executive, teaches at Montclair State University in New Jersey]

Twitter to judge: Let us tell everyone exactly how many secret orders we get

Twitter has asked a federal judge to decide what seems like a relatively simple question: is it ok to tell the public that the company received a specific number of national security orders, rather than simply a broad range, during a given period of time? The case began more than two years ago, when Twitter sued the Department of Justice and argued that the federal law that prohibits the company from being more precise is unconstitutional. The government counters that courts should defer to the executive branch with respect to classification and not allow Twitter's request. Lawyers representing the social media giant and the Department of Justice squared off on Feb 14 during a hearing as to whether the judge should immediately rule in the government’s favor on a motion for summary judgment.

How Information Fuels the Power of our Democracy

[Commentary] We started this conference 10 years ago...and look where we are:
First, the internet continues to hold small “d” democratic promise like nothing else in history.
Technology continues to astonish in the ways it makes possible previously unthinkable ways of communicating.
Third, trust has evaporated. Trust in institutions and in each other. The traditional channels of intermediation have evaporated or weakened. Since the middle has shrunk and internet facilitates finding backup for any point of view, it helps confirm bias and polarizes.
Fourth, the programs we use to discover this information are not neutral. What we know or think we know is increasingly determined by algorithms controlled by a handful of tech companies whose relationship to government is evolving and whose commitment to free expression is uneven.

It is time for a new national conversation and new solutions. The pace of disruption will not slow down and is moving too quickly for a fixed model, we’ll remain agnostic, trying different ways but based always on our belief in free expression, citizen engagement and inclusive societies.

[Alberto Ibarguen is the president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation]

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