STRIB ATTACKS (Part I) Objective: Hillary!

Hey, we get it. We, the readers, know what’s been going on at “that liberal newspaper” in Minneapolis. Billionaire Glen Taylor bought it, and now it’s not liberal anymore. Now it’s a decidedly right-wing conservative glad rag for Karl Rove’s GOP Think Tank. That is, no more fair exchanges of opinions or diverse ideas unless they have the Republican seal of approval.

Despite the Pulitzers for investigative reporting and Steve Sack’s political cartoons, most of the journalistic quality and ethical standards at the “Minneapolis Star Tribune” have all but evaporated. Writers who want to stay employed at this newspaper have to go along with using emotionally-loaded words and biased headlines whenever their writing involves the DFL or Democrats, in general. New owner, New rules. But there’s bias, then there’s outright smearing — even if it is the passive-aggressive kind that tries to fly under the radar.

For some reason, though, Citizen Taylor thinks his paper can unfairly and unprofessionally launch these character attacks in such a way that readers won’t notice. Like, we’re really THAT stupid, Glen?

Apparently so.

Take another look at “Wicked Stepsisters = Nancy& Hillary,” my last blog posted on March 31st. Both Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton got slammed in a fake movie review that had never been designed to be film criticism in the first place. Unfair and unscrupulous maneuvering to be sure, but now there’s something worse.

Now we have The Headline Tool and Citizen Taylor’s shameless directives for daily usage. He’s been mindful of this tactic and encouraging his employees to use it because it’s so effective. What, exactly, is it?

It’s a sneaky way to manipulate public perception by putting carefully chosen emotionally-loaded words with negative connotations in headlines.

As my grumpy old journalism professor used to say, “The most powerful person at the newspaper isn’t the editor or the one who writes the editorials. IT’S THE GUY WHO WRITES THE HEADLINES.”

That’s how they’re going after Hillary. That’s how they’re turning Hillary the Candidate into Hillary the Enemy.

Clearly, The Strib doesn’t want Hillary Clinton to be our next president. Okay. Point taken. No law says any newspaper HAS to endorse her. No law says anyone HAS to like her, either. Of course, the newspaper also has every right under Freedom of the Press to criticize and attack her. So, criticize and attack her. Why keep annihilating her in such a nasty, underhanded way?
Continually going after her in such a deliberately manipulative and disingenuous manner has nothing to do with journalism and everything to do with propaganda.

Let’s look back to the newspaper headlines from Monday, April 13, 2015 — the day after Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy.

On the front page of The New York Times, in the upper left-hand corner was this headline:

“Clinton ends Speculation, Entering the 2016 Race”

Factual, accurate, simple — this headline simply gave information without showing bias or editorializing.

Underneath that main headline was this sub-headline:

“In Video on ‘Everyday Americans,’ Starts to Detail Rationale for Presidential Run”

Of course, you could always make the case that the sub-heading seems more opinionated than the headline. Or that it’s creeping into the realm of editorializing.

But it does appear that reporter Amy Chozick was merely informing readers about the way Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy. Instead of speaking at a rally, Ms. Clinton chose instead to use a two-minute and 18-seconds of video to toss her hat in the ring — not the way it’s usually done.

Contrast that news story with the one that appeared in the Minneapolis Star Tribune…on the front page but at the bottom:

“NO LONGER COY, CLINTON IS RUNNING”

As far as the Minneapolis Star Tribune’s treatment of this news story goes, two major things stand out like red fascist flags.

The first one is a careless, disrespectful use of Amy Chozick’s byline.

The story that appeared in the Minneapolis Tribune identified the reporter as “Amy Chozick, “New York Times.” But none of Ms. Chozick’s thorough, well-written news story itself was actually contained in The Strib’s front page story. I’ve read both stories in both newspapers several times, and there’s no similarity between the two at all. The only thing they have in common? Both used a few of the same quotes from the video. That’s about it.

The order of ideas and the syntax itself are also different. It’s pretty obvious that these articles came from two different people. It’s obvious to me, anyway, that what appeared in the Minneapolis Star Tribune was NOT written by Amy Chozick.

And it’s highly doubtful that this reporter from The New York Times would write numerous revisions of this story for different markets in the U.S. and other parts of the World. If that were the case, Ms. Chozick would never be able to continue her reporting career. She’d be mired down with re-writing the same basic news story, over and over, so it would appeal to various segments. She’d be more like a copywriter then, not a reporter.

So why did this happen?

Is The Strib’s editorial board so uber paranoid about getting sued that they just gave Amy Chozick a byline for something she didn’t actually write?

Or did Citizen Taylor’s braintrust think their editorial smear of Ms. Clinton would seem more legit as a new story with a byline from “The New York Times?”

Hard to say. But after that editorial “disguised” as a movie review got printed, nothing at the Minneapolis Star Tribune surprises me any more.

I’m still annoyed that this newspaper could so flagrantly manipulate the word COY by setting it in CAPS and positioning it right by the photograph of Hillary Clinton!

Now we have an emotionally-loaded yet negative adjective forever linked with the face of a presidential candidate. Doesn’t matter if it’s even an accurate connection. What only matters is that The Strib keeps up the designated strategy GOP wants it to continue.

And what has the chorus of Republican politicians and supporters been asking about Hillary for the past three years? Why didn’t she just say that she’s running for President? Why can’t she just answer the question with a “yes” or “no” ?

Yeah. Why so COY, Hillary?

That’s COY, in the derogatory sense. That’s COY, as in the dictionary definition of “Annoyingly unwilling to commit oneself; affectively devious.”

So she’s being “unwilling to commit” or “affectively devious” because she didn’t want to announce her political intentions three years ago? Or four years before the 2016 race? Funny, none of the other Republican candidates officially announced their intended candidacies that early, either…But that’s not the point.

The point is to create doubt and distrust by continually asking rhetorical questions about her that make no sense. And to associate negative and unflattering words with the candidate and her image. It’s all about trying to destroy her character before you actually know if she’s running for office. Talk about a pre-emptive strike…

Who’s being the devious one now, Glen?