A few days ago, Donald Trump Jr. said that his father is considering banning some mainstream media outlets from White House press briefings and replacing them with more independent outlets.  After all their lying, deception, and dirty tricks, boy, does that feel good!  Maybe American Thinker staffers will get a place at the briefings.

It is time to go much further.  Donald Trump as president should declare that these legacy media are banned indefinitely from press briefings and interviews until they come clean on behavior unbefitting their stature.  To this end, he will state publicly the top egregious violation (or should it be the top 5 or 10 or 20) committed by each one that any reasonable person would consider unacceptable, and demand a heartfelt apology to appear repeatedly, whether above its front-page fold, atop its internet site, or on-air during prime time; no stealth edits, weekend dumps, or corrections appended to years-old articles no one sees.  The wording must be satisfactory to the aggrieved for the apology to be accepted.  Here are a few examples of what I mean by an adequate apology:

The New York Times and Washington Post: “We admit we peddled the totally fictitious Trump-Russia collusion narrative, concocted by Hillary Clinton and the DNC and abetted by the DoJ/FBI/CIA.  To this end, we knowingly and unquestioningly acted as stooges to print politically motivated leaks of false material damaging to Trump.  This was unethical, unjustified, and indefensible; protecting democracy as we see it is not a valid rationale. We sincerely apologize, and we will strive to ensure something like this never happens again.  Further, it was inappropriate and unwarranted for our reporter to receive a Pulitzer Prize for such reporting; the reporter has agreed to return the prize to the Pulitzer committee.  The record will show that we consider this Pulitzer as not counting as an award received by our newspaper.”

ABC: “We admit that supplying Kamala Harris in advance with the topics of the questions to be asked in the presidential debate with Donald Trump was by any fair standard deceptive, inappropriate and indefensible, regardless of how we feel personally about Donald Trump.  Furthermore, announcing at the beginning of the debate that neither candidate received the ‘questions’ [sic] in advance also was deceptive.  Deciding before the debate to fact-check (not always correctly, we admit) only Donald Trump was also unfair and unethical.  We apologize profusely and declare we will never do anything like this again.”

Other examples: peddling knowingly false COVID narratives; pretending the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation; hiding Joe Biden’s mental decline and incapacity; CNN’s debate violations.  I would leave out more nebulous examples such as cited in the link above unless specific proof of unethical behavior is available.

If you think everyone knows by now of MSM misdeeds, consider a very educated acquaintance of mine.  I made the mistake of telling her that given the election results, at least we won’t be subjected to DEI reprogramming anymore.  Well, she thought DEI training was a great idea many need because they are white supremacists, and then she spilled out her other thoughts: Trump 45 inherited Obama’s outstanding economy so he gets no credit; Trump’s closeness with Putin may indeed indicate he is a Russian stooge and so investigation of him is warranted; Kamala Harris was a brilliant California DA and AG and a very strong presidential candidate, defeated only by white male supremacists who wouldn’t vote for a black woman; she never heard that Kamala was given the debate topics in advance.  I could go on.  If you’re wondering, my acquaintance reads the NYT.  Maybe if people like her are exposed to the truth, candidates like Trump would win 80-20 rather than 53-47.  Well, maybe not.

Republicans in both Houses of Congress should be unified in not giving scoops to reporters from these outlets.  If such reporters catch them in the halls and ask for comment, they should respond that they do not trust the reporter or its network after what they did, state their crime, and say they are awaiting an apology.

If you think there’s no way the media would subject themselves to such humiliating apologies, they’re already bleeding customers and money.  Factor in no access, no interviews, no DoJ/FBI/CIA leaks, and they have nothing left. I guess they could still always make things up citing unnamed sources.

Genuine difference of opinion and debate between liberal and conservative outlets is the American way.  But this kind of dishonest behavior must end once and for all.

W.A. Eliot is a pseudonym.

Image: Free image, Pixabay license.