TRUMPIANS FIGHT BACK – AT 11:18 A.M. ET:  Does anyone doubt that the mainstream media is trying to delegitimize President Trump.  The New York Times has dropped all pretense.  The Trumpians are fighting back.  Sometimes they may not be too elegant, and they must choose their targets wisely, but at least they are not allowing the mainstreamers to run all over them, which is what happened with George W. Bush.  From Fox:

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus on Sunday defended President Trump and a top aide’s sharp criticism this weekend of news agencies, saying “there is an obsession by the media to delegitimize this president.”

“We are not going to sit around and let it happen,” Priebus told “Fox News Sunday.”

Trump suggested to CIA staffers Saturday on his visit to the agency that his well-publicized rift with the U.S. intelligence community was drummed up by the media.

Trump didn’t agree with some in the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia influenced the 2016 White House race to help him win.

And Trump argued more recently that somebody within that community leaking an unofficial dossier with alleged damaging personal information about him was like living in “Nazi Germany.”

Priebus told Fox that “one bad actor” likely leaked the document so Trump wasn’t angry at all of the country’s intelligence officers.

“I’m telling you; It was a love fest in there,” Priebus said about Trump’s visit at CIA headquarters that was attended by about 300 staffers.

He also suggested that a reporter was at best careless in erroneously reporting that Trump has removed a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office.

“It could have had explosive ramifications. … It was shoot first, point later,” he said about the inaccurate report, for which the reporter later apologized.

COMMENT:  Priebus is right.  Having been in it, I will tell you that the profession of journalism is breathtakingly arrogant.  "We are the observers," they say.  "We keep them honest," they say.  "We are the eyes and ears of the people," they say.  No they're not.  They're the eyes and ears of themselves.  And a number of journalists (not all by any means) are biased and unprofessional. 

The Trumpians are right to take on the press when it wrongs him.  But they must be careful.  There's an old saying:  "Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel."  It's generally true.  It would be poor strategy to be belligerent toward the media every day.  It's also poor strategy to argue over trivial items, like crowd counting at the inaugural.  Who cares? 

All presidents complain about the press.  President Kennedy banned the old New York Herald-Tribune from the White House.   Former President Eisenhower denounced "sensation-seeking columnists" at the 1964 Republican convention.  Former President George H.W. Bush openly, and bitterly, complained about the treatment given his son, George W. Bush, by The New York Times.   

It;s hard to know when criticism works.  Administrations have been known to have private talks with newspaper executives about coverage.  The media would be in a much better position had it covered Barack Obama in a fair and balanced way.  Instead, the media worshipped him, infuriating the people who won the 2016 election.

January 22,  2017