Rick HasenVerified account

Traditional media taking a long time to learn how to handle a candidate who regularly lies, and raises dangers to democratic institutions

The need for an evenhanded narrative that gave equal attention to the relatively small email issues compared to the slew of Trump stories:

stories of potential sexual assault, tax evasion, uncertain business interests which could put a future president in a position of weakness

while many of these stories got eventually covered, the email issue consumed so much oxygen

This was made much worse by cable news, which had incentive to build Trump up for drama/ratings, selling it as reality TV and not serious

and outlets giving oxygen to fringe pundits with unsupported and irresponsible theories, all in name of even-handedness

And rise of incendiary and false news sites such as Breitbart, which mangle the truth and more importantly provide an alternative reality

It is a reality that allows Trump's base of non-college educated whites to really believe nonsense about it all being rigged against Trump

and the nonsense by Trump, amplified by faux media, further amps up the crowds against the press and democratic institutions

Language about taking the country "back" further fuels a backward-looking move to what for many Americans were the bad-old days.

6/ So there's lots of anxiety out there. for good reason. And I hope that the country can begin to heal Nov. 9. But I'm anxious too <end>