* While Michelle Wolf was doing her comedy routine at the White House Correspondents Dinner, Trump was giving a speech in Michigan that was full of attacks and lies. Guess which one the media panned.
It seems that every journalist, politician, and professional Offended Person in America was professionally offended by a speech delivered on Saturday evening. Unfortunately, that speech was not this speech. ..
Because this speech, this rant that included invective, false accusations, and threats, came from the man in the nation’s most powerful position. A man who has demonstrated that he will follow up on his threats, will govern through petty spitefulness, and act with justification or reason against those who he feels have slighted him in some way. A man who isn’t a hairsbreadth from the line of running the nation like a dictatorships, but several steps beyond that line.
But that speech—has become accepted. Has become normalized. Has been treated by the press from the beginning, as something that it need not dissect in detail, need not hold up as dangerous, need not hold up in outrage. Because … honestly, the answer to that ‘because’ is a genuine puzzle.
* If you want to know what Michelle Wolf said that really offended the media, here you are:
MICHELLE WOLF: I think what no one in this room wants to admit is that Trump has helped all of you…he has helped you sell your papers & your books & your TV. You helped create this monster and now you’re profiting off of him.
— Ethan Grey (@_EthanGrey) April 29, 2018
* I chose not to write a whole post about this nonsense, but twitter did its usual job of coming up with some of the best responses.
You know, it’s almost like there’s a different standard for the white guy that “speaks his mind,” and for women, who are immediately labeled “vulgar” and “insulting.”
(Trust me, there is.)
— Julia Ioffe (@juliaioffe) April 29, 2018
“Sarah Huckabee Sanders has perfect eye makeup.”
“I deeply hurt for all women in America who must suffer these types of comments every day.”
—
“We should murder any woman who ever gets an abortion.”
“Whoa whoa whoa don’t censor this guy, let’s hear what he has to say!”— Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) April 29, 2018
The all-time greatest performance by a comedian at the WHCD was Stephen Colbert. Media panned that one, which tells you all you need to know.
— Nancy LeTourneau (@Smartypants60) April 29, 2018
If you don’t remember how that went down, here is Richard Cohen concern-trolling about how Colbert wasn’t funny.
Trump complaining about the dinner would be like him complaining about Vietnam. He was too much of a coward to attend either one
— American Veteran (@amvetsupport) April 30, 2018
I attended the WHCD last night. Donald Trump has so poisoned the atmosphere by attacking the disabled, gold star parents, Muslims, Mexicans, Blacks, women, the press, the rule of law that a comedian who simply tells the truth is offensive? She’s joking. He’s not.
— Rob Reiner (@robreiner) April 29, 2018
I covered authoritarian regimes, where comedians are sued or jailed for using satire to expose regimes e.g. Luttazzi in Italy & Egyptian @Byoussef.
America’s greatness rests in the fact that we hold the most powerful people accountable.
Be outraged by the lies not the jokes. https://t.co/kn1iZzaADA— Rula Jebreal (@rulajebreal) April 30, 2018
Finally, this pretty much says it all:
After you spend decades turning broadcast news and presidential politics into show business sub-sectors, and turn the WHCD into a way to hang with celebrities, and turn a reality TV star into a name-calling @POTUS, don’t complain about the result.
# # #— Kurt Andersen (@KBAndersen) April 30, 2018
