[flatline]

Trump is primarily playing off a base of xenophobia and isolationism, for which Americans have always had a certain luxury due to our geographic isolation from the rest of the world. For our one neighbor to the South, he wants to build a wall. I see nothing that would indicate a stifling of the press, individual rights to free expression and assembly, rigged elections, and all the other problems facing Turkey today.

[untothebreach]

I disagree, I believe there would definitely be effects to freedom of the press and free expression. Trump's opinion of the press is well-documented[1], as well as his opinion on free speech[2][3].

1: http://www.politicususa.com/2016/02/27/trump-freedom-press-n...

2: http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2016/02/donald-trump-...

3: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/25/business/media/25trump.htm...

[6stringmerc]

Thank you for listing these; one of the most shocking observations I've had is how absolutely up-front Trump is about saying he'd basically gut the First Amendment because he doesn't like journalists. Having sources like you've provided is quite helpful. Why 'the press' hasn't savagely been aggressive and hostile toward him the way he has to them doesn't inspire confidence in me unfortunately.

[untothebreach]

My cynical opinion is that, unfortunately, "trump stories" == "clicks/viewers" == "more ad revenue", to the point where no news organization can afford to _not_ cover every ridiculous story about Trump.

[6stringmerc]

No disagreement, I'm familiar enough with media revenue streams and what-not that I understand the "appeal" of coverage. It does kind of remind me a bit of the way media members 'covered' for Tiger Woods for all those years. As in, if you wanted access to him for interviews, content, etc, you'd better keep certain things out of print (so to speak). Skewering Trump would "curtail" access, or, more than likely, result in a lawsuit threat.

[soundwave106]

Donald Trump reminds me more of Silvio Berlusconi than Erdogan, personally.

Berlusconi was nowhere near Erdogan's style of strongman politics, but unfortunately, during his term, Berlusconi did stifle press freedom somewhat in Italy... primarily via questionable libel lawsuits against any critical outlet if I recall.

It's easy for me to see Donald Trump following a similar pattern, of attempting to sue any critical outlet into silence.

[6stringmerc]

Absolutely; he's stated as much flat out. "I want to make it easier to sue the press." As Trump so clearly shows, it's very easy to sue somebody in the US (or use it as an empty threat) - there's lots of avenues for recourse.

Unfortunately for Trump, the courts have consistently sided with the press when they report accurate and factual statements, even if they may be unflattering. This doesn't seem to register with Trump. If asked to define what "treating me fairly" actually, genuinely means, I'm pretty sure he couldn't.

[gukov]

So let him sue and let the courts deal with it.

Do you think the media needs to be a little more accountable or the hysteria is good?

[soundwave106]

Accountability for accuracy is desirable. But with strongmen leaders, "accountability in media" tends to be "toe the party line", regardless of accuracy.

Practically I don't think Trump would get very far with any sort of libel lawsuits. Even in Italy, Berlusconi's "sue into silence" strategy was not 100% effective -- and Berlusconi is a much more dominant player in comparative national medias than Trump is.

Even so, my gut feeling is that Trump would be perfectly okay with a Putin / Erdogan style strongman media takeover if he could get away with it.

[6stringmerc]

To answer your question, yes, I do think the media needs to be a little more accountable, and to clarify, I fully believe it should be to a person or entity of character and with a steadfast reaspect for truth - qualities of which Donald Trump's behavior and statements certainly do not reflect.