[zzzeek]

> The media (left especially) proceeded to talk about Trump 24/7 and give him unlimited free air time (and they got a ratings bump in return). They took someone who was a fringe character and made him seem like the mainstream. The Streisand Effect kicked in and Trump immediately shot up in the polls.

your post is chock full of simply ridiculous claims and this one is the crowning piece. please supply *any* actual documentation for any of these made up ideas. Trump shot up in popularity because he ran in primaries, he had plenty of money to do so as well as a lot of backers (both domestic and foreign, we were to learn) all around the country and conservative voters liked his ideas (mostly the anti-immigrant rhetoric, which is the oldest song in the conservative catalog, as well as a deep well of hatred for HRC that had been developed by conservative interests for literally decades) the best, plain and simple. FOX news would have built him up ahead of time as they are a right wing propaganda outlet that most certainly did want to create a Trump candidacy, sure. however "Left wing media" or even "mainstream" media outside of FOX did not "pre-choose" Trump ahead of his popularity by any means. As he continued beating everyone in polling and later in actual primaries by crazy numbers, the (non-FOX) media appropriately noticed and reported on it, and he became the center of attention as is actually appropriate. There is absolutely nothing new about that in conservative politics (except for the novel opportunity to run against a female candidate who had been built up as a focal point of anger for 25 years).

The bigger problem with this notion that Trump was "fringe outside the mainstream" is this attempt to distance US conservatism from the deeply nativist, anti-immigrant stance of the Trump presidency. But that is exactly a core value of the conservative base, which I have personally observed for my whole life amongst the many conservatives in my large extended family as well as in the communities I live in. He is exactly what "regular" conservatives want. Trying to pin it on a "the media made us do it!" is a dangerous lie in that regard.

[LewisVerstappen]

> your post is chock full of simply ridiculous claims

State exactly which claims are ridiculous and why they're ridiculous.

> please supply any actual documentation for any of these made up ideas

Here's a study by the Shorenstein Center on Media/Politics/Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

"The report shows that during the year 2015, major news outlets covered Donald Trump in a way that was unusual given his low initial polling numbers—a high volume of media coverage preceded Trump’s rise in the polls."

"Neither of these indicators, however, explains Trump’s coverage. When his news coverage began to shoot up, he was not high in the trial-heat polls and had raised almost no money. Upon entering the race, he stood much taller in the news than he stood in the polls.[8] By the end of the invisible primary, he was high enough in the polls to get the coverage expected of a frontrunner. But he was lifted to that height by an unprecedented amount of free media."

"The Democratic race in 2015 received less than half the coverage of the Republican race. Bernie Sanders’ campaign was largely ignored in the early months but, as it began to get coverage, it was overwhelmingly positive in tone."

"The Shorenstein Center study is based on an analysis of thousands of news statements by CBS, Fox, the Los Angeles Times, NBC, The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. The study’s data were provided by Media Tenor, a firm that specializes in the content analysis of news coverage."

https://shorensteincenter.org/pre-primary-news-coverage-2016...

Of course, you provide 0 "documentation" for any of your own claims and are just dismissing whatever I said as "made up".

> As he continued beating everyone by crazy numbers, the media appropriately noticed and reported on it, and he became the center of attention as is actually appropriate

Completely false. You provide 0 evidence whatsoever. I gave you a study conducted by the Harvard Kennedy School that shows the exact opposite.

The media gave Trump disproportionate airtime at the start of the primary when he was polling far behind other republican candidates.

[zzzeek]

> State exactly which claims are ridiculous and why they're ridiculous.

the media did not give Trump free air time as a nobody, fringe candidate. Especially left leaning media. Trump ran for president many times before and he was always treated as the joke he is. What changed in 2016 was he had HRC to run against as well as a potent backlash in conservative politics that was brewing after the Obama presidency.

> "The report shows that during the year 2015, major news outlets covered Donald Trump in a way that was unusual given his low initial polling numbers—a high volume of media coverage preceded Trump’s rise in the polls."

your statement is: "The media (left especially) proceeded to talk about Trump 24/7". The above report does not break down anything about "left leaning media" vs. centrist media vs. FOX news. I'm a consumer of left leaning media. In that world, Trump was a total nobody until he began winning.

> Of course, you provide 0 "documentation" for any of your own claims and are just dismissing whatever I said as "made up".

the burden of proof is on you to show "left leaning media" reporting on Trump "24/7" *before* his polling dominance and electoral wins occurred.

[LewisVerstappen]

I'm not going to waste my time if you refuse the read the study.

> The above report does not break down anything about "left leaning media" vs. centrist media vs. FOX news

It literally does. Read the study...

"When critics have accused journalists of fueling the Trump bandwagon, members of the media have offered two denials. One is that they were in watchdog mode, that Trump’s coverage was largely negative, that the “bad news” outpaced the “good news.” The second rebuttal is that the media’s role in Trump’s ascent was the work of the cable networks—that cable was “all Trump, all the time” whereas the traditional press held back."

"Neither of these claims is supported by the evidence. Figure 2 shows the news balance in Trump’s coverage during the invisible primary. As can be seen, Trump’s coverage was favorable in all of the news outlets we studied. There were differences from one outlet to the next but the range was relatively small, from a low of 63 percent positive or neutral in The New York Times to a high of 74 percent positive or neutral in USA Today. Across all the outlets, Trump’s coverage was roughly two-to-one favorable."

"By our estimate, Trump’s coverage in the eight news outlets in our study was worth roughly $55 million. Trump reaped $16 million in ad-equivalent space in The New York Times alone, which was more than he spent on actual ad buys in all media during all of 2015. In our eight outlets, the ad-equivalent value of Trump’s coverage was more than one-and-a-half times the ad-equivalent value of Bush, Rubio, and Cruz’s coverage, more than twice that of Carson’s, and more than three times that of Kasich’s. Moreover, our analysis greatly underestimates the ad-equivalent value of Trump’s exposure in that it’s based on only eight media outlets, whereas the whole of the media world was highlighting his candidacy. Senator Cruz might well be correct in claiming that Trump’s media coverage was worth the equivalent of $2 billion in ad buys."

They only included positive/neutral coverage when analyzing ad-equivalent purchases.

[zzzeek]

I read the whole thing. "By our estimate". Where is the data? When did it happen and at what rates? What news sources are called "the left"? note that while I dont consider the New York Times to be very "left", that sentence is using the NYT as an example of how much advertising space costs, not that the NYT itself ran $16 million of coverage directly. Also, the images on this page don't seem to load (example https://shorensteincenter.orgwp-content/uploads/2016/06/figu... . host not resolvable here).

Trump ran for president many times before. Why didn't "the media" create his candidacy all those other times? It's because there were many factors working in favor for him this time, that both matched the message he was giving, as well as that he had himself honed his message with the help of foreign agents like Paul Manafort. Of course "the media" was essential to his win, as they would be to any candidate running at a national level, but they didn't just pick him out of thin air and decide to create a candidacy on a whim.

[thunky]

I don't have any data to have this up other than personal observation, but I would wager that CNN (for example) covered trump much more than other candidate simply because he was their best seller. They are a for-profit entertainment company after all.

I'm not necessarily saying that they set out to help him win, but they sure did help him win.

[_ktx2]

Personally, I'm not too keen on either of your takes. I do remember Trump getting an unusual amount of attention, but it was mainly because the media was mocking the idea of him running. Whether this had the Streisand effect I think is pretty irrelevant.

NYT is "left" as far as an every day citizen is concerned; how left the NYT is I think is a non-sequitur. There's a pattern on the left of unclaiming anything anyone raises about "the left" that's negative. You unclaimed the NYT but I've also heard this done rhetorically with Antifa. People will say they don't exist because there's no one leading it or that "they're not left" in a no-true-Scotsman fashion. I don't think these are helpful or truthful positions to hold.

There are pretty thoughtful takes on what motivated Trump supporters. I'll leave a few for both of you.

- https://dangerousintersection.org/2021/08/06/what-motivates-... (During and post-presidency)

- https://electionsetc.com/2016/11/12/why-was-trump-elected/ (Election)

tldr: The areas Trump won in were rural areas, those were key to capturing the presidency in a tight race. I lived in one of these areas at the time; not a single Democrat showed up. There were no ads, there was nobody shaking hands, at that point I doubted people would even know what a Democrat or a left-leaning Libertarian were. QAnon and Neo-Nazis certainly did vote for him, but that doesn't make up the huge swing needed for him to win in a race as close as that one.

There's a rather easy fix for this: Send the fucking Democrats. Show up in the primaries in rural areas. Make policy and plans for improving rural areas. Speak directly to these people without telling them that you aim to take their jobs. Show them a trajectory to a better life and I'll bet they'll follow. People forget that many of these areas are historically Democrat or swing states.