New York Times executive editor Joseph Kahn says democracy is not the most important thing

[FelineOverlord]

While I don't think he dislikes Biden, he also thinks Trump is better than Biden on immigration and the economy. He still seems pissed at the current White House.

https://www.semafor.com/article/05/05/2024/joe-kahn-the-newsroom-is-not-a-safe-space


https://archive.ph/Dl7Kn

To say that the threats of democracy are so great that the media is going to abandon its central role as a source of impartial information to help people vote — that’s essentially saying that the news media should become a propaganda arm for a single candidate, because we prefer that candidate’s agenda. It is true that Biden’s agenda is more in sync with traditional establishment parties and candidates. And we’re reporting on that and making it very clear.

It’s our job to cover the full range of issues that people have. At the moment, democracy is one of them. But it’s not the top one — immigration happens to be the top [of polls], and the economy and inflation is the second. Should we stop covering those things because they’re favorable to Trump and minimize them? I don’t even know how it’s supposed to work in the view of Dan Pfeiffer or the White House. We become an instrument of the Biden campaign?

Jay Rosen
@jayrosen_nyu
·
17h
The speaker is Executive Editor of the New York Times, Joe Kahn, in an interview with @semaforben
. https://semafor.com/article/05/05/

gain, the speaker is Executive Editor of the New York Times, Joe Kahn, in an interview with @semaforben
.

Read the full Q & A: https://semafor.com/article/05/05/2024/joe-kahn-the-newsroom-is-not-a-safe-space


The headline is: "Joe Kahn: ‘The newsroom is not a safe space.’"

Link to tweet

[NewHendoLib]

1. Follow the money

[BannonsLiver]

2. Joes a sanctimonious twit.

Which is required to work at the NYT

[dalton99a]

3. The New York Times's loyalty is to the oligarchs, not democracy or truth.

[CrispyQ]

4. All I've heard my entire life is that republicans are better for the economy.

Even though democrats have bailed them out of their financial fiascos multiple times, this remains an unchallenged American myth.

[dalton99a]

5. +1

[Johonny]

12. Yup, the economy wasnt better under Trump

And he failed to build a wall or have Mexico pay for the wall he built. Trump sucked as president by every metric. He was worse than W by a wide margin. His current economic policies are cut rates to zero, tariff war with China, mass deportations and detention camps. If that sounds good, then the NYT will be bankrupt by 2028.

[Duncan Grant]

6. Immigration is a Republican focus group "crisis" topic.

Fine, cover immigration honestly. Stop framing it as “the right-wing authoritarians handle it best”. See the difference? Maybe talk about how racism is prevalent among right-wing white Republican reactionaries? How about a mention of poor brown people historically exploited by capitalism?

How Americans View the Situation at the U.S.-Mexico Border, Its Causes and Consequences — Pew Research Center

[Crunchy Frog]

7. His sentiments may be different when he and his colleagues are hanging on walls

in the fascist state that's likely to emerge under Trump. Trump hates the NYT and regards them as "enemies of the people". They might want to study history to learn what happened to other groups of people to whom that label was applied in violent authoritarian regimes of the past.

[shrike3]

15. It won't happen to them, they think.

[Lonestarblue]

8. He was also quoted that the Times is obligated to report the news.

Then he gave an example of the need to report as news what Trump supporters believe—with no facts countering those beliefs because I guess he thinks the lies that Trump supporters believe are equal to the accomplishments of the Biden administration.

Now that Sulzberger has been called out, there are fewer articles bashing Biden’s age. Instead we have headlines like “Biden has already lost,” and last week one saying that Trump only broke the law for a higher purpose. I couldn’t stand to read the whole article to find out what that higher purpose was because it was clear that the writer was another of the right-wing opinion writers the Times has been pushing for the last year.

[dalton99a]

14. The way the Times was obligated to report Whitewater, Saddam's weapons of mass destruction, Hillary emails, etc. etc.

But hey, George W. Bush got his war and Donald Trump got elected - untold billions for the rich and super rich

[Johnny2X2X]

9. They're going to both siderism us into fascism

And when they and their relatives are being hauled away in cattle cars, they'll be saying, "Well, at least we didn't point out that this was going to happen, that wouldn't have been fair to the dictator."

[RandiFan1290]

10. Feels like we are just waiting for the big reveal. nt

[moondust]

11. Guided by greed.

I mean, what else is there?

[Kid Berwyn]

13. Fascism and Democracy aren't two sides of the same coin.

They're two different currencies.

Somehow it doesn't feel so odd telling that to the Executive Editor of the New York Times after reading 1984.

[cachukis]

16. An intellectual fail exhibited in saying immigration

and the economy is more important than democracy based on polling.
Take away democracy and freedom of speech and the press goes bye- bye.
Trying to intellectually both sides.

Good interview, but Joe Kahn compromised his whole raison d'etre.

[vanlassie]

19. Must have been failing up

his whole life. I bet nobody in his earshot ever challenges him. What a horse’s ass.

[budkin]

17. Hedging his bets for when Trump decides to round up journalists

That's all this is.

[NanaCat]

18. Gee... What a surprise the the NYT doesn't care about democracy

[edhopper]

20. Putting children in cages is better?

motherfucker!

[Uncle Joe]

21. The Devil Wears Pravda, a movie about high fashion clothes for stenographers.

It has always been about capitalism, first, last and in the middle with much if not most of the corporate media, Democracy is just window dressing for pubic consumption.

Whenever we send our people out to die in some foreign war, it's for "freedom and democracy."

I never hear them tout capitalism as the driving force for waging war, but not much has changed since the days of Smedley Butler.

Thanks for the thread FelineOverlord

[Silent3]

22. Since a free press relies on democracy, democracy absolutely is a "bias" the press should have!

Yes, even if that "bias" means more support for a candidate who doesn't happen to be a would-be fucking dictator.

Further, if the press were doing it's job and not both-siderism everything, democracy would be a higher priority in voters minds than immigration. The only reason immigration might rank higher in polls as a concern than democracy is (1) all the bullshit needlessly alarmist reporting about "the border crisis", which is much more of a crisis for the immigrants themselves than Americans, and (2) the insufficiently alarmist reporting about the threat to democracy, because you're too scared of seeming "shrill".

[0rganism]

23. Mr. Kahn has another job lined up for next year?

He can hedge against democracy if he likes, but that's unlikely to extract the NYT from Trump's shitlist. The "free press" is a hallmark of democracy, and historically has not fared well in authoritarian regimes. Mr. Kahn may want to remember before it's too late.