Thursday, October 10, 2024

Sane-wash, Repeat, Repeat -- The Procrustean Era of the New York Times


Today's [9/24/24] New York Times gave us an excellent case study on the multistep process where you repeatedly sane wash a Trump speech until it looks like the sort of thing the NYT would write a serious article about, chopping off the parts that you can't make fit then stretching and contorting what's left until you have something suitable for the paper of record. All the news that can be made to fit. 

First, you leave out as much context as possible. When talking about Trump's upcoming speech on economic policies, you leave out that he has proposed paying off part of the national debt with crypto currency and has threatened to end fed independence.

Then seek out the least crazy form of the thing you need to report on. You might think that when an actual speech deviates sharply from the prepared notes distributed in advance by the campaign, the more newsworthy version would be what the candidate said to the public. That's why it's notable that the NYT's big, detailed write up was on the notes. The speech itself was covered in more of a quick-hit live-blogging fashion. They may have a longer, more structured write-up somewhere but as of midnight following the speech, I can't find it.

It is true that focusing on prepared material allowed the reporters more lead time, but it's not like they were fighting a deadline for the online edition. The other, I suspect more likely, explanation is that inevitably the versions of Trump's speeches handed out in advance are far saner, more coherent, more on-topic, with considerably fewer offensive comments. If you want to portray Donald Trump as, if not a viable candidate, then at least a halfway normal one, the prepared speech is a much better option.

When sane washing that advance version, and certainly the version he actually delivered, the first key is to keep your language dry and measured, choosing the most reasonable possible interpretation of everything that is said, and only quoting the less crazed, incomprehensible, and interesting sentences while making enough critical comments to seem tough though not nearly thorough enough to cover all of the comments that merit criticism.

For example:

Former President Donald J. Trump will give a speech on economic policy in Savannah, Ga., on Tuesday in which he is expected to promise to lure other countries’ factories to the United States, according to excerpts from his prepared remarks distributed by his campaign.

Mr. Trump and his campaign are eager to focus the race on the economy, an area where they believe he holds an advantage over Vice President Kamala Harris, and he plans to promise an era of “new American industrialism,” according to the excerpts.

Mr. Trump, who often deviates from prepared remarks, is expected to repeat economic promises he made earlier this month, including to increase tariffs and to lower the corporate tax for businesses who make their products in the United States, as part of an effort to keep companies from moving operations overseas and to persuade manufacturers who left to return to the country.

Polls have consistently shown voters ranking inflation, the cost of living and the economy as top issues in the election. Ms. Harris is expected to focus on the economy when she travels to western Pennsylvania on Wednesday.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly promised he would increase tariffs both as a way to discourage companies from moving jobs abroad and to promote American-made products. But many economists believe that his proposals might disproportionately burden lower-income Americans, since some goods would probably get more expensive.

If you follow the economic promises link, you will find an article (co-written – – God help me – – by the same reporter who wrote this one) that the reporters more or less comes right out and says that Trump doesn't really have any serious ideas about the economy. Most are trivial and bad. A couple are big and far worse. 

Based on this speech and what Trump and Vance have argued elsewhere, these amazing economic benefits are supposed to come primarily from the magic of tariffs and mass deportations (now including both undocumented and documented aliens). Notice the "economists believe" criticism in the last paragraph. This perfectly hits the bare minimum required to maintain credibility while continuing to sane wash. While technically true, it badly distorts by omission. An overwhelming majority of economists don't just believe that tariffs at this level "might disproportionately burden lower-income Americans, since some goods would probably get more expensive"; they are absolutely certain that these goods would get more expensive. Trade wars are also mentioned in the linked article. As far as I can tell, neither article mentioned Trump's constantly repeated lie that tariffs are paid for by other countries rather than by American consumers.


As much as most economists dislike Trump's positions on tariffs, they absolutely hate what he's claiming about immigration and the economy. The economic consensus is that immigration is good for growth and the overall economy while the mass deportation and extreme anti-immigration proposals coming from Trump and his advisors would be disastrous.

But even the most accurate and unflinching account can't fully capture what's going on a the Trump campaign because even if the reporters had the journalistic and the literary gifts to tell the story (Hunter S Thompson comes to mind), the readers would assume they must be exaggerating. The only way to understand is to see it for yourself.

First set the scene of an entertainer in decline playing to crowds a fraction of the size he used to draw.

Compare the way Trump talks about his policies to the neutral and sober language the NYT uses to describe his them.


But perhaps the most striking thing about Trump's "Economic Policy Speech" is how much of it has nothing to do with economics at all. Instead we get the inevitable attempts to stoke the racism that fuels his campaign. We get a listing of grievances (People are saying he lost the debate. Oprah betrayed him.) We get extended account of the assassination attempts that increasingly invoke divine intervention. We get bizarre moments that defy conventional categorization. 

In other word, we get a Trump speech.


Trump has steadily made up larger and larger numbers of Haitians in Springfield. He is now up to 32K.












If you're up for it, this video shows longer cuts of some of these clips. They do not benefit from the added context.

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