The War Over the War

I understand why FCC Chair Brendan Carr is threatening the legacy media.

War coverage has turned into TDS

Coverage of the Iran conflict, as with most every other political issue, has become another case study in Trump Derangement Syndrome. War is always messy and mostly unpredictable; the story of success and setback painted in tragedy. As in life, it is often more useful to identify tomorrow’s potential pitfalls than to celebrate today’s victory.

Despite Jake Tapper’s claim, CNN and all the other usual suspects are doing far more than simply asking the hard questions, demanding accountability. They are an oppositional force committed to undermining the president and his allies. Watch and read them for even a short while – thank heaven you don’t do it for a living – and one would conclude that so far America’s remarkably successful war effort is failing because it was launched without much of a plan; that despite being crippled, the Iranian regime keeps escalating its response, meeting every tit with a tat. Note, too, their dark fantasies about Trump’s incompetence make no note that America’s partner in the war, Israel, is by any measure the most effective fighting force in the world. Does anybody believe they don’t know what they’re doing?

Bad faith

While the legacy media pepper their reports with snippets of reality, their goal is to salt the landscape to undermine support for the war and, by extension, Trump. Never mind that the country’s national security interests and prestige are on the line. They don’t explore the complexities, and trade-offs, of wartime decision-making. They just blast away. They don’t challenge the incoherent overview of the war’s opponents: Yes, Iran is a ruthless, murderous regime that is responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans, but we should do little, short of failed diplomacy, to stop them.

As with the earlier intervention in Venezuela – which we hear little about because it is going well – their logic seems to be that allowing the tyrants in remain in Tehran is a price worth paying if it cripples Trump. It is just their latest effort to nullify the results of the election.

This is not treason but the hardest of hardball politics: They see Trump as that much of a threat. But in a nation where partisanship traditionally ended at the water’s edge, and the media has long been expected to provide a somewhat accurate portrait of reality, it is hard not to conclude that something ought to be done to rein in the press, which has become perhaps the most divisive and least trusted force in America.

Liberal media far more partisan

Yes, conservative media is also partisan; except for the president himself, no one is a bigger cheerleader for Trump than Sean Hannity. But where the left is marching, as always, in lockstep, conservatives are more conflicted about the war – see Megyn Kelly and Tucker Carlson. Besides, conservative voices do not have the legacy media’s ability to make their misinformation the dominant narrative.

It’s so bad, I wish we could have a do-over: Wipe away all the outlets and start from scratch. It is hard to believe we could be worse off.

Unlike Carr, I am not a top government official; my thoughts carry no promise of the force of law. I pose no threat to First Amendment protections. Carr does. Like our often intemperate president, Carr doesn’t seem to understand that his great power should constrain his free speech. Neither man seems to understand that their words aid and abet their enemies in the legacy media. They allow dishonest press outlets to shift the focus away from their own misdeeds, while cloaking their loathsome deceptions in high-minded principles that they consistently violate.

Principle remains important

Ironically, as conservatives are filled with fury at the sounds coming from most cable news shows, they know how many liberals feel about the gun debate. Our Constitution is the great guardrail against the slippery slope, allowing bad actors to operate to secure larger freedoms. Fake news is preferable to government censorship. Those who cast themselves as defenders of the First Amendment while the Biden administration undermined its freedoms should remember that. If no one stands on principle, all is lost.

And so, we seem destined to complain as the New York Times, Washington Post, NBC, and the rest of the gaggle quadruple-down on their tendentious coverage. That they continue down this path, despite the fact that almost all, save the Times, are losing their audience, is a sign of their ideological commitment. They are true believers. They will not change. Nor will the Democratic leaders they represent, who are as committed as ever to the policies that cost them the 2024 race, including weaponizing the justice system to prosecute their political foes and reopening the southern border.

As war continues, rage will get worse

All of which is to say the foreseeable future will be filled with blood-boiling outrages. What to do? Not to sound too touchy-feely, but the rest of us would do well to consider our own mental health. Even as we continue in the necessary work of exposing their duplicity, we would be wise to do it in a spirit of humility and bemused mockery rather than righteous anger. There is a place for rage, but when that becomes our driving emotion, we are allowing others to poison our hearts and minds. Who wants to go around being angry all the time?

Having the humility to recognize they’re going to do what they’re doing despite our best efforts is freeing. Instead of believing we can alter their behavior and growing frustrated by our failure to move the needle, better to recognize how absurd these people are. They may be deadly serious, but they are not serious people. We give them too much credit by lashing out. A good laugh is the best response to their absurdities. I know this is hard to do – this column has not been a laugh fest – but it is worth a try.

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.