I’m grateful for George Mathews’ letter (June 1) on a Harvard study that demonstrates media bias against President Trump. Now I can expand on my letter citing precedent for the media’s interest in conflict rather than partisan leanings.
It’s simple, really: What the president says is news. He craves publicity, and his Twitter feeds and interviews — such as admitting he fired FBI Director James Comey because of the Russia meddling probe — are astonishingly naive and self-serving. No journalistic interpretation needed.
Here’s a cogent response to the Harvard study from the angle of news consumers — us. Mark Joyella, a Forbes magazine columnist, writes: “When your company delivers a product that doesn’t work, and customers get angry about it, it’s not biased for reporters to tell the story — which could clearly be ‘negative’ in tone. That Trump — doing most of the talking himself or through his surrogates — manages to produce such negative coverage may speak more about the man than it does the media.”
From the same Harvard report, “The fact that Trump has received more negative coverage than his predecessor is hardly surprising. The early days of his presidency have been marked by far more missteps and miss-hits, often self-inflicted, than any presidency in memory, perhaps ever.”
So it’s all on Trump. Fans like Mathews should accept that and follow the lead of respected conservative columnists such as George Will and Michael Gerson, who detest the man and what he has done to their Grand Old Party.
Dave Griffiths, Mechanic Falls
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