I don’t write enough about the dreadful disdain that my profession deserves. But, occasionally, some story is so ridiculously egregious that I must admonish the story, its writer, and the editors. This afternoon, when turning on Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio, Windows 11 Start menu teased with news that might interest me. I clicked mainly curious why our AI overloads would pick something about the Republican presumptive presidential candidate.
From Newsweek, headline: “Donald Trump Stung in Primary As Huge Number of Republicans Vote Against Him“. Lede: “Donald Trump suffered a blow in a number of primary votes on Tuesday, after thousands of Republicans refused to vote for him”. Well, yeah, that would be news if true. But, before proceeding, let’s dispatch any confusion caused by semantics.
According to Cambridge Dictionary, huge means “extremely large in size or amount”. Let’s bullet point select excerpts from the story meant to make writer Kate Plummer’s point about that “blow” from a “proportion of Republicans voted for politicians no longer in the race”—during yesterday’s primaries in four states.
- “In Wisconsin, Trump won 78.9 percent of the vote share while [Nikki] Haley, the former South Carolina governor, garnered 12.8 percent of the vote and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis 3.3 percent of the vote, according to NBC News”. (She didn’t do her own reporting on those numbers?)
- “In Connecticut, the former president won 77.8 percent of the vote. Fourteen percent went to Haley while a further 4.8 percent said they were uncommitted”.
- “Trump also lost some 20 percent of the vote in New York where he gained 82.1 percent of ballots to Haley’s 12.9 percent”. (Am I math challenged, or is there something not right about that “20 percent” assertion?)
- “In Rhode Island, he won 83.7 percent of the vote, while 10.6 percent of voters opted for Haley, instead”.
Those four citations above are quoted from Plummer’s story. Now, keeping in mind the dictionary definition of huge, Trump’s percentage of the vote in all four primaries is “extremely large in size or amount”. That’s far removed from claiming that a “huge number of Republicans vote against him”.
Now, Nikki Haley’s showing in all four states surely is newsworthy, considering that she dropped out of the race last month—and that Trump hasn’t announced his vice presidential pick. Speculation that she might have done better, if still running, could be warranted if coming from a legitimately responsible, non-partisan political analyst. Instead, we have the misuse of huge, which is repudiated by the story’s contents.
Except, how many people will never read beyond the headline or first couple of sentences? How many others will be influenced by the inflammatory position and fail to stop and look at the numbers for what they really are?
The, ah, huge amount of misreporting about Donald Trump is exhausting. Let the facts speak for themselves. He has a stack of legal problems taller than some San Diego high-rises. If the naughty news gatherers that despise the man really want to beat him into submission, they have lots of legitimately disparaging news to report and they can do so effectively by being dispassionate.
Stop the rhetoric. Bury your opinions. Win your audience’s trust by reporting responsibly. A free press doesn’t mean free to lie, free to misinform, or free to let personal opinions taint the reporting.
The only thing huge about Plummer’s story is the size of the tall tale told. Oh, and it’s a whopper. Sadly, she isn’t alone. I could write 10 of these posts a day about all the so-called fake news spread by my peers reporting for traditional news organizations.
The Fourth Estate is a failure.
On that topic, for further reading: “Relic of the Fourth Estate“; “Whom Do You [Trust]“; “Who Mourns for the Fourth Estate? (Part 1)“; “Who Mourns for the Fourth Estate? (Part 2)“.