| Saturday, August 23, 2025 |
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Hey, happy Saturday. Programming note: Reliable will be on vacation for the rest of August. 🏖️ But first we have some tremendous weekend reads to share with you, plus the latest from the WSJ, the LA Times, Puck, Slate, 404 Media, The Guardian, and more... |
Seemingly every day, it's the same story, just with different targets. Bloomberg: "Trump escalates pressure campaign on Fed." WaPo: "Trump and allies pressure red-state Republicans for more redistricting." Reuters: "Trump threatens federal intervention in Chicago, government takeover in D.C." Rolling Stone: "Trump calls for another convicted felon to be set free." NYT: "As Trump targets the Smithsonian, museums across the U.S. feel a chill." Here are some of the best recent reads about the president's pressure and, in some cases, the public pushback: |
"Trump's most dangerous opponent is knowledge," the Trump-opposing Democratic lawyer Marc Elias wrote to his readers this morning. "That's why Trump has turned his attention to the Smithsonians and the Kennedy Center." I think Trump would say it's about PR — he wants positive press about the US and his own presidency. Anyway, depending on your POV, this White House blog post either counters or confirms what Elias asserted. "President Trump Is Right About the Smithsonian," the headline declares. The article IDs supposedly objectionable content on display at museums, listing "exhibitions and materials mentioning race, slavery, transgender identity and immigration," as WaPo recapped here. One of the artists whose work was scrutinized, Rigoberto A. González, quipped to the Post, "Maybe somebody will want to buy a painting" thanks to the publicity. But he also said the White House list "reminded me right away of, when you read in our history, about 'degenerate art' that the Nazis targeted. I was like, 'There it is: another sign of where they want to take the country.'" >> NYT culture reporter Robin Pogrebin says, "Many are asking: Where is the opposition? Where are the voices that typically call for artistic independence and free expression?" She observes that "no institution wants Trump as an enemy, having seen how formidable an adversary he can be," and the Smithsonian is "refraining from public protest and trying not to provoke the president..." |
💃 So you think you can...? |
Trump talked more about his overhaul of the Kennedy Center yesterday and joked "that people may start referring to the performance arts center as the 'Trump Kennedy Center.'" Meanwhile, the staff turnover continues, with the dance director and two other full-time programmers terminated "amid tensions with the center's leadership," the NYT's Julia Jacobs reports. "The president of the arts center cited the TV show 'So You Think You Can Dance' as the type of programming that could be more broadly appealing to audiences." |
WSJ objects to 'vendetta campaign' |
"President Trump promised voters during his campaign for a second term that he had bigger things on his mind than retribution against opponents. But it is increasingly clear that vengeance is a large part, maybe the largest part, of how he will define success in his second term," the WSJ editorial board opined in this piece about the FBI search of John Bolton's home and office. Lest readers mock the board's naiveté, they note, "We said this was one of the risks of a second Trump term, and it's turning out to be worse than we imagined." |
'Our institutions aren't failing. We are' |
"Our institutions aren't failing. We are," Matt Bai argued in this recent WaPo opinion piece, writing that the American people — not judges or media outlets or CEOs or law firms — are "the ones expressly charged with holding a rogue president accountable, and we're failing spectacularly." He says "as long as Trump is seen by a healthy plurality as the flawed but tolerable instrument of their anti-elite, anti-government rage, then we shouldn't expect other institutions to keep him in check. That's not their brief. It's ours." |
Four more Trumpworld notes |
>> Yesterday's release of the Ghislaine Maxwell interview "wasn't about pursuing truth or accountability," Jon Passantino argues. "It was about feeding fresh meat to his hungry MAGA base that they could point to as proof that Trump was delivering on his promise." (Status) >> Michael Schaffer's latest column gets at the significance of the "visually arresting social media driving the Washington conversation about the law enforcement surge." (Politico) >> The FTC "will continue to be prohibited from enforcing a civil investigative demand on the progressive watchdog group Media Matters" after a judge "rejected the government's effort to put her prior ruling on hold." (Deadline) >> The sidelined Voice of America staffers who are suing to save the organization have asked a court to hold the US Agency for Global Media in contempt. (X) |
>> Lydia Polgreen follows up on Israel's killing of Anas al-Sharif and why it "marks an ominous new phase in the war." (NYT) >> "What To Do About Trump's Truth Decay:" Bill Mitchell suggests "five steps we can all take to resist his authoritarian distortion of reality." (How True) >> Gavin Newsom and his Trump-like tweeting "has driven Fox News completely crazy," Lorraine Ali asserts. (LA Times) >> David Brooks' latest is about "the rise of right-wing nihilism," which has a lot to do with media consumption. (NYT) >> A fascinating compilation by Julie Gerstein and Margaret Sullivan: "Thirteen journalists on how they are rethinking ethics." (CJR) >> Stephanie Hayes' column inspired by Taylor Swift: "Your energy is a luxury item — especially in the news business." (Poynter)
>> Adam Buckman calls MSNBC's rebranding as MS NOW the "head-scratcher of the week." (MediaPost)
>> The reasons for the name change are readily apparent: NBCUniversal execs demanded that MSNBC drop the "NBC." (Status)
>> Joe Bernstein has a must-read about web shows like Jubilee's "Surrounded" that collapse "the boundaries between celebrities and their audiences," part of a "parasocial mille-feuille, layers of which we all consume in some way." (NYT) |
Twenty years since Katrina |
Next week marks the 20-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and in addition to all the official events and commemorations, there will be some prominent TV and streaming premieres. On Sunday night, CNN will have a special live hour anchored by Victor Blackwell at 8, followed by "Rebirth of the Superdome" at 9. Later in the week, Netflix will premiere "Katrina: Come Hell and High Water," a three-part docuseries produced by Spike Lee. For more, Chelsea Brasted of Axios highlights how "dozens of media outlets, bloggers and content creators have debuted documentaries, podcasts and shows to explore stories" from the Gulf Coast and its recovery since Katrina... |
💡 Unlocking the paywall for Wikipedia editors |
The Wikipedia Library has struck a deal with Dow Jones to give Wikipedia's most active editors free access to normally paywalled WSJ, Barron's, MarketWatch and Investor's Business Daily content. The library says this is "the first time a major American subscription newspaper is providing Wikipedia's volunteer editors access to its trusted reporting to verify information." The proliferation of paywalls poses a challenge to wiki volunteers, so I suspect we'll see more pacts like this one... |
>> TikTok "is full of AI slop videos" about the National Guard's deployment in DC. Rosie Thomas says "some of the videos blend real footage with AI footage, making it harder than ever to tell what's real and what's not." (404 Media) >> "Three years in, one of AI's enduring impacts is to make people feel like they're losing it," Charlie Warzel writes. (The Atlantic) >> "In the age of AI paranoia, people are cutting em dashes, skipping metaphors, and leaving in typos to prove their human," Laurie Clarke writes, cleverly! (Slate)
>> Related: Brian Phillips defends the precious — and persecuted — em-dash. (The Ringer) >> "Suddenly, Silicon Valley is lowering AI expectations," John Herrman observes. (NYMag) >> Meantime, "the AI doomers are getting doomier:" Matteo Wong says "the industry's apocalyptic voices are becoming more panicked — and harder to dismiss." (The Atlantic) >> Hilke Schellmann put some AI tools through their paces to see how well they work for journalism. (CJR) |
404 Media, the punchy tech publication that quickly gained a reputation for churning out scoops, celebrated its second birthday with a thoughtful piece by the four co-founders that reflects on their journey and the state of the industry. "It has been a relief that this business strategy of 'publish good articles and ask people to pay for journalism' still works, despite the fracturing of social media, the slopification of every major platform, AI being shoved into everything, and the rich and powerful trying to destroy journalism at every turn," Jason Koebler, Samantha Cole, Emanuel Maiberg, and Joseph Cox wrote. "That it is working is a testament to the support of our subscribers." The quartet has more to say here... |
About that CBS revenue... |
In Dylan Byers' latest about CBS News, he says the network news division is losing "around $35 million" a year, not $50 million, but the news division is considered profitable "according to Paramount's traditional internal accounting" because it "apportions some $50 million in revenue from retransmission fees to the news division." The big problem, he says, is that CBS News ad revenue is cratering... |
Wallace lands in RedBird's nest |
After leaving CNN last year, Chris Wallace "quietly became a senior adviser this summer for news and media investments at RedBird Capital Partners," Michael M. Grynbaum and Ben Mullin report. Wallace told the pair that "any direct input for CBS News 'is T.B.D.,' and that he was as likely to advise on strategy for RedBird's other media interests, including The Daily Telegraph of London and the digital site Front Office Sports, as he was on, say, '60 Minutes.'" |
Warren: No one wants this! |
"Except for corporate executives, no one is asking for giant companies like Nexstar to gobble up more local news stations, fire reporters, and jack up prices for Americans," Sen. Elizabeth Warren said in a new statement about the Nexstar-Tegna deal on Friday. "Rules exist that protect consumers by prohibiting megadeals like this one and preventing companies from exercising monopoly power — and the government must enforce those rules," she added. >> Execs from Sinclair — who have also been circling Tegna and proposed to merge with it on the eve of its deal with Nexstar — paid FCC chair Brendan Carr a visit on Wednesday to discuss the TV ownership cap, according to an FCC filing. |
>> "Prosecutors link LA contract to Smartmatic 'slush fund' as voting tech firm battles Fox in court." (AP) >> "The Guardian has successfully defended a libel action brought by the actor Noel Clarke over an investigation in which he was accused of sexual misconduct by more than 20 women." (The Guardian) >> Bluesky "has made the decision to block access to its service in the state of Mississippi, rather than comply with a new age assurance law." (TechCrunch) |
Entertainment notes and quotes |
>> "Superman" is now "the first superhero pic to soar past the $600 million mark at the 2025 global box office." (THR) >> Tatum Hunter details why "spicy and pricey vertical mini-dramas are taking over streaming." (WaPo) >> My next read: Ashley Cullins' "Your Favorite Scary Movie: How the Scream Films Rewrote the Rules of Horror." (NPR) >> Last but not least: "We asked kids: Why are you so obsessed with 'KPop Demon Hunters'?" (CNN) |
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This edition of Reliable Sources was edited by Andrew Kirell and produced with Liam Reilly. Email us your feedback and tips here. We'll be on vacation for the rest of August, and back in your inboxes after Labor Day. | |
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