TRANSPARENCY? ME THINKS THE MEDIA NEEDS TO COME OUT AND ADMIT THEY'RE THE ONES WHO NEED TO APOLOGIZE!

Seems the talking heads have decided to go after Hillary cause she decided not to take a sick day and I heard the theme from Jaws as they went in for the kill.

WELL TODAY WAS NOT PRETTY, as the aftermath of Hillary's pneumonia took hold of the media and it seemed to go off the rails. The only thing good that may come of it is I've decided to go cold turkey on a number of television's political talking heads. Enough, I'm sorry no more, I've had it. Amazingly, for the first time I actually see what Hillary and Bill Clinton have been saying for years about the media and I'm not just talking about the vast Republican militia known as FOX News, or as I call it Fox Faux News. I'm discussing the so-called biased liberal, specifically MSNBC and CNN, as I've watched both news outlets devolve into a pair of National Enquirer offshoots. Until today I hadn't realized the extent at which the dumbing down had taken place on what has been a staple of my viewing pleasure for years now. To hear Donald J. Trump call CNN, the Clinton News Network I always considered it as pretty funny, but now, I'm beginning to discover that the funny is on me and Hillary Clinton and the people who hope she becomes our next President. But today was like I had a revelation while listening to Thomas Roberts go after Hillary and probably for me its the last straw. As I witnessed a rather eye opening assault on Hillary Clinton's health, character and candidacy by several people on both stations. Thomas Roberts was not the first today that went after her, but the way he did made her illness, her pneumonia, a referendum on her entire campaign. His guest, a spokesperson for the Clinton campaign, sorry I didn't jot down her name, was there to give their side of the story, and after a few moments of niceties I started hearing the theme from Jaws in my head. You could imagine the shark as he was seeing blood in the water as the shark sped up and went all in. Sadly the rest of the talking heads only made the sickness I felt in my stomach grow worse.

So as he demanded transparency of the Clinton surrogate my eyes were opened to the truth. What I was seeing was just the latest assault on Hillary during this campaign. We've witnessed most of the media fall all over themselves over Trump as we've watched the news media turn into a 24/7 reality episode in Trump's latest television series. Each new tactic by Trump or his surrogates easily over powering any measly legal issues that he actually may have, like the past week's reveal that Trump supposedly is no longer a Birther! So instead of the media doing its job, we get them going after her for calling out his racist followers for what they really are. I've also noticed the closer we get to election day, as well as every time Hillary seems to start making this race a run away victory, the media turns up this gossip. And any semblance to real news is thrown out as we watch the attack dogs go after Hillary for deciding not to let the world know she was under the weather or for saying anything politically incorrect. 
Any reasonable person would have listened to the surrogate answer and went cool, good to hear. Thanks for the update, now let's talk about something of real importance. Why not discuss what Hillary actually said the other day when she threw out truths about Trump's followers and his handlers.  Why not discuss the entire statement and not just the sound bite that they've edited to make her look like the bad person. Let's explain why she decided to slightly walk the comment back. As you can see I've highlighted the part that Trump is using, but I've given you the entire section of the speech so you can read it in context. 

I know there are only 60 days left to make our case — and don’t get complacent, don’t see the latest outrageous, offensive, inappropriate comment and think well he’s done this time. We are living in a volatile political environment. You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up. He has given voice to their websites that used to only have 11,000 people — now how 11 million. He tweets and retweets their offensive hateful mean-spirited rhetoric. Now, some of those folks — they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America. But the other basket — and I know this because I see friends from all over America here — I see friends from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina and Texas — as well as, you know, New York and California — but that other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they’re just desperate for change. It doesn’t really even matter where it comes from. They don’t buy everything he says, but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different. They won’t wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroine, feel like they’re in a dead-end. Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well. - Hillary Clinton  

Here's the link to the entire speech: http://time.com/4486502/hillary-clinton-basket-of-deplorables-transcript/ 

When you read it, you can see that his attacks are ridiculous and you again can see that Donald is just not in her league. Its a pretty damning attack against Trump and one that instead of responding to it with facts the only thing that Donald actually does is come up with another outlandish talking point. Seems his latest stomp suggestion is calling what she said possibly the single worst thing that a Presidential candidate has ever said. Are you kidding me sir, that statement may be the funniest  flat out laughable thing he's ever said, if it wasn't simply a sad reminder of the only thing he really has, his obnoxious stomp speeches. No policies, no ideas, just hatred. 
So of course real reporting didn't occur, this shark smelled blood and wanted to taste it. Honestly whatever qualities I liked about Thomas's abilities went out the window during this interrogation. It seems that keeping 'this' from the public, the truth behind her maladies, not telling us immediately when the prognosis was originally given is worthy of a Congressional hearing the way he was now accusing her of not being transparent. A few times during this insult to news, as he was piling it on, Thomas actually laughed like 'Ha ha, I got you!' It was seriously not dope. Eventually the subject changed to her now infamous remarks at her fundraiser, but as with her transparency issues, her use of the term deplorable was attacked. The spokesperson explained how Hillary's comments and even her walk back was correct. That her assessment of Trump and his associates as well as many of his followers, are deplorable, as well as all the other words she described them was right on target. Sadly Thomas didn't want to have that conversation, the racism and hatred that Trump and his followers are pulling, cause he summed up the entire interview as if he had proven Hillary was hiding something, she wasn't being transparent. Journalism at its lowest. Why is this latest attack on Hillary being made into a thing? Luckily there are a some talking heads on MSNBC I can still turn too, Rachel Maddow had a great piece tonight showcasing the absurdity of Trump arguing against the percentage of people Hillary called his 'Basket full of Deplorables'. Seems the fact that any of his followers are, well deplorable doesn't seem to be an issue with him. And afterwards. Lawrence O'Donnell has a piece that calls today's media coverage of Hillary's health as 'the day the political news media lost its mind'.

Considering the man going after her for saying those obvious things about his 'Basket full of deplorables' is Trump, why is the media taking its cues from someone who doesn't know the meaning of the word transparent? As with everything else, he attacks her for exactly what he is. He takes something she's said or didn't even say or has done, and twists it in into a full on attack and the media eats it up. 
Today he throws out a new attack against Hillary, again entirely scripted and read off of a TelePrompTer and all the accusations against him go out the window and are forgotten as yesterdays garbage, and seemingly the real issues in Trumps life, all seem to be non-story's. What about his taxes? What about all the allegations against him? What about all those people he ripped off? All of his derogatory statements, the people who he's surrounding himself with, his friends in the Alt-Right, all his past misdeeds, nothing. Instead of the media taking her accusations and investigating them, all we got are his surrogates coming out, talking over everyone, dominating the interviews and somehow making the story not about his evil ways, but how dare she call Americans evil.
So starting today, one by one, I will be turning off the talking heads. Each time one of them showcases that they've lost their impartially and start to sound like a Trump surrogate I will say good bye forever. I'm not saying I want the media to stop reporting the news, but what I am saying is when they do I want it to seem at least truthful and not slanted to favor any candidate. I honestly don't care if the reporting is pro Republican or pro Democrat as long as its not bullshit. And I'm sorry what I witnessed today was a total crock of… and sadly it wasn't much worse then what we've come to expect from the political media. And I know I've written this a few times, my threat to give up my television fix. But, I'm at the point of feeling like a junkie whose had one too many bad hits and today I practically overdosed on the poison. So today was my epiphany, and today is the day when my cleansing begins. So good bye Thomas Roberts, you're officially the first of many. Funny I feel better already.

Just one man's opinion
© Neil Feigeles, Neilizms, Monday, September 12, 2016