[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Most people believe what they want to believe.

No, they don't. Most people believe what they are told by a figure of authority. The vast majority of people are not equipped to come a conclusion of their own of whatvthey can believe. They need someone to tell them.

There were all kinds of stories in the media exposing Trump's incompetence and corruption. True believers ignored that stuff, assuming it was lies peddled by a mainstream media in the pocket of the Clintons and Wall Street.

There were not enough. There were also too many that made excuses for his behaviors. There were not enough that should have crucified him for his behaviors and his failures to observe long standing traditions of openness and transparency. The mass media should have drilled into those stories and provided substance required to show how untrustworthy and full of #### Donald Trump is. They didn't, and they failed in their responsibility as the function of oversight and a check on power. Instead they chose to take the easy way out, chased the salacious in Trump's tweets and let him drive the narrative. Disgustingly weak work by people who are more concerned for their own fame than they are about exposing the facts.

It doesn't help that Americans overwhelmingly believed that the mainstream media backed Clinton.

And they should have. Just like the press should have been against Hitler in the 1930's.

Others didn't know the worst about Trump because the media landscape today is so fragmented and partisan that there are few agreed-on facts. And yet other voters looked at the facts about Trump and voted for him anyway because they thought the alternative was worse.

And where did the information for that perception come from? The mass media failed us as a source of information. I agree with you that the fragmentation of the media is largely to blame, but that was a politically motivated decision done years ago, and most people don't know who made the decision or why.

Get used to it. By the time the next presidential election rolls around the mainstream media will be even more marginalized, and the number of agreed-on facts will be even smaller. The partisans on the left and right (and the other political identities that have appeared) will live in essentially different realities.

Completely agree. Unless the media finds a backbone. Maybe they can follow through by defending this eloquent speech.