No Joe, That's Not Your Job

“The Front Page” - 1931

There’s a curious thing happening in corporate journalism these days. Fear is running rampant among the executives and on-air talent. This fear, courtesy of Donald Trump, is two-fold. The corporate media is afraid of losing access to Trump during the next four years and they are afraid of retribution if they get on his bad side (as if he actually has any other side to get on).

Ther poster child for this new phenomenon is MSNBC and particularly the “Morning Joe” show and its hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski.

The married “Morning Joe” hosts ignited a firestorm of criticism recently when it was revealed that they went down to Mar-a-Lago to meet Trump and kiss the ring. It was seen as a pre-emptive strike in which the hosts hoped it would stave off any retribution from Trump for things they said about him in the past. After all, I’m sure they would rather not go to jail for hating him in the past.

And I’m sure the decision was made by one of the executives running the network to send Joe and Mika down to Florida to make nice with Trump, in the hopes of retaining access to what will be the dominant story of the next four years – anything Trump says or does.

This is what is known as “access journalism.” Staying on the good side of a subject so they will not shut you out. Trump has been practicing this for years, but in a different way. He will only talk to right-leaning outlets that are friendly to him, like Fox News and Newsmax. They don’t have to worry about access to him because he seeks them out. But “liberal” outlets like MSNBC or CNN need to stay on his good side so he may decide to throw them a bone and give them a quote or two for a story.

They “liberal” outlets also need to stay on his good side to keep him from threatening to pull their broadcast licenses.

But back to Joe and Mika.

Trying to explain away his highly unusual in-person meeting with Trump, Joe Scarborough characterized the meeting as “doing the corporate thing,” whatever that means.

He also complained that the criticism of the meeting was “outrageously stupid.”

No Joe, your meeting with Trump was outrageously stupid.

“That's exactly what the Washington Post is doing. That's exactly what the Wall Street Journal is doing. That's exactly what The New York Times is doing. What do you call it? You call it their job," he said.

Except that’s not the job of a journalist. Trying to curry favor with a subject of your reporting is not your job. Sure, it makes your job easier if your subject is willing to talk to you. But if they’re not, you have to find other ways to get the information you’re looking for.

Bowing down to the mighty is not how good journalism should work. A journalist’s job is not to make friends, it is to find out things that someone doesn’t want anyone to know about. This is the exact opposite of access journalism. But today’s media seemingly has forgotten this.

It used to be that a journalist’s job was to get the story by any means possible. Find out the facts, corroborate them, and inform the public. These days, it seems that journalists think their job is to not make waves and not lose access. Instead of being reporters they are stenographers. Writing only what they are spoonfed by their sources and not questioning what they’re told.

But you can’t blame Joe and Mika entirely. The bigwigs at MSNBC surely are wary of lawsuits. And Trump is famously litigious. But while he may threaten to sue everyone for everything, he rarely wins.

But now that he’s President-elect again, Trump is embolden to take on his perceived enemies and is threatening to unleash people like Kash Patel – who Trump has suggested to head the F.B.I. – and his other henchmen on those that go against him. Patel has threatened to pull broadcast licenses and jail reporters on Trump’s “hit list.”

There’s little doubt Patel and Trump would try to carry this out. Whether they succeed is another story.

But it’s enough to put fear into corporate executives and on-air talent. So much so that they would do anything to try to stave off such an outcome.