In the New York Times‘ view, a politician whose nominees have a net worth of $14 billion has been “shun[ning the] establishment.”
In the New York Times‘ lead news analysis after Donald Trump’s inauguration (1/20/17), White House correspondent Mark Landler wrote of Trump, “It remains an open question whether he will continue to be the relentless populist who was on display on Friday.”
Really? Looking at Trump’s nominations and appointments—the clearest indication during the transition period of how a president-elect actually intends to govern—it’s hard to discern any signs of populism whatsoever:
- Trump’s Treasury nominee, Steve Mnuchin, worked for Goldman Sachs and George Soros before launching his own investment firm, where he earned the title of “Foreclosure King,” with critics accusing him of “using potentially illegal tactics to foreclose on as many as 80,000 California homes.”
- Trump named the president of Goldman Sachs, Gary Cohn, to be his chief economic advisor. Cohn has argued that the way to keep business in the US is to create a “really competitive environment.”
- Labor nominee Andrew Puzder, a fast-food CEO, has fought against raising the minimum wage, expanding overtime pay and sick-leave policies. He has said he prefers robots to human workers because “they never take a vacation, they never show up late, there’s never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex or race discrimination case.”
- Wilbur Ross, Trump’s choice for Commerce, is a billionaire investor who has declared that “the 1 Percent is being picked on for political reasons” and endorsed Mitt Romney’s claim that 47 percent of the public are “dependent upon government.”
Landler also wrote that “Mr. Trump is as close to an independent as has ever served in modern times,” as “he ran against the Republican establishment as much as he ran against Hillary Clinton.” One suspects that the most independent president of modern times wouldn’t pick the head of one of the two major parties to be his White House chief of staff, as Trump did with Reince Priebus. Probably their vice president wouldn’t have previously held their party’s third-highest leadership position in the House, either.
Landler is not alone at the New York Times in his approach of paying attention to what Trump says, not to what he does. In the next day’s paper (1/21/17), national political correspondent Jonathan Martin began an article by asking of Trump, “Will he actually pursue his campaign agenda of big-government nationalism, all but obliterating the liberal-conservative distinctions that have defined America’s political parties for a century?” To Martin, Trump’s speech at his swearing-in ceremony seemed to answer that question: “An inaugural speech delivered with the same blunt force that propelled Mr. Trump’s insurgent campaign has dashed Republican hopes for a more traditional agenda.”
The LA Times‘ Doyle McManus endorses the principle of paying less attention to what Trump says and more to what he does–such as appointing orthodox Republicans to cabinet positions.
LA Times political reporter Doyle McManus (12/8/16) took on this kind of analysis in a column last month:
If you watch what Trump does, not what he says—which at this point, mostly means the choices he makes for Cabinet positions—he doesn’t look unusual at all.
In Trump’s picks for economic and domestic policymaking jobs, there’s a consistent underlying thread…Republican orthodoxy. Trump’s choices have all been thoroughgoing conservatives who believe in the free market, deregulation and, wherever possible, privatization of government functions.
Most of them could have been nominated by any GOP nominee, including Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio.
There’s nary a populist among them—not even the conservative kind.
The New York Times (1/21/17), to its credit, was willing to refer in a headline to Trump’s “false claims,” noting his assertion that 1.5 million people attended his inauguration was “a claim that photographs disproved” and that White House spokesperson Sean Spicer tried to back up this contention with “a series of false statements.” The paper needs to entertain the possibility that Trump may be lying about his political ideology as well as the size of his audience.
Jim Naureckas is the editor of FAIR.org. You can find him on Twitter at @JNaureckas.
You can send a message to the New York Times at letters@nytimes.com, or write to public editor Liz Spayd at public@nytimes.com (Twitter:@NYTimes or @SpaydL). Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.
Mirroring the smoke
All valid points. I would add there is one area where Trump may not be a good Republican loyalist and that is on the subject of American mlitarism vis a vis Russia and the ‘pivot to Asia’ generally. Something’s up and it appears the NYT is carrying water for the ‘deep state’/military industrial complex by publishing anonymously sourced stories with the words ‘Trump’, ‘Russia’ and ‘investigation’. Shades of Judith Miller and Saddam Hussein. I’ve started to wonder if regime will actually begin at home this time.
Militarism and war-hawking isn’t exclusive to the GOP. Look at everything a Dem administration did these past 8 years. D or R, doesn’t matter. They’re all of the same oligarchy.
It’s nice to know there’s at least one person out there who realizes that we’re living in an oligarchy. Now if we could find support, anywhere in the media, for repeal of Citizens United, there might be hope for democracy. Nah, forget it.
‘Mitt Romney’s claim that 47 percent of the public are “dependent upon government.”’
And among those most dependent upon government writing the rules that advantage them the most are Steve Mnuchin, Gary Cohn, Andrew Puxder and Wilbur Ross…
Stop calling Republicans and Trump nominees “conservative>” They are not conservative, they are reactionaries or regressives. Conservatives want to keep things the same. These people and their right wing ideological agenda, want to turn the clock backwards and undo anything that is progressive and democratic. Their views and policies are extreme and against anything passed by Democrats in the last 75 years. They are for less government, less regulation, less taxes for the rich and no protections for the environment, the workplace, our food, our water, our public health, for our National Parks, are against public education, no protections for civil rights, women, LGBT and people of color’s human rights and for more foreign intervention by the military industrial complex. They must be resisted and opposed.
Could consider if he is a populist – but – just in the way he talks. However, this too might just be how he behaves.
Of course, in no way do you expect the reader to assume this, so what they effectively said stays the same. I think their interests and socioeconomic sphere benefits from non-populism in a lot of these policies. (but they do not like the lack of meekness in politics)