DC Trawler

ABC News Deceptively Edits Ari Fleischer’s Praise Of Sean Spicer To Sound Like Criticism

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I’m not going to pretend to know if Trump’s all-out war with the media is a clever strategy, evidence of incurable mental illness, or both. After all, I’ve been wrong about everything else for the past 18 months. But if he’s so awful, why do his opponents have to make stuff up to attack him?

Alex Griswold, Mediaite:

ABC News apologized Tuesday after the Monday night edition of Nightline edited a quote from former George W. Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer in a way that made it appear that he was more critical of current White House press secretary Sean Spicer than he actually was.

Here’s ABC’s apology:

Nightline aired a segment Monday night about the first three days of the new administration including Sean Spicer’s statement to the press on Saturday. As part of the report, we interviewed former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer. In editing the piece for air, his quote was shortened and as a result his opinions mischaracterized. We are fixing the piece online to include his full quote and context. We apologize and regret the error.

Online, where far fewer people will see it. Like a newspaper printing a lie on page 1 and running the retraction the next day on page 17.

They kept Fleischer’s criticism, but edited out his praise in the same breath. It’s dishonest, and there’s no way to spin it. This is the same thing they’ve done for as long as I can remember. It’s why I hate them, and it’s why so many Trump voters hate them.

Whether or not you think Sean Spicer is doing a good job, he’s doing the same thing all White House press secretaries have done. He takes questions and then says whatever his boss needs him to say, whether it’s true or not. I don’t like it, and I don’t expect the press to like it. But the only difference is that he’s clumsier at it.

The thing is, these guys don’t have as much of a problem with being lied to so brazenly when the president is a Democrat. They sat there and nodded their heads while Josh Earnest and Jay Carney and Robert Gibbs told the most obvious lies imaginable, and most of the time they just went with it. Once in a great while, Jon Karl or somebody would say, “Okay, hold on a minute.” But only once in a great while. They took it for their team, because their team was in power.

Well, this is what they get. It’s a little late to start pretending it’s something new.

Trump is the president, whether they like it or not. Attacking him this way hurts them a lot more than it hurts him. But I don’t think they can stop.

On the bright side, at least it gives me something to rant about first thing in the morning. Yay!

P.S. something something Dippin’ Dots i don’t even know anymore

P.P.S. Mission accomplished!

Or, they’ll claim they fired the culprit, but won’t identify him or her. NBC News did that after their deceptively edited audio of George Zimmerman’s 911 call. “Seriously, that dude is fired. No, there’s no way for you to verify that. Problem solved. This time we’re not lying.” And it worked.