The Times They Are A Changein’, says Bill Maher of ‘Real Time’ – The New York Newspaper

Objective Journalism was brought to court with Bill Maher on Friday night real time, with the New York Times in the middle of discussion about whether opinion buried coverage.

On the panel discussing this important topic was Ari Melber, moderator of MSNBC‘s “The Beat With Ari Melber” and staff writer for The broadcastwith Sarah Isgur, host of The Dispatch Podcast, and contributor and political analyst for ABC news.

Maher began by bringing up the disclosure that broke in this week’s lawsuit in Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox. It was revealed in the papers that top business leaders and news anchors did not address allegations of then-President Donald Trump’s 2020 election fraud, although they did give airtime to those who floated the theory.

Maher called it a suspension of the rules of responsible journalism.

Isgur hits the nail on the head about why objective journalism seems strange: “We’ve seen a shift in ad revenue,” she said. “It’s now about individual subscribers.” That is why news organizations focus on “ideological niches”.

Melber claimed that “People at Fox know they’re lying,” adding that the hosts “came in.”

Maher responded by asking Melber if MSNBC isn’t sometimes guilty of doing the same. Isgur reminded Melber that MSNBC was notorious for always claiming that Trump was about to be thrown into the Gulag.

Melber danced and said the MSNBC network should be “open to constructive criticism,” but acknowledged that “the media has a responsibility and sometimes falls out.” He later condemned the practice of treating debates as “narrative hunting”.

Coastal drift also plays a role in coverage, the panel agreed, noting the recent Ohio train derailment as an underreported topic.

Will MSNBC criticize Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s slow response to the disaster, Maher wondered.

Predictably, Melber blamed Trump, a move “aimed at completely delegitimizing facts.”

Maher also points to the New York Times’ struggles this week over its coverage of transgender people and their issues. Maher said coverage can’t pretend another side of the debate isn’t valid, like a petition called for by Times staffers and celebrities

To her credit, the Times backed off and said, “No.” We will be impartial.”

Returning to her opening admissions, Isgur argued that the media business “is now a subscription business model, so they (trans activists) have to be fair. This subscriber-based model is a problem if you want objective journalism. Maybe give your subscribers don’t care (objectivity), they just want to hear that their side is right about everything.”

Melber said one reason for the rejection in the Times and other media is that journalists try not to repeat past mistakes. As an example, he mentioned the civil rights movement and coverage of Selma.

Isgur had one final point about that.” :”If you start censoring the truth and you can’t speak the truth because it hurts your feelings – that’s (wrong).”

Maher’s New Rules editorial indicated that he believes the parliamentary battle we’re seeing abroad will soon reach our shores, given how bitterly partisan things have become.

Before that happens, he urged politicians to learn a lesson from show business: “You can achieve great things and still hate each other.”

Then he made a montage of great movies and TV shows where the key creatives hated each other. In one example, he cited director Roman Polanski denying Faye Dunaway a bathroom break. She peed in a cup and threw it in his face. The dynamic “Chinatown,” Maher noted, is “ironically about hoarding water.”

“The government needs to learn to do the same,” Maher said of cooperating in the face of hate. “Here we are in some horrible, horrible, immoral showbiz, but we’re still doing our job – making your kids communist and gay.”