Oh, boy. If I hadn’t already canceled my subscription to The Washington Post…
There are a lot of horrible things happening to the free press right now. Last week, a judge in Mississippi ordered the Clarksdale Press-Register (the link is to a column by a friend of mine) to remove an editorial because it hurt the feelings of the city council. Thankfully, that ruling has been vacated.
A few days ago, MSNBC fired Joy Reid, who had her own show on the network (if you’re reading this blog, you probably already know that and watch more MSNBC than I do). Reid's firing takes one of the most high-profile Black women off the network at a time when the Trump administration (sic) has made attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies.
Mike Beckom, who’s a POS liar, believes she was canned over her low ratings, but she was the second-most watched show on MSNBC. How much do you want to bet Dumbass Beckom didn’t bother to look that up?
Reid’s colleague, Rachel Maddow, who has the highest-rated show on MSNBC, gave a blistering takedown of her own network over Reid’s firing. Shortly after that, the majority of Maddow’s staffers were let go.
Another attack on the First Amendment came from the White House as the Trump administration (sic) banned the Associated Press from all presidential (sic) events because the news outlet wouldn’t use the term “Gulf of America.”
As if that wasn’t enough, the White House is now choosing who’s in the press pool. Because you can’t have hundreds of journalists in the briefing room or on a flight with the president, whoever that is, there is a small group of reporters covering the president, and they provide their coverage to the rest of the press. This group is chosen by the non-partisan White House Correspondents’ Association. Now, the Trump administration will be making those choices. On Wednesday, two additions to the daily briefing were Newsmax and The Blaze, two right-wing fucknut propaganda outlets. the HuffPost was out.
Trump might as well be the one writing the questions he’ll be asked.
Now, The Washington Post is obeying. Before the election, the paper pulled an endorsement of Kamala Harris. Owner Jeff Bezos didn’t want to upset Trump in case he won. Then, the Post pulled an Ann Telnaes cartoon that depicted billionaires, including Bezos, kneeling to Trump. Ann quit while her editor, David Shipley, asked her to stay. Now, the right-wing and anti-journalism shift at the Post has become too much for Shipley, as he just quit.
Bezos, who promised to be a “hands-off” owner, has mandated that the Opinion section prioritize two topics, personal liberties and free markets, and not publish dissenting views in those areas. If Herblock was still alive, he would be fired if he didn’t quit.
Bezos wrote to the staff, “I'm writing to let you know about a change coming to our opinion pages. We are going to be writing every day in support of defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets.
We’ll cover other topics too of course, but viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others. There was a time when a newspaper, especially one that was a local monopoly, might have seen it as a service to bring to the reader’s doorstep every morning a broad-based opinion section that sought to cover all views. Today, the internet does that job.”
Basically, the order is that the Post Opinion page can’t publish anything Bezos, the hands-off owner, disagrees with. There is revolt.
Former executive editor Marty Baron said Bezos has ironically undermined personal liberties by “cravenly yielding to a president who shows no respect for liberty.” He wrote that Bezos, whose holdings also include a sizeable chunk of Amazon and space tech company Blue Origin, “has prioritized those commercial interests over The Post, and he is betraying The Post’s longstanding principles to do so.”
Baron added, “It was only weeks ago that The Post described itself as providing coverage for ‘all of America.’ Now its opinion pages will be open to only some of America, those who think exactly as he does.”
former senior managing editor for the Post Cameron Barr said Bezos’ changes are “an unacceptable erosion of its commitment to publishing a healthy diversity of opinion and argument.”
Amanda Katz, who recently left the Post’s Opinion section, said this is, “An absolute abandonment of the principles of accountability of the powerful, justice, democracy, human rights, and accurate information that previously animated the section in favor of a white male billionaire’s self-interested agenda.”
There’s more outrage, but I’ll be here all night if I quote them all.
Charlie Hurt, the opinion page editor of The Washington Times and weekend co-host of Fox & Friends, said the move is the latest indication that Bezos wants the paper to move away from "lunatic" resistance to Trump. Hurt proves that despite being a newspaper editor, even if it’s a paper nobody reads, he doesn’t understand how an Opinion page is supposed to work. Of course, his Moonie-owned paper has never allowed dissenting views…EVER.
Another example of this being a horrible move by Bezos is that Elon Musk tweeted, “Bravo, Jeff Bezos.”
Lisa Benson didn’t just draw the talking points in a cartoon. She has thoughts. In today’s Counterpoint newsletter, Lisa added comments to her cartoon, stating, “Apparently, staff at The Washington Post are outraged that Jeff Bezos wants to see more topics on the opinion page defending personal liberties and free markets. Hurry ... everyone run to your safe space!”
Lisa was so excited by this that she probably giggled her ass off and couldn’t wait to use it politically. It was so exciting for her, except it would be less exciting and useful if she stuck to the facts. What Lisa left out is that Bezos is ordering ONLY the opinions he agrees with are to be published. It’s not MORE topics, Lisa…they are the only topics. Lisa also leaves out that the Opinion editor, David Shipley, quit.
It doesn’t just outrage me that these MAGAt idiots have to lie, but that they lie about their industry. All these filthy cartooning MAGAts wouldn’t have a career if it wasn’t for a free press, yet they’re lying for the people trying to kill it. They’re going to really enjoy cartooning when they only draw what they’re told to draw. I hope they’re learning how to obey now while telling us we need to obey.
If a rule was placed on MAGAt cartoonists that they couldn’t lie in their work or base their opinions on bullshit, they’d have nothing to cartoon about.
When the newspaper industry started dying, the first to go were the cartoonists. Some right-wing cartoonists would mock laid-off liberal cartoonists, claiming as if economics didn’t have anything to do with it. When the lay-off trend started hitting right-wing cartoonists, those same hateful insensitive morons claimed they were being silenced and victimized because they were conservatives.
In case you’re a goosestepping fascist, you’ll be relieved to know that Michael Ramirez’s cartoons will still be in the Post.
Creative note: This one took longer to draw than it should have. Sure, there was a lot of procrastination with people messaging me all day, but I started this cartoon on three different canvases. It’ll all be in the Timelapse video (not the 30-second version).
Bluesky: In case you haven’t done it yet, you can find me at claytoonz.bsky.social
Drawn in 30 seconds:
Timelapse:
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I cancelled my subscription to WaPo when Bezos refused to allow his editorial staff to support Kamala Harris. I would have cancelled again when he killed Ann Telnaes' cartoon, and would cancel yet again now over this latest outrage. So ... bottom line ... WaPo is now just another right-wing tabloid with no credibility. It's sad and it's dangerous, as is so much of what is happening today. I no longer recognize this world.
Keep calling them out, Clay! All foul balls as far as I can see.