The Rigged Game: Reporting Corruption

It's not just the enemies; it's the enemies + the friends

In a recent New York Times interview Senator Elizabeth Warren identified the beginning of her rise toward the Senate as a Democratic convention keynote speech in which she plainly stated the American people’s position in our era: she said that they see the game as rigged, and they are right. This is as true—maybe more true—of MAGA voters as it is of anyone else. “Great Again” in MAGA might well be shorthand for “unrigged.” Unrigging the game is what Donald Trump promised to do on “Day 1”. It got him elected.

This will be a brief post with one simple point. The media, its commentators, and influencers reflexively divide Trump coverage between “attacks his enemies” and “pampers his friends” silos. This is a fundamental mistake. These are not two independent stories; they are one “rig the game” story and any account of either one that does not integrate the other is radically incomplete.

Coverage of the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey for lying and obstructing justice provides an example. Yes, Comey is an enemy of Trump’s. (Although you might raise an eyebrow at Trump’s ingratitude for Comey’s drama queen announcement of re-opening the Hilary Clinton e-mail investigation on the eve of an election.) Many in MAGA accept that Trump has enemies and that they share some of those enemies. They have no difficulty accepting Comey’s presence on that list. Just possibly, Comey is not as lovable as Comey obviously believes himself to be. Covering the indictment of Comey as a “violates the norms of the Justice Department story” does not alert voters to the problem. If anything, it evokes the dithering norms-worship of Merrick Garland.

The Trump non-prosecution list and pardons list certainly involve some friends with benefits. Tom Homans accepts $50,000 in cash in a bag. Ross Ulbricht head of the Silk Road dark web franchise, drug trafficker. Rod Blogojevich, the Illinois governor convicted of trying to sell a Senate seat. Brian Kelsey, Tennessee state Senator who stole campaign funds. Devon Archer convicted in a scheme to steal millions from Native American groups, but who made himself useful in Hunter Biden investigations. Trevor Milton, electric vehicle fraudster. Michele Fiore who stole from a fund designed to honor fallen police officers. Paul Walczak, who stole $10,000,000 in a nursing home scandal. Todd and Julie Chrisly, reality TV stars who reaped $30,000,000 in fraudulent schemes and evaded taxes. Closer to home, there’s Charles Kushner, Ivanka Trump’s father-in-law pardoned after a tax evasion conviction. (He had previously set up his sister’s husband for a video-taped sex sting; he has subsequently been appointed Ambassador to France). Al Pirro, ex-husband of Fox News host and new D.C. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro. Most of Trump’s beneficiaries committed (among others) the same sort of offenses—false statements, obstruction—with which Comey, New York AG Leticia James, and others are now threatened.

All these things are reported, but reporting the “enemies” and the “friends” stories as if they were independent amounts to a lie.

You can’t see “wetness” in any individual molecule of H₂O; it is an emergent quality recognizable only when the molecules are combined. You cannot see the metastasizing corruption of the Trump regime in isolated reports of enemies attacked and friends coddled. “Enemies attacked” and “friends absolved” are not two stories; “Enemies attacked + friends absolved = Rigged game” is a single, major, and utterly basic, story.

MAGA is against the rigged game. Well, here it is. It’s not Left/Right, Liberal/Conservative; Woke/Christian. The question is corruption: amoral corruption and abject GOP acceptance of it. That’s the story to cover

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