The Press is the Enemy - redux

We’ve heard that paranoid line before, those of us who lived through the Nixon years.  Richard Nixon was probably the most paranoid president in American history up to now.  In one of his taped Oval Office conversations with Henry Kissinger in December 1972, Nixon told Kissinger “Never forget, the press is the enemy. The establishment is the enemy. The professors are the enemy.”  

Nixon went so far as to create an enemies list in 1971.  In a memo of that year from John Dean, White House Counsel, Dean stated “This memorandum addresses the matter of how we can maximize the fact of our incumbency in dealing with persons known to be active in their opposition to our Administration; stated a bit more bluntly—how we can use the available federal machinery to screw our political enemies.”  The plan was to accomplish this by means of tax audits from the IRS and by manipulating grant availability, federal contracts, litigation, and prosecution.  Paul Newman was on that enemies list and often said that being on the list was one of his proudest accomplishments.

Here we are 46 years later and we have a president who is so paranoid, so willing to shamelessly manipulate facts to suit his absurdly large ego, that he makes Nixon seem well-adjusted by comparison.  In the month since He Who Must Not Be Named (HWMNBN) began to foul the Oval Office with his noxious presence, he has almost daily released Tweets and other statements that indicate that his goal is to create an “us versus them” presidency, us being those who agree with him and them being everyone else.

He uses the term “fake news” to describe any news item that would dare to suggest that less than 100% of the American people are in complete agreement with him.  In the Tweet from the Twit today, he listed the fake news culprits as ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and the New York Times.  Notice a glaring omission?  Fox News, generally considered as being the Ted Baxter of news by those who understand journalism, wasn’t mentioned.  Apparently HWMNBN considers Fox News to be the only true news provider.  

One month into this national nightmare, HWMNBN has proven to be arrogant, outrageously thin-skinned, paranoid, and delusional.  Folks, this is becoming more frightening almost daily.  This blog title is 1461 Days.  If it’s been this bad after a month, what will the remaining 1431 (or so) days be like?  I find myself becoming resentful and downright angry at the voters who actually thought this clown would be good for America, at the Democratic Party that couldn’t come up with a viable candidate to oppose him, and the Republican Party that was equally guilty.  As a nation, we’re now reaping the whirlwind and it is just the beginning.

~ Exile in Medford - Medford OR