In an unprecedented display of cowardice, the billionaire owners of the LA Times and the Washington Post ordered their newspaper editors to act counter to tradition by not allowing for an endorsement for either presidential candidate in 2024. The editors promptly resigned in protest.
The New York Times and other newspapers’ editorial boards have endorsed the pro-democracy democrat Vice President Kamala Harris to become the 47th US president.
The explanation used by the publisher, Will Lewis, a former Rupert Murdoch employee to justify deviating from the tradition of 30+ years with the sudden decision to not endorse any US presidential candidate based on long past practices, has a CYA feel where Mr. Lewis ordered employees with instructions, “go to the archives, dig up something – it doesn’t matter what – about not endorsing a candidate so we can cover for Mr. Bezos!”
But in these times, with the US democracy, the US Constitution, the “rule of law,” the peaceful transfer of power,” the US national security interests at serious risk, the only viable explanation is that the owners of these two newspapers gave in to fear of the possibility of retribution by the GOP MAGA ex-president if he should win the presidency. This is a major capitulation to the ex-president, a wannabe dictator. It’s anticipatory obedience to a dictator, and self-censorship. It’s a dereliction of these two longstanding venerable newspapers’ duty to the public, to be a check on power, an exemplar of the free press. These two media outlets have recently endorsed numerous other candidates for political office.
The timing of Jeff Bezos decision on the same day as his aerospace company’s executives met with former US President Donald Trump just hours before this non- endorsement edict gives the appearance of a conflict of interests.
As per msn.com, “within 24 hours of the (WaPo) newspaper’s publisher announcing its decision, a first in 36 years, more than 2,000 subscribers cancelled their subscriptions, indicating the extent of readers’ fury.” It’s been reported that the LA Times consumers have acted likewise. This smells like coordinated lies. In the Washington Post, over 31,000 subscribers complained in the comments section. There’s been a lot more than 2,000 cancellations.
This is what happens when 90% of the US media is owned/ controlled by 6 corporations. The billionaire owners have decided to side with GOP MAGA conservatives who’ve a strong preference for the US democracy to be transformed into an anti-union autocracy as per the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 blueprint.
Thus, we’ve been witnessing media folks becoming codependent enablers of the GOP MAGA ex-president, as they grant him, the liar-in-chief equal footing with the competent, truthful democrat VP Kamala Harris.
Billionaire owners who don’t get what “freedom of the press,” free speech, journalistic integrity means as they own these prestigious news outlets with a history of breaking news that call power to task should get out of this business.
See: The Big 6 Largest Media Conglomerates | Motley Fool…
Margaret Sullivan of the Guardian details the shocking news in her October 25th report, about how the cowardice of “The Washington Post and LA Times refused to endorse a candidate. Why?:”
“On one side is Donald Trump, a felonious and twice-impeached conman, raring to finish off the job of dismantling American democracy. On the other is Kamala Harris, a capable and experienced leader who stands for traditional democratic principles.”
“Nevertheless – and shockingly – the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post have decided to sit this one out. Both major news organizations, each owned by a billionaire, announced this week that their editorial boards wouldn’t make a presidential endorsement, despite their decades-long traditions of doing so.”
“There’s no other way to see this other than as an appalling display of cowardice and a dereliction of their public duty.”
“At the Post (where I was the media columnist from 2016 to 2022), the editorial page editor David Shipley said he owned the decision, but it clearly came from above – specifically from the publisher, Will Lewis, the veteran of Rupert Murdoch’s media properties, hand-picked last year by the paper’s owner, Jeff Bezos. Was Bezos himself the author of this abhorrent decision? Maybe not, but it couldn’t have come as a surprise.”
“All of this may look like nonpartisan neutrality, or be intended to, but it’s far from that. For one thing, it’s a shameful smackdown of both papers’ reporting and opinion-writing staffs who’ve done important work exposing Trump’s dangers for many years.”
“It’s also a strong statement of preference. The papers’ leaders have made it clear that they either want Trump (who is, after all, a boon to large personal fortunes) or that they don’t wish to risk the ex-president’s wrath and retribution if he wins. If the latter was a factor, it’s based on a shortsighted judgment, since Trump has been a hazard to press rights and would only be emboldened in a second term.”
“Disturbing spinelessness at an institution famed for courage,” the wrote former Washington Post editor Marty Baron on Friday on X, blasting the Post’s decision. He predicted that Trump would see this as an invitation to try further to intimidate Bezos, a dynamic detailed in Baron’s 2023 book Collision of Power.”
“The editorials editor at the Los Angeles Times, Mariel Garza, resigned this week over the owner’s decision to kill off the editorial board’s planned endorsement of Harris.”
“I am resigning because I want to make it clear that I am not OK with us being silent,” Garza told Columbia Journalism Review’s editor, Sewell Chan. “In dangerous times, honest people need to stand up. This is how I’m standing up.”
“Others, including a Pulitzer prize-winning editorial writer at the California paper, followed her principled lead. The Washington Post editor at large Robert Kagan resigned in protest, too. They do so at considerable personal cost, since there’re so few similar positions in today’s financially troubled media industry.”
See: Washington Post Says It Won’t Endorse a Presidential Candidate/ New York Times
13 Ex-Trump Aides Back Kelly’s ‘Dictator’ Warning, Trump Seeks Absolute, Unchecked Power
Billionaire cowardice led to The Washington Post, L.A. Times non-endorsements/ MSNBC…
Note: This post was last updated on October 29, 2024.
Gronda Morin 
[…] LA Times and Washington Post Have Declined to Endorse Any Presidential Candidate […]
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Hi!
It’s great to hear from you! Thanks for the reblog.
Last night I met Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell who I’m hoping will beat out Sen. Rick Scott for the US Senate seat. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse was with her to support her.
After the meet and greet meeting, I’m more hopeful about our chances in Florida. It’d be great to be able to beat the GOP MAGA ultra rich mega donors by everyday folks with of their votes.
Still, I’m biting my nails until then.
Hugs, Gronda
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