The Fourth Estate

We folllow the staff of NYT during their coverage iof Trumps' first year in office.

My five points are for the directing and editing which are near brilliant. It feels like " All the president's men" or "The Post" but then for real. You can easily see Hoffman or Hanks as one of the NYT reporters here . They all are those cleancut almost sanctimoniously noble and driven journalists hunting for the bad guy, in this case ofcourse Trump (instead of Nixon).

But that's also the main problem with this documentary : it is completely one-sided as it only deals with: the viewpoint of the Democratic elite. As I sometimes glance to the NYT (the EU version) it becomes clear that the whole newspaper is completely obsessed by Trump. The bulk of the articles are directly linked to him. Besides it got the sales up again it is also due to the fact the NYT is largely owned by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim who obviously is no friend of Trump. So much for objectivity then. But it is really well made.

A series of segments about NYT reporters covering Donald Trump's presidency. If you've ever wondered what it's like inside the NYT echo chamber, this may interest you. For everyone else, it's basically a ripoff of "The Circus" except instead of last week, the content is over a year old and instead of personable hosts there are a bunch of pretentious NYT reporters.

I get it, Trump is awful, but I just suffered through two years of the MSM obsessing about Russia and whinging about mean tweets. Why would I want to watch a documentary series review the same inane partisan hackery in detail?

I absolutely loved this. I've read the articles and seeing how they run down stories is fascinating. It shows how tough it is for them in this age when the press is under attack, and the decisions they have to make. I'd highly recommend it.

I give this a 7. I think this was a very good look at the inner workings of the Times. There is nothing wrong with this documentary. It is well done.

The part I find weird is that, watching this you can see the bias. the single minded intent, and the lack of diversity of opinion, pretending to be journalists going after a story. I actually don't so much believe the Times is actively as biased as many conservatives feel, It seems to me to be an almost an aloof bias. When they are breaking stories it is glaring that they don't have a single person on staff to bat a different point of view back and forth. They are all of one mindset, "Get Trump, trash Trump, hate Trump." They are indeed doing their jobs going after the story. There is no argument there, and that is what every news organization should do. But it becomes apparent, if you are not a "progressive," that they are all after an angle on the story, not the story. Every news clip they show is on MSNBC, or CNN. Every news clips on the Televisions of reporters and editors, is...MSNBC, or CNN. Could you imagine if the Times had pursued the Obama Admin in this manner? They would be blasted as racists, sabotuers, etc.

This documentary kind of hurts the Times. It appears through the edits that the Times only reports negative stories on Trump and dismisses anything at all positive. They have no one on the staff that even has a positive mindset towards Trump. In the first episode they show the reporter that covers Republicans and the Conservative movement and its clear from body language that he doesn't understand conservatives, and has a disdain for not only Trump, but all conservatives. This is ok, I guess you could claim that is a way to be critical but my guess is whoever they have covering the progressive movement is likely neck deep in the movement is extremely comfortable and cozy with those they are covering.

Another reporter, not covering Russia, says he tries to write about things that "piss him off." Of course he is attacking the Administrative state on de-regulation. He is admitting he is an activist journalist with a big conflict of interest. He doesn't seem to be concerned for the last admins. destruction of the rights of individual Americans, States Rights, or the trampling of these rights by unelected bureaucrats, but as soon as de-regulation is mentioned this guy is all over attacking the Trump admin. Is this unbiased reporting? No.

The biggest thing this doc shows is the lack of diversity of opinion at the Times. The Old Gray Lady is of one solid opinion and you cannot avoid seeing why they couldn't get the 2016 election right. They were angry about the election and only pay a passing glance to understanding how they got the election wrong. If they want to understand how Trump got elected they really need to dive into the arrogance of their staff, editors, and staff, and that lack of diversity of opinion. The Grey Lady needs an overhaul and it is not one that comes from "understand" by the current employees, but maybe could come with a change over of many of their employees. Go after the stories, they are great at that, but they must have a much more diverse conversation about their narratives. The reason Trump resonates when he talks about "Fake News," is because the media doesn't even recognize their own bias. They spent 8 years cheering on, backing up, and extolling the glories of one point of view. They got so in deep with that Admin. that they completely insulated themselves from any opposing view. This attitude has poisoned them all. At this point, I don't know if they will have anyway to recover at all. America has more opinions than the left.

A closer look at the inner workings of the Political biased news and attacks through journalism to those that dont fit the narrative.