Flush Tapper down the crapper

Democrats have to learn the beltway media aren’t their friends

Want to run for president in 2028? Well here’s your first decision:

Do you want to spend all your time talking about her emails or her fracking positions?

Because unless we learn to get tough with a Trump-loving press corps that doesn’t give a damn about the constitution or the American people, we will be walking into the same buzzsaw of bullshit that Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris did.

Think we’re exaggerating? Turn on CNN. You will find them talking about Jake Tapper’s scummy new book that insults and demeans President Joe Biden in ways that Tapper would never dream about doing to Trump. Now turn off CNN.

Tapper and Axios’s Alex Thompson and the rest of the beltway butt-kissers have repeatedly made clear that they think accountability and standards should only apply to Democratic candidates and officials. That’s why Tapper is spending his time trashing Biden and kissing up to Lara Trump and Megyn Kelly at the very same time that Trump is attacking Bruce Springsteen in the middle of the night and accepting bribes from Middle East countries. To be crude, reporters like Tapper are pussies. It’s way easier to get tough with Biden when you know he won’t call you stupid or send a violent mob to your home. The civility police are dirty cops.

This is not a new dynamic. Democrats have been battling the bullshit double standards of a mostly white male press corps for years. It’s why President Obama’s tan suit and birth certificate were news stories, but Trump’s sexual assault, nonstop corruption and degradation of the country get short shrift. Anyone who was alive in 2016 remembers how the New York Times covered Hillary Clinton’s emails. When Trump said he didn’t know if he has to follow the constitution, it wasn’t even on the front page.

And when Tapper moderated a debate between Biden and Trump in 2024, he didn’t ask about Trump’s being called a rapist by a judge and he didn’t start the night by asking about Trump’s attempted coup that injured 140 police officers. No, instead he started off the night with a question about inflation.

After Biden stepped aside? Well then the race became about Harris’s changing fracking positions and her laugh and her joy. It would have been gauche to focus on the guy who kept saying he wanted to be a dictator or his disastrous economic plans.

So yeah we know what’s coming next. We know — or at least we damn well should know — that beltway reporters aren’t our friends. We know that they will downplay or ignore Republican scandals while buying and promoting every bad-faith attack on Democrats the GOP can come up with. We have a lot of theories about why they’re like this, but none of that matters. What does matter is having a real strategy to combat these soulless nerds.

There are really two ways to approach this. The first is what you might call the Pete Buttigieg approach. Mayor Pete will go on any show and talk to anyone. He is one of the party’s most effective communicators, and he seems to relish the idea of challenging right-wing beliefs in the places where they live.

There’s a lot to be said for the Pete approach when applied to legacy media. Reporters love access, and they punish candidates like Harris who deny them their self-importance. It makes sense that candidates want to charm or even befriend big name reporters and stroke their massive egos and sense of entitlement. It’s a smart strategy.

But does anyone think for one second this strategy would stop Fox News or Joe Rogan or the New York Times from spending six months pushing Republican attacks and innuendo about Pete’s marriage or military service? Of course not. Not for one second. Again, we know what’s coming.

So that means we need a new strategy. We like to call it Punching Politico.

This strategy starts with the deep and profound knowledge that reporters are neither your friends nor your priest. They are not there to hear your confession or absolve you of your sins. They are there for scoops, clicks and ambition. That is their holy trinity, and anyone who doesn’t understand that should not be working in politics and media in the year 2025.

The first way to get around them is with money. Raise so much dough that you can run ads nonstop and get around the old MSM gatekeepers. This is basically what Mitch McConnell did in Kentucky for years, but it’s less effective in a fractured media environment than it used to be.

The second way around is to explore the new media landscape. Who needs the NYTimes ed board when the MeidasTouch bros are who people are actually listening to? The old gatekeepers don’t control the conversation the way they used to. There are creative ways to still reach voters without kissing the media ring.

But perhaps more than anything, this strategy means going public with the sins of the political press. It means letting Americans know we are up against a corrupt and broken special interest group that no longer cares about its role as government watchdog. If a news organization is caving to Trump but fucking with you, then say that. Put them on defense. If a bigtime beltway reporter is trying to shake down your campaign for an interview by writing negative stories, tell the world. Go on social media, name and shame them. They love it when Trump does this shit, so we’re sure they’ll enjoy it when we do too.

If a reporter wants to shadow or interview your candidate, then do the research. How much has this person tweeted at Elon? How many excuses did they make for Trump? Are they fair? Are they honest? Who do they work for? Who owns their news station or newspaper? Or are they obviously going to twist everything your candidate does and says to make it a scandal or fit some preconceived narrative? If you think it might be a trap, it’s a trap. If they fuck you over, remember it.

This ain’t Walter Cronkite. It’s soulless bean counters writing checks to the Jan. 6 president. The days of trying to impress and win over a corporate media that is busy sending protection money to Trump are over. Any candidate who doesn’t get that, shouldn’t be running.

In recent days, the Wall Street Journal, Politico and the Associated Press have all told us that how Democratic candidates handle Joe Biden’s health is the first “litmus test” of the 2028 campaign. We disagree.

To us the first litmus test of 2028 is seeing which of our candidates has the guts to take on these beltway creeps instead of kissing their asses and throwing their own party under the bus.

Because anyone trying to impress Jake Tapper instead of Democratic voters has already lost, and we need to know that sooner than later.

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